1.Daniel Smith Harris.Steamboat Captain, 1833-1861.2.Captain Thomas Burns.Pilot on the Upper Mississippi River from 1856 to 1889. Inspector of Steamboats under President Cleveland and President McKinley.3.Charles G. Hargus.Chief Clerk on the "Royal Arch," "Golden State," "Fanny Harris," "Kate Cassell" and many other fine steamers on the Upper Mississippi.4.George B. Merrick."Cub" Pilot, 1862.
1.Daniel Smith Harris.Steamboat Captain, 1833-1861.2.Captain Thomas Burns.Pilot on the Upper Mississippi River from 1856 to 1889. Inspector of Steamboats under President Cleveland and President McKinley.3.Charles G. Hargus.Chief Clerk on the "Royal Arch," "Golden State," "Fanny Harris," "Kate Cassell" and many other fine steamers on the Upper Mississippi.4.George B. Merrick."Cub" Pilot, 1862.
1.Daniel Smith Harris.Steamboat Captain, 1833-1861.
2.Captain Thomas Burns.Pilot on the Upper Mississippi River from 1856 to 1889. Inspector of Steamboats under President Cleveland and President McKinley.
3.Charles G. Hargus.Chief Clerk on the "Royal Arch," "Golden State," "Fanny Harris," "Kate Cassell" and many other fine steamers on the Upper Mississippi.
4.George B. Merrick."Cub" Pilot, 1862.
Chapter XIKnowing the River
To "know the river" fully, the pilot must not only know everything which may be seen by the eye, but he must also feel for a great deal of information of the first importance which is not revealed to the eye alone. Where the water warrants it, he reaches for this information with a lead line; as on the lower river, where the water is deeper, and the draft of boats correspondingly great. On the upper river, a twelve-foot pole answers instead. The performance is always one of great interest to the passengers; the results are often of greater interest to the man at the wheel. The manner in which the reports of the leadsman are received and digested by the pilot, is not usually known to or comprehended by the uninitiated. The proceeding is picturesque, and adds one more "feature" to the novelties of the trip. It is always watched with the greatest interest by the tourist, and is apparently always enjoyed by them, whatever the effect upon the pilot; whether he enjoys it or not depends on the circumstances.
Soundings are not always necessarily for the immediate and present purpose of working the boat over any particular bar, at the particular time at which they are taken, although they may be taken for that purpose and no other. In general, during the season of low water, the leads are kept going in all difficult places as much for the purpose of comparison as for the immediate purpose of feeling one's way over the especial reef or bar where the soundings are taken. If it is suspected that a reef is "making down", the pilot wants to satisfy himself on that point, so that he may readjust his marks to meet the changed outlines. If a reef is "dissolving", he also wants to know that, and readjust his marks accordingly—only in the first place, his marks will be set lower down the river; in case of a dissolving reef, his marks will be setfarther upstream, to follow the deep water which is always found close under the reef—that is, on the downstream side. The shallowest water is always on the crest of the reef, and it "tapers" back, upstream, very gradually, for rods—sometimes for half a mile or even more, until another reef is reached, with deep water under it, and another system of shallows above.
This is where the perfection of the pilot's memory machine is demonstrated along another line. He has acquainted himself with every bluff, hill, rock, tree, stump, house, woodpile, and whatever else is to be noted along the banks of the river. He has further added to this fund of information a photographic negative in his mind, showing the shape of all the curves, bends, capes, and points of the river's banks, so that he may shut his eyes, yet see it all, and with such certainty that he can, on a night so perfectly black that the shore line is blotted out, run his boat within fifty feet of the shore and dodge snags, wrecks, overhanging trees, and all other obstacles by running the shape of the river as he knows it to be—not as he can see it. In sounding, he is mentally charting the bottom of the river as he has already charted the surface and its surroundings.
As he approaches the crossing which he wishes to verify, he pulls the rope attached to the tongue of the big bell on the roof, and sounds one stroke, and an instant later two strokes. The captain or mate on watch sings out: "Starboard lead!" "Larboard lead!" and the men detailed for the duty are at their stations in a minute or less after the order is given. Then the cry, first from starboard and then from port, long-drawn and often musical: "No-o-o bottom; no-o-o bottom!" rises from the fo'c'sle, and is repeated by the captain or mate to the pilot. "Mar-r-k twain, mar-r-r-k twain!" indicates soundings the depth of the sounding pole—twelve feet, or two fathoms. This is of no interest to the pilot, for he knew there was "no bottom" and "two fathoms" before the soundings were taken. It is of the highest interest to the passengers, however, to whom the cry of "no bottom" seems a paradox, when the boat has been rubbing the bottom most of the way from Rock Island up. They have not yet been taught that this simply means no bottom with a twelve-foot pole, and does not indicate that the Mississippi is a bottomless stream at this or any other point.
On the upper river, the cry of "ten feet, eight and a half", or even "six feet", does not strike any sensitive spot in the pilot's mental machinery, for upper river men are used to running "where there is a heavy dew". On such occasions he might listen to the latest story, detailed by a visiting comrade, and even take part in the conversation, apparently indifferent to the monotonous cries from the lower deck. But all the time his brain is fitting the leadsman's cries to the marks in which the cries have found his boat—not consciously, perhaps, but nevertheless surely. He has not only fitted the cry into the marks, but has mentally compared the present with the depth of water cried at the same spot last trip, and the trip before that, and noted the change, if any has taken place. Say the leadsman has sung "six feet", "six feet", "six feet", "six feet", "six feet", until you would think there was no other depth but six feet in the river; then in the same tone he sings "five-and-a-half", "six feet", "six feet", "six feet". The pilot is still talking with his visitor, watching his marks and turning his wheel; but he has picked out that "five-and-a-half" and stored it away for future reference, together with all the surroundings of his boat at the instant the call reached his ear—the marks ahead, astern, and on either side. The next trip, as the leadsman sings "six feet", "six feet", "six feet", he will be shocked and grievously disappointed if he does not find his "five-and-a-half" at just that point. And he will not be counting the "six feet" cries, nor, possibly, will he be aware that he is looking for the "five-and-a-half". When he drops into the marks where the "five-and-a-half" found him last week, if he hears only the "six feet", he will be in a similar frame of mind to the man who, coming into town, misses a prominent tree or house, and asks: "Where is that big tree that stood on the corner, when I was here last time"?
The pilot does all this without realizing that he is making any mental effort. When he begins this sort of drill as a "cub", he realizes it fully; and if he is half sharp he will open an account with every shoal place between Rock Island and St. Paul, and set down in writing the soundings on the lowest place on each reef, and try to supply the marks in which his steamer lay when the cry was heard. As he grows in his studies he will rely less on his notebook and more upon his memory, until the mental picture of the bottom of the river becomes as vivid as that of the surface.Then, when his chief asks suddenly: "How much water was there on the middle crossing at Beef Slough last trip"? he can answer promptly: "Four feet on starboard, four feet scant on port".
"How much trip before last?"
"Four feet large, both sides."
"Right, my boy; you're doing well."
If that "cub" doesn't grow an inch in a minute, under these circumstances, he isn't the right kind of boy to have around.
Naturally the boys studied the "nightmares", first of all. If they could get over Cassville, Brownsville, Trempealeau, Rolling-stone, Beef Slough, Prescott, Grey Cloud, and Pig's Eye, they could manage all the rest of the river. But the leads were kept going in fifty other places which, while not so bad, had enough possibilities to warrant the closest watching. The chiefs were making mental notes of all these places, and could tell you the soundings on every crossing where a lead had been cast, as readily as the "cubs" could recite the capital letter readings of Beef Slough and Pig's Eye. The miracle of it was, how they could do this without giving any apparent attention to the matter at the time. They struck the bell, the leadsman sang, the mate or captain repeated the cries mechanically, while the pilot appeared to pay little or no attention to the matter. When he had enough of the music he tapped the bell to lay in the leads, and nothing was said as to the results. Yet if asked at St. Paul by a brother pilot how much water he found on any one of a hundred crossings of average depth, he could tell, without hesitation, just where he found the lowest cast of the lead.
In my experience as a printer I have stood at the case and set up an editorial out of my head (how "able" I will not pretend to say), at the same time keeping up a spirited argument on politics or religion with a visitor. The thinking appeared to be all devoted to the argument; it was probably the talking only. To set the type required no thought at all; that was purely mechanical; and to compose the editorial was the unconscious operation of the mind, accustomed to doing just this sort of thing, until the framing of words into sentences became more or less mechanical. Certainly the mental drill of a river pilot along a very few lines, developed a memory for the things pertaining to his profession which waswonderful, when you sit down and attempt to analyze it. To the men themselves it was not a wonder—it was the merest commonplace. It was among the things which you must acquire before you could pilot a steamboat; and for a consideration they would covenant to teach any boy of average mental ability and common sense all these things, provided always that he had the physical ability to handle a wheel, and provided also, that he demonstrated in time of trial that he had the "nerve" necessary for the business. A timid, cowardly, or doubting person had no business in the pilot house. If it were possible for him to acquire all the rest, and he lacked the nerve to steady him in time of danger, he was promptly dropped out of the business.
I saw this illustrated in the case of a rapids pilot between St. Paul and St. Anthony. We always made this trip when a cargo of flour was offered by the one mill which in that early day represented all there was of that great interest which now dominates the business of Minneapolis. While our pilots were both capable of taking the boat to St. Anthony and back, the underwriters required that we should take a special pilot for the trip—one who made a specialty of that run. On the occasion in point we had taken an unusually heavy cargo, as the river was at a good stage. At that time the channel was very crooked, winding about between reefs of solid rock, with an eight to ten mile current. It required skilful manipulation of the wheel to keep the stern of the boat off the rocks. In going downstream it is comparatively easy to get the bow of a steamer around a crooked place; it is not easy to keep the stern from swinging into danger. In this case the stern of the steamer struck a rock reef with such force as to tear one of the wing rudders out by the roots, in doing which enough noise was made to warrant the belief that half the boat was gone. The special pilot was satisfied that such was the case, and exclaimed: "She is gone!" at the same time letting go the wheel and jumping for the pilot house door. She would have been smashed into kindlings in a minute if she had been left to herself, or had the engines been stopped even for an instant. Fortunately the rapids pilot was so scared by the noise of rending timbers and wheel-buckets that he did not have nerve enough left to ring a bell, and the engineer on watch was not going to stop until a bell was rung, as he knew that the drift of a minute in9798that white water, would pile us up on the next reef below. Fortunately for the "Fanny Harris", Tom Cushing was in the pilot house, as well as myself. When the other man dropped the wheel Cushing jumped for it, and fired an order to me to get hold of the other side of the wheel, and for the next six miles he turned and twisted among the reefs, under a full head of steam, which was necessary to give us steerageway in such a current. We never stopped until we reached St. Paul, where we ran over to the west shore, it being shallow, and beached the boat. When she struck land the captain took the special pilot by the collar and kicked him ashore, at the same time giving him the benefit of the strongest language in use on the river at that time. Beyond the loss of a rudder and some buckets from the wheel, the boat was not seriously damaged, and we continued the voyage to Galena as we were. Had Tom Cushing not been in the pilot house at the time, she would have been a wreck in the rapids a mile or so below St. Anthony Falls. The rapids pilot lost his certificate.
Typical Portion of the Upper Mississippi.Map of the river between Cassville, Wis., and Guttenberg, Iowa, showing the characteristic winding of the stream.
Typical Portion of the Upper Mississippi.Map of the river between Cassville, Wis., and Guttenberg, Iowa, showing the characteristic winding of the stream.
Typical Portion of the Upper Mississippi.Map of the river between Cassville, Wis., and Guttenberg, Iowa, showing the characteristic winding of the stream.
Chapter XIIThe Art of Steering
Every pilot must of necessity be a steersman; but not every steersman is of necessity a pilot. He may be studying to become a pilot, and not yet out of the steersman stage. "Cubs" begin their studies by steering for their chiefs. Many boys become quite expert in handling a boat, under the eyes of their chiefs, before they are sufficiently acquainted with the river to be trusted alone at the wheel for any length of time.
At first thought, one might imagine a number of favorable conditions as prerequisite to the ideal in steering: a straight piece of river, plenty of water, and an average steamboat. These would indeed guarantee leaving a straight wake; but under such conditions a roustabout might accomplish this. The artistic quality is developed in the handling of a boat under the usual conditions—in making the multitudinous crossings, where the jack staff is continually swinging from side to side as the boat is dodging reefs and hunting the best water. In doing this, one man puts his wheel so hard down, and holds it so long, that he finds it necessary to put the wheel to the very opposite to check the swing of the boat and head it back to its proper course, in which evolution he has twice placed his rudder almost squarely across the stern of his boat. If this athletic procedure is persevered in at every change of course, it will materially retard the speed of the steamer and leave a wake full of acute angles, besides giving the steersman an unnecessary amount of work.
The skilled steersman, combining his art with his exact knowledge of the bottom of the river, will give his boat only enough wheel to lay her into her "marks", closely shaving the points of the reefs and bars, and will "meet her" so gradually and so soon as to check the swing of the jack staff at the exact moment whenthe "marks" are reached. There is then no putting the wheel over to bring the boat back, after having overreached her marks, and the rudders have at no time been more than a quarter out of line with the hull of the boat. It is this delicate handling of the wheel, which differentiates between the artist and the athlete.
Steamboats have their individuality, the same as pilots and steersmen. There are boats (or have been), that would almost steer themselves, while there are others so perverse and tricky that no one could feel sure of keeping them in the river for any consecutive two miles. The "Ocean Wave" was, perhaps, the most unreliable and tricky of all the craft on the upper river—or any river. In low water no one man ever thought of standing a watch alone at the wheel, and at times she would run away with two men at the wheel. She was short, "stubby", and narrow; and when she smelt a reef she would, unless very carefully handled, under a slow bell, run away from it, often with one paddle wheel backing while the other was coming ahead, and the rudder standing squarely across the stern. Many times she has plumped into the bank under these conditions, and nothing less than the bank would stop her. The "City Belle", the "Favorite", and the "Frank Steele" were built much like the "Ocean Wave", but were not quite so unreliable in steering. She was in a class by herself. On the other hand, the "Key City", one of the largest, longest, and finest of the up-river packets, was so well-balanced, and her hull so finely moulded, that it was a delight to handle her, even under otherwise unfavorable conditions, such as low water, or high winds.
A stern-wheel boat going downstream when the wind was blowing up the river, was about as helpless a craft to handle as could well be imagined. After she was once "straightened down" she was all right; but in attempting to get her nose pointed down river, after having made a landing, there were more profane possibilities than the uninitiated ever dreamed of. The current, acting on the stern of the boat and the partially-submerged wheel, was all the time pulling that end of the boat downstream; while the wind, acting upon the tall chimneys and the pilot house and "Texas", was at the same time pushing the bow of the boat upstream; and the pilot was all the while endeavoring to reverse this position, and get the bow of his boat pointed in the direction inwhich he wished to go. It sometimes took hours to accomplish this, particularly if caught in places where the river was narrow and correspondingly swift, and the wind strong and contrary. The only way to swing a stern-wheel boat was, to put the steering wheel hard over, throwing the four rudders as far to one side as possible, and then back strongly against them. Under this leverage if there was no wind, the boat would swing easily and promptly, until her head was pointed downstream; and then by coming ahead and gaining steerageway, the boat was under perfect control. But when the wind was blowing upstream, it was often found impracticable to back fast and far enough to gain the necessary momentum to swing her in a narrow place; the engines would have to be stopped before the boat was swung to more than a right angle with the river, and then, before steerageway was gained after coming ahead, the bow of the boat would again be pointing upstream, and the same performance would have to be gone through with—sometimes a dozen or twenty times, before the boat would get under way in the proper direction.
In 1881 I saw Henry Link, after having made a landing at Newport, back the "Mary Morton", of the Diamond Jo Line, more than five miles down the river, she having swung stern-down at that place. He see-sawed back and forth across the stream, first in one direction and then in another, and failed at last to swing his boat against the strong south wind which was blowing. He finally gave it up and ran ashore, and getting out a line to a big tree, backed his craft around until her bow was pointed downstream, and then made a start from a broadside position against the bank. I happened to be a passenger on the boat at the time. His remarks on that occasion were unprintable. A side-wheel boat, under the same conditions, would have backed out into the river, come ahead on one wheel while backing on the other, and in two or three minutes would have been going full speed ahead on the desired course. That is the beauty of the independent side-wheel system. It is a great saving of labor and morality for the steersman, and a great saving of time for the owners.
It would seem that if you could get the bow of your boat clear of the bank, or of an overhanging tree, after pointing in pretty close, that the rest of the boat would follow the bow andlikewise come out, without any undue intimacy with the trees or bank. It takes only one trial to disabuse a beginner of this notion. The balance of the boat does not follow the bow out of such a position; and while every pilot knows the immutable laws of physics which operate upon his boat under such circumstances, most of them, sooner or later, get caught, either through carelessness or recklessness, just as the green cub does through ignorance.
In running downstream, when you point into the bank, and shave it closely, you pull the bow of the boat away, and then there are two forces over which you have no control with your steering wheel: the impetus of the after half of your boat is still in the direction of the bank, after the forward half has begun to swing away; which would also be the case in a perfectly dead lake. In the river, you have the second force in the current which is pressing against the whole of the hull, but more particularly against the after part, and this is pushing the boat in toward the bank after you have pulled her bow away from it. The result is, that while you may clear the bank with the bow of the boat, the stern swings in and gets the punishment.
Because of these two laws of physics, it was almost impossible to run a stern-wheel boat around the sharp bend in Coon Slough, a feat which "Tom" Burns performed several times without stopping a wheel. "Jack" Harris tried it with the big side-wheeler, the "Northern Light", late in the fall, when the anchor ice was running. Her bow got around all right; but her stern swung into the ice which had lodged in the bend, with the result that the whole stern was torn away, and she sank in twenty feet of water. "Ned" West tried a similar experiment at Dayton Bluff, just below St. Paul, with the "Key City". He ran in very close to the rocky shore, under full headway. He got her head out in good shape, but the stern struck the rocks, tearing out the rudder and smashing the deadwood. He worked her back to St. Paul with the wheels alone, and there the damage was repaired. I doubt if he was even reprimanded, for he was the "fastest" pilot on the upper river, as well as one of the best, and getting eight hundred dollars a month for his services. He could get a boat over the course from St. Louis to St. Paul, in less time than any other pilot could take the same boat, and that of coursecarried with it the supposition that he knew the river as well as any man.
I learned the lesson myself through inattention. I was well acquainted with the principle through precept, and had been very careful not to run too near the bank. Coming down from St. Croix Falls with the "H. S. Allen", on reaching the mouth of the Apple River, I saw a school of black bass lying on the white sandy bottom where the Apple River empties into the St. Croix. The inflow from Apple River sets almost squarely across the St. Croix, and when the former is in flood the current sets nearly across the channel. To meet it, it is necessary to point toward the incoming current, to prevent being thrown against the opposite bank. Being an ardent fisherman I was deeply interested in the scores of fine fish plainly distinguishable from the height of the pilot house. The result was inevitable. I neglected to point the bow of the boat sufficiently against the inflow, and she took a sheer for the opposite bank the instant she struck the cross current. I pulled the wheel hard over in an instant, and got the bow clear of the overhanging timber, but the stern went under, and when it came out the "H. S. Allen" lacked two escape pipes and half of the washroom and laundry. The stewardess herself was short about half her senses, and all her temper. The captain had seen the same trick performed by older and better pilots than myself, and was not unduly distressed. It took about one hundred dollars to make the boat presentable. I did not tell about the black bass for some time after the incident occurred—long enough after so that there would be no obvious connection between the fish and the missing laundry.
The man who has once mastered the art of steering a steamboat on Western waters, never loses his love for it. Whatever may have been his occupation after leaving the river, his hands instinctively reach out for the wheel if fortune so favors him as to place the opportunity within his reach. I mean, of course, the man who sees and feels more than the mere turning of the wheel so many hours a day, for so much money to be paid at the completion of his task. It may be work, and hard work, for the enthusiast as well as for the hireling; but with the man who puts his spirit into the task, it is work ennobled by painstaking devotion, and glorified by the realization of work artistically andlovingly done. To such a man there is an exhilaration about the handling of a big steamboat in the crooked channels of the Great River, akin to that felt by the accomplished horseman when guiding a spirited team of roadsters, or that of the engineer, holding the throttle of a great locomotive rushing over the rails at a speed of sixty miles an hour. However long the hands of the horseman or the engineer may have been divorced from reins or throttle, there is the same longing to grasp the one or the other when the opportunity offers. It is a wholly natural craving of the inner being; and however inexplicable it may be, it is there.
For forty years, since leaving the river for other pursuits, often harassing and full of care, I have dreamed, time and again, of holding a wheel on one of the old-time boats on which I served as a boy. In my sleep I have felt again the satisfaction in work well done, the mortification of failure, and have felt again the cares and responsibilities that weighed so heavily when beset with difficulties and dangers. It is all as real as though I again stood at the wheel, doing real work, and achieving real victories over besetting difficulties and dangers. Mere work, as a means of earning a living, would not take such hold upon one's nature. It is the soul of the artist incarnate in the pilot.
Chapter XIIIAn Initiation
I have said that in addition to "knowing the river", and knowing that he knows it, the young pilot must also be fortified with a large measure of self-reliance, or all else will go for nothing. The time of trial comes to every one, sooner or later, and the manner in which it is met usually determines the standing of the young novitiate in the estimation of river men. The reputation of every man on the river is common property the length of his run, from St. Louis to St. Paul. It was proverbial that river men "talked shop" more than any others, in those early days, probably because they were more interested in their own business than they were in that of other men. Possibly because, as one government engineer stated it, they didn't know anything else. However, the doings of all the river men were pretty thoroughly discussed sooner or later, from the latest dare-devil exhibition of fancy piloting by "Ned" West, to the mistakes and mishaps of the youngest "cub". Sooner or later, each and all were served up at the casual meetings of river men, at whatever port they might foregather.
My own "baptism"—not of "fire", but of water and lightning—came on the very first trip I made alone on a steamboat. I had been running with Charley Jewell on the "H. S. Allen", from Prescott to St. Croix Falls. Mr. Jewell fell sick and was laid off at Prescott. On the levee, the day he went home, was a steamboat load of rope, rigging, boats, and camp-equipage, together with a couple of hundred raftsmen landed from a down-river packet that did not care to make the run up the lake. The disembarked men were anxious to reach Stillwater with their cargo, that night. Our regular starting time, as a United States mail boat, was at 7 o'clock in the morning. They offered extra compensation if we would take them up that night, andthe proposition was accepted by Captain Gray. All hands were set to work loading the stuff. I felt quite elated at the prospect, as it was a bright evening, and I felt sure of finding my way, for there were only three or four close places to run in the thirty miles of lake navigation between Prescott and Stillwater.
We got everything aboard, and I backed her out and started up the lake. There had been some lightning in the north, where there was a bank of low-lying clouds. So far away were they, apparently, that no one thought of a storm, certainly not a serious one. We were running toward it, however, and as we soon discovered, it was coming to meet us at a rattling pace. We met when about six miles above Prescott. First a terrific wind out of the north, followed by torrents of rain, and incessant lightning, which took on the appearance of chain-mail as it shimmered and glittered on the falling rain drops. I put up the breast-board, and let down the head-board as far as I could and still leave room between to look out ahead; but the fierce wind drove the rain in sheets into the pilot house, and in a minute's time I was completely soaked. The lightning and thunder were terrifying in brilliancy and in sharpness of sound, the flash and the report coming so closely together as to leave no doubt that the bolts were getting seriously close to the smokestacks. The pilot house was not the place I would have chosen from which to enjoy these effects, had I my choice. The place I really longed for was somewhere down below, where I would have felt less conspicuous as a target.
I managed to work my way around the Kinnickinnic bar, and made the run up to the Afton (or "Catfish") bar, around which the channel was quite narrow and wofully crooked. Thus far, the high banks had sheltered us somewhat from the wind. Here, however, the low-lying prairie came down to the water's edge. The sweep of the wind was terrific, while the downpour of rain was such that at times it was impossible to see any landmarks a hundred feet away. Captain Gray, wrapped in his storm clothes, who had, since the tempest broke, staid on the roof, one eye on the banks, when he could see them, and the other on the young man at the wheel, finally called up and wanted to know if I did not think we had better feel our way ashore and tie up until the storm abated, even at the risk of being late in getting back to Prescott to take up our regular trip in the morning. I wasshivering so that my teeth chattered, and the captain would have been fully justified in assuming that I was shaking as much from fear as from cold. I had a deal of pride in those days, however, and a fair allowance of inherited courage, with perhaps a dash of pig-headedness. I did not wish to have it bulletined from one end of the river to the other that the first time I was left in charge of a steamboat, I had hunted a tree to tie up to because it happened to thunder and rain a little. That would have been the popular version of the incident, in any case. I replied, therefore, that if Captain Gray would send his waiter up with a glass of brandy, I would take the steamer to Hudson levee before taking out a line, and from there to Stillwater and back to Prescott in time for our morning run. The captain said nothing, then or thereafter, but sent his "boy" up with the brandy. This was applied inwardly, and served to take the chill off.
Thus fortified—temperance people will please not be horrified at this depravity of a nineteen-year-old novice, under such extraordinary provocation—I worked around "Catfish" and followed along the west shore as far as Lakeland. From Lakeland across the lake to the Hudson levee, is about three-quarters of a mile. It was still blowing a gale, and the rain came down in torrents, so that the opposite shore could not be seen—in fact one could not distinguish an object ten rods ahead. I had felt my way along, sometimes under the "slow bell", until the present. I must now cut loose from the west shore, and make the crossing to Hudson. There was plenty of water everywhere; but I could not see any landmarks on the opposite side of the lake. I got a stern bearing, however, and headed across. In a minute's time I could see nothing, either ahead or astern, and having no compass I had to rely on the "feel" of the rudders to tell me which way she was swinging. As it turned out, this was of little value, owing to the strength of the wind. For five minutes I ran under full head, and then slowed, trying to get a glimpse of the east bank, and "find myself". When I did, the "H. S. Allen" was headed squarely down the lake, and fully a mile below the Hudson landing. The force of the wind on the chimneys had turned her bow down-wind and downstream. As the rain began to slacken and I could see my marks, it took but a few minutes to straighten her up and make the run to the landing.
On leaving Hudson there were two ways of running the big bar opposite and below the mouth of Willow River. One, the longest, was to cross back to Lakeland and then run up the west shore—all of it straight work. The other, was to run squarely out into the middle of the lake, turn north and run half a mile, then quartering west-north-west across the lake to the opposite shore. This crossing saved a mile or more of steaming over the other course; but it was crooked and narrow, and the possibility of hanging up was much greater. Captain Gray asked me, when backing out, which crossing I would make. I replied that I was going to take the upper to save time. He said nothing, but again took his place by the bell. He made no suggestion, nor offered any opinion as to my decision. That was a part of the river etiquette, which he adhered to even in the case of a boy; for which I sincerely thanked him in my inner being, while accepting it outwardly quite as a matter of course—which it would have been, with an older and more experienced man at the wheel.
I made the crossing without calling for leads, or touching bottom, and the rest of the way was easy. When we made Stillwater the stars were out, and the storm-clouds hung low on the southern horizon. I went below and got into dry clothes, and had a few hours sleep while the freight was being put ashore. Along about two o'clock in the morning I started back, with the mate on the roof. In confidence he confided to me the gratifying news that the "old man says you're all right. He says that you've got nerve enough to last you through". As "nerve" was one of the things needed in the business, I was certainly proud that my night's work, alone on a heavily-loaded boat, in one of the worst of storms, had given me a standing with the "old man"; and I felt reasonably certain that his report would carry weight among the river men who might chance to discuss the merits of the young "cub", and his equipment for serious work.
I may, I hope, be pardoned for dwelling at such length upon an incident of such common occurrence on the river as to attract little or no attention when the man at the wheel was an old and experienced pilot. But this was my "trying-out" time, which made a difference. Even if no one else ever gave the incident asecond thought, I should have felt the shame of it to this day, had I "craw-fished" on that first trial.
I have never seen or heard anything to compare with the storms we used to have on the river. The river men had a theory of their own—not very scientific, and probably without foundation in fact—that the vapors from the lowlands and islands formed clouds which were more than ordinarily charged with electricity.Whythey should be more highly charged than vapors arising from lowlands or islands elsewhere, they did not attempt to explain, and could not had they attempted. The fact remains, that our thunder storms were something out of the ordinary, and were so regarded by people from the East who experienced them for the first time. Many steamboats were struck by lightning, but few were burned, the electrical bolt being diffused through the iron of the boilers and machinery, and finding ready escape through the water-wheel shafts into the river. I have heard it stated that engineers have often received serious shocks from bolts thus passing from the chimneys to the water, by way of the machinery, but I never heard of one being killed. I do know that when these pyrotechnics were going on, the engineers kept their hands off the throttle-wheel, except in cases of dire necessity. The pilot was seemingly in more, but really less danger than the engineers. However, under such circumstances, a man had to hang on to his nerve as well as his wheel; and I doubt if many pilots ever became so hardened as not to feel "creepy" when the storm was on.
Chapter XIVEarly Pilots
"How did the first steamboats find their way up the hundreds of miles of water heretofore unbroken by steam-driven wheel?" No voice out of the past will give an answer to this query. The imagination of the trained pilot, however, needs no written page to solve the problem of how it might have been done; and he can picture to himself the satisfaction, akin to joy, of the man at the wheel, picking his way amid the thousand islands and snag-infested channels innumerable, guided only by his power to read the face of the water, and his knowledge of the basic principles that govern the flow of all great rivers. Standing thus at his wheel, with new vistas of stream and wood and bluff opening to him as he rounded each successive bend, choosing on the instant the path as yet uncharted; unhampered by time-honored "landmarks", with "all the world to choose from", none might be so envied as he. But we will never know who had this pleasure all his own.
In thus picturing the passage of pioneer steamboats up the Mississippi, there is danger that we may inject into the scene the image of the modern floating palace, with her three decks, her tall chimneys, her massive side-wheels, her "Texas", and her pilot house, fully equipped with spars, gang planks, jack staff, and all the paraphernalia of the beautiful and speedy "packets" of our day. Upon no such craft, however, did the early navigators pick their way into the solitudes of the upper river. Their boats were little better than the keel boats which they superseded—in fact they were keel boats operated by steam. The cargo-box afforded shelter for passengers, merchandise, and machinery. There was no pilot house in which to stand, fifty feet above the water, from that height to study the river bottom. The steersman stood atthe stern, and manipulated his tiller by main strength and awkwardness, while the captain stood at the bow and studied the river, and gave his orders to "port" or "starboard", as the case required. As the boat drew less than three feet of water, the necessity for fine judgment in choosing the channel was not as necessary as in guiding a craft drawing twice as much. Nevertheless, it did call for judgment and decision; and these qualities were inherent in the men who made the navigation of Western waters their occupation in the early decades of the nineteenth century.
Long years before the advent of steam, the fur-traders of the upper river were running their heavily-laden canoes, bateaux, and Mackinac boats from St. Anthony Falls to Prairie du Chien, and thence up the Wisconsin and down the Fox to Green Bay and Mackinac; or, farther down the Mississippi to St. Louis. To guide these boats, with their valuable cargoes of peltries, pilots were as necessary as on the larger craft that later were to supersede them. A man standing in the stern, with ready paddle in hand, was the forerunner of the pilot of civilization. In his veins the blood of sunny France mingled with that of a tawny mother from Huron, Chippewa, or Dakota wigwams. His eye was quick to read the dimpling waters, and his arm strong to turn the prow of his craft aside from threatening snag or sand-bar.
The transition from bateaux paddle and sweep to the steamboat wheel was not great, and it followed that the names of the earliest recorded members of the profession are such as to leave no room for doubt as to nationality or pedigree. Louis DeMarah heads the list of upper Mississippi River pilots who handled steamboats prior to 1836. There were steamers running between St. Louis and Fort Snelling from the year 1823, with more or less regularity. The "Virginia" (Captain Crawford) was the first steamboat to reach Fort Snelling, May 10, 1823. While we have the name of the captain, we have no mention of her pilots and engineers. It is probable that the master did his own piloting. Nearly all historical references to the early navigation of the upper Mississippi or Missouri Rivers speak of the master as also the pilot of his craft. Occasionally, however, we read of a pilot, but do not learn his name, his office being his only individuality.
Lumbering operations had already begun on the Black, Chippewa, and St. Croix Rivers prior to 1836, and pilots were in demand to run the timber rafts down the river. No doubt DeMarah began his professional life in this trade, if not in the earlier life of thevoyageur. He is mentioned as being an old man in 1843, his home being then in Prairie du Chien, where, in the census of Crawford County, in the new Territory of Wisconsin, he is listed with a family of eight—probably a Chippewa wife and seven "breeds" of varying attenuations. With the phonetic freedom exercised by our forefathers, his name appears as Louis "Demerer".
In connection with DeMarah's name there is associated in the earliest annals of the river that of Louis Moro (or Morrow), evidently a corruption of Moreau, a name not appearing on the census roll of Crawford County. Evidently aprotégéof DeMarah's, he probably was taught the science of piloting by the elder man, as the names are nearly always spoken of in connection. Evidently they were partners, so far as that was possible in the days when steamboats took but one pilot, running only by day, and lying at the bank at night. Captain Russell Blakeley, who began life on the river in the early '40's, speaks of these men as the first who engaged in steamboat piloting as a business.
It may only be an accidental coincidence of names, and yet it is more than possible that Louis Moreau, of Prairie du Chien in 1836, was a descendant of the Pierre Moreau, the notedcourier du bois, and adventurous trader who befriended Father Marquette, patron saint of Wisconsin, as he lay sick, slowly dying, in his squalid hut on the portage between the Chicago River and the Des Plaines, one hundred and fifty years earlier, as recorded in the pages of Parkman'sLa Salle and the Discovery of the Great West.
Another of the earliest pilots was Pleasant Cormack, also a Frenchman with possibly a slight dash of Indian blood in his composition. He is in the records as an intelligent, trustworthy pilot, and held the wheels of many of the largest and finest of upper river boats during the flush times between 1850 and 1862.
DeMarah and Moreau were so far ahead of my generation on the river, that I never saw either of them. My own acquaintance with the half-breed pilot of tradition, was confined to the person of Joe Guardapie, a St. Croix and Mississippi River raftsman.He filled the bill completely, however, and having seen and known him the type was fully identified. A lithe savage, about five feet ten inches in height, and a hundred and sixty-five or seventy pounds in weight, his color exhibited more of the traits of his Chippewa mother than of his French father. In facial expression, however, the mercurial disposition of his father's kindred supplanted the stolidity of his Indian forbears. As quick as a panther, and as strong in nerve and sinew, he could whip any member of his crew, single-handed. In case of necessity he could put to rout a dozen of them—else he could not have run a raft to St. Louis; in fact, had it been otherwise he could not have started a raft from the landing at Prescott. Several times he made the return trip from below on our boat, taking cabin passage while his crew went "deck passage". He loafed in the pilot house most of the time on the up trip, as was the custom of the craft, and occasionally took a trick at the wheel to relieve the regular pilots. I never heard of his doing regular steamboat work, however, his tastes and education tying him to rafting.
It was interesting to listen to his broken English, freely mingled with borderland French, the whole seasoned with unmistakable Anglo-Saxon profanity. It is curious to note that the untutored Indian has no profanity at all; and that of the Frenchman is of such mild-mannered texture as to be quite innocuous. Any one acquainted with modern polite literature must have observed that the French brand of profanity is used to flavor popular novels treating of life in high society, and themon Dieusandsacresare not considered at all harmful reading, even for boarding school misses. It follows that the Frenchman who wishes to lay any emphasis upon his orders to a mixed crew of all nationalities—English, Irish, Dutch, Yankee, and Norwegian, with a sprinkling of French and Indian, must resort to Anglo-Saxon for effective expressions. And even this must often be backed with a ready fist or a heavy boot, properly to impress the fellow to whom it is directed. Joe Guardapie had the whole arsenal with him, all the time, largely accounting, I fancy, for his success as a raft pilot.
Another old-time raftsman was Sandy McPhail. He piloted log and lumber rafts from the Chippewa to Prairie du Chien, and further down, in the days when Jefferson Davis, as a lieutenant in the regular army, was a member of the garrison at Fort Crawford.Whether "Sandy" was the name conferred upon him at the baptismal font, or gratuitously bestowed by an appreciative following on account of the color of his hair and beard, which were unmistakably red, will never be known. He certainly had no other name on the river. He was a good pilot, and a great handler of men, as well, which made him a model raftsman. He never took to the milder lines of steamboat piloting, so far as there is any record to be found.
Still another was Charles LaPointe, who ran rafts from the Chippewa to lower river ports prior to 1845—how much earlier, it is now impossible to learn. He also was of the typical French half-breedvoyageurpioneers of the West, and handed down a record as a competent navigator of rafts on the river when it was almost unknown and entirely undeveloped.
When I was pantry boy on the "Kate Cassell", my first venture aboard, we had a pilot picked up "above the lake", when we started out in the spring, a raftsman named McCoy—J. B., I think he signed himself. He was from Stillwater, and made but few trips on the steamer before taking up his regular work in rafting. A Scotchman, very quiet and reserved, so far as his deportment went while on the "Kate Cassell", he had, nevertheless, the reputation of being exceedingly handy with his fists when on his native sawlogs. This reputation led to an impromptu prize fight, which was "pulled off" at a woodyard near Hastings, Minnesota. A St. Louis bruiser named Parker, who had fought several battles on Bloody Island, opposite that city, was on board. Having heard of McCoy's reputation as a fighter, he lost no opportunity to banter and insult him, especially when he (Parker) was in liquor, which was most of the time. This lasted for several days, from Galena to Hastings, where it reached a climax. McCoy told him he would settle it with him at the next woodpile, so that they might not go into St. Paul with the question in doubt. When the woodpile was reached the officers of the boat, with most of the passengers, and as many of the crew as could abandon their posts, adjourned to the woods a few rods from the landing. A ring was roped off, seconds were chosen, and bottle-holders and sponge-bearers detailed. The men stripped to their trousers and went in. There was not as much science exhibited, probably, as in some of our modern professional "mills", but there was plentyof good, honest slugging. Both men were well punished, especially about the head and face. So equally were they matched, that neither suffered a knock-out, and when the bell struck for starting they had to quit without either getting the decision. This happened in the days when the Heenan-Sayre international bout was one of the prime topics of public interest, and it was noticeable that any number of our men were well enough posted in the rules of the P. R. to serve as officials in all departments. McCoy lost no caste among crew or passengers on account of this incident. There were neither kid gloves nor silk stockings among the pioneers who were pushing into Minnesota in 1856, and an incident of this sort was diverting rather than deplorable.
Other pilots whose names appear very early in the annals of steamboating on the upper river, and whose fame as masters of the art will ever remain green among members of the craft so long as pilots turn a wheel on the river, were William White, Sam Harlow, Rufus Williams, George Nichols, Alex. Gody, and Hugh White, all of whom appear to have been in service in 1850 or before. These were followed by John Arnold, Joseph Armstrong, John King, Rufus Williams, Edward A. West, E. V. Holcomb, Hiram Beadle, William Cupp, Jerome Smith, William Fisher, Stephen Dalton, Jackson Harris, Henry Gilpatrick, James Black, Thomas Burns, T. G. Dreming, Harry Tripp, William Tibbles, Seth Moore, Stephen Hanks, Charley Manning, Thomas Cushing, Peter Hall, and fifty others equally as good. All of those named, served in the Minnesota Packet Company in the days of its prosperity, some of them for many years. All were experts in their profession, and some of them, as "Ned" West and John King, were entitled to the highest encomium known on the river—that of being "lightning pilots".