Once 19 Schooners Hailed From Here: Schooner Days DCCLVII (757)

by C. H. J. Snider

WITH the assistance of the invaluable Capt. Jas. Van Cleve's memoir of lake shipping and odds and ends of information picked up on the south shore of Lake Ontario, a fairly complete list of the vessels belonging to the now deserted harbor of Wilson, N.Y., is here presented.

Capt. Van Cleve's principal source of information was Reuben F. Wilson, of the shipowning, lakefaring family which gave a name to the place formerly known merely as Twelve Mile Creek, because it was twelve miles east of Niagara. Port Dalhousie, twelve miles west of Niagara, was also known as Twelve-mile Creek until the Welland Canal came through and inaugurated the undying dispute between DalHOWsie and DalOOsie protagonists on pronunciation.

Seemingly the first vessel built in Wilson was named the Wilson, owned by Wilson and sailed by Wilson. Here is the list as far as we have been able to arrange it chronologically. They were all schooners but one vessel, a scow, and nearly all were two-masted, or what are called on the lakes fore-and-afters:

FIRST IN 'FORTY SIX

1. R. F. WILSON, built 1846, Luther Wilson, owner; 63 tons, first captain, Luther Wilson.

2. NIAGARA, built 1847, Luther Wilson, owner; 105 tons; first captain, Dennis Grofs.

CANADA ENTERS PICTURE

3. EMBLEM, built 1848, Morgan Johnson and Joseph Johnson, owners; 8,000 bushels capacity; first captain, John Kelley, This information was given to Capt. Van Cleve by R. F. Wilson in 1877, or a little earlier.

The Emblem became Canadian early in her long life, for when the flaming cabin of the steamer Ocean Wave of Oswego lighted up the night sky off the False Ducks after midnight on the 30th of April, 1853, it was the schooner Emblem, Capt, Belyea, of Bronte, and the schooner Georgina, Capt. Henderson, of Port Dover, that rescued the survivors from the icy lake, and the Emblem took them all to Kingston. Twenty-eight persons perished in this tragedy, thirteen passengers and fifteen of the crew, and the fire shone so brightly that farmers on Point Traverse were wakened in their beds by the reflection.

The Emblem was owned in 1864 by Bennett & Chisholm, of Brighton, and was then known as the Olivia, having been rebuilt in 1855. In that year she had been run down by the steamer America of the Great Western line, and five of her crew were drowned. The renaming probably followed the rebuild, and perhaps commemorated Olivia Hicks, a Prince Edward County girl. At one time the vessel was owned in Napanee, and as already told, the old name "Emblem of Napanee" appeared under her fading paint when she lay in Picton harbor after being bought by Alva Rose, although she had then been known as the Olivia for many years. Her bones lie in the marsh at Picton. The old lake register gives "Bronta" as her birthplace, and "Littles" as her builder. The builder may have been Savillon L. Little, and Wilson her birthplace, unless she was bought for that port, or she may have been built by Wm. Little, the itinerant builder who built the large "barque" Allies at Oshawa in 1855 on Crimean War money.

SWEET TO THE SWEETS

4. FORREST, built 1848, Ira Sweet and Roswell Sweet, owners; 20 tons: first captain, Ira Sweet.

5. ALMIRA, built 1849, Ira Sweet and Roswell Sweet, owners; 59 tons; first captain, Theron Elton. Thomas' Register of 1864 gives the Almira 38 tons and 1858 as her building year, suggesting that she was rebuilt then. M. Connor, J. Ryan and J. Leary, all of Wilson, were her owners in 1864, and she was incurable for $1,000.

The Almira appears on the books of the old Port Whitby harbor company as paying "export tolls" on 105 cords of wood in 1855, a pretty good load for her tonnage. The date is three years before her building date in the register, which requires explanation. Perhaps the Almira was an older vessel, rebuilt at Wilson in 1858, or perhaps there were two Almiras. She appears again on the Port Whitby books in 1861, charged 60 cents "export tolls" on two masts. The spars may have been new ones for herself in a refit or intended for some schooner being outfitted at Wilson. Anyway, the Port Whitby harbor company, which never missed a chance, collected for them.

6. ENTERPRISE, built 1850, Luther Wilson, owner; 5,500 bushels capacity: first captain, Luke Dumply or Dunphy.

In Thomas' Register appears schooner Enterprise, 116 tons, built by Littles in 1854, repaired in 1861, and bought by John Stanton and Co., of Picton, by 1864. Another Enterprise of 118 tons, and distinguished by a round stern, was built by Wm. Manson in Port Hope, in 1855, and owned by Hargraft and Butler, Cobourg. One or other of them was wrecked at Wellington. Her anchor, recovered a few years ago, is a tourist attraction on the beach.

Capt. Luke Dumply or Dunphy, as the name variously appears, sounds cheerful, but the name of a vessel he once commanded was blamed by one of the old-timers for a schooner's bad luck.

WHAT'S IN A NAME?

Capt. Van Cleve left this curious note: "In December, 1855, the schooner Frank Pierce, Capt. Luke Dunphy, got ashore on Braddock's Point when laden with merchandise for Hamilton. She was got off in the following spring, but again got ashore at Port Credit in 1857 when loaded with pig iron. The owner, Wm. H. Doyle of Youngstown, attributed her bad luck to her name, but she is still going in the lumber trade on the Upper Lakes." This was written in 1877.

BUFFALO "BARQUE"

7. GERALDINE, built 1851, Luther Wilson, owner; 18,500 bushels capacity; first captain, Robert Hall. The Geraldine was a barquentine, three-masted, built by Little at Wilson in 1856, according to Thomas' Register. She measured 303 tons and was owned by W. H. Ingram, of Buffalo, in 1864, and was valued at $7,000.

8. ST. JOSEPH, 75 tons, built by Dupree at Wilson, in 1852, for Sterling and Co., of Monroe, Mich. She was intended as a river scow, and was repaired in 1861. Perhaps she was able to negotiate the creek as far as the village, which is a mile and a half from the lake. Mr. Wilson did not mention her in his list.

9. MARY, 80 tons, built by L. Littles in 1852 for J. A. Acton, St. Catharines, who owned her in 1864. There was more than one Mary in the lake list, the beautiful name being as common on water as on land. This one was wrecked a long time before the better known Mary of Napanee which carried "Young Andy" Baird to a watery grave off Oswego in 1907. Mr. Wilson did not include her in his list.

PORT'S BEST

10. JOSEPHINE, built 1854, Reuben F. Wilson, owner; 380 tons register, 18,500 bushels capacity; first captain, I. H. Crouch. In 1864 she was owned by F. Pryme, of Wilson. From her tonnage she appears to have been the port's most ambitious craft. She probably was a three-master like the Geraldine and possibly the Belle Adkins. The "18,500-bushel capacity" was the maximum the Welland Canal could then accommodate on nine-foot draft. The Josephine was insurable for $7,500 when ten years old.

11. BELLE ADKINS, built 1856, D. C. Abby, owner; 18,500 bushels capacity; first captain, Dick Daniels. Apparently lost early as she does not appear in the 1864 register.

12. ACTIVE, built 1862, Ira Sweet and Roswell Sweet, owners; 67 tons; first captain, George Morl. (The Active was enlarged to 87 tons in 1863.)

13. METEOR, built 1863, Orrin Quick, owner; 85 tons; first captain, Orrin Quick. In Thomas' Register her building date is given as 1856. She passed to the Canadian register and was owned by D. Palmatier, Prince Edward County, in 1864, and then sailed from Montreal, as did many lake vessels. She was owned in Brighton, Ont., for many years. Wm. Quick, father of Orrin, was a wharf-owner and shipbuilder there, with warehouses in Presqu'isle bay.

OUR FENIAN FIGHTER

14. EUREKA, built 1863, Savillon L. Little, owner; 9,000 bushels capacity; first captain, Savillon L. Little. Thomas' Register gives Schooner Eureka, 216 tons, built by L. Littles, 1858, five years earlier, owned by Caleb Giles and Sylvester Bros., in Toronto in 1864, and fitted out as a cruiser by Capt. McMaster in the Fenian Raid troubles and manned by a Toronto Volunteer Naval Brigade.

She was not under fire as a Fenian fighter, and the volunteers who put their time and money into manning her were defenders of Canada who got less credit than they deserved. The Volunteer Naval Brigade converted the steamers Rescue and Magnet into gunboats, and was complimented by Col. W. S. Durie, himself a sailor, and the Major-General commanding the troops engaged.

FATAL FLEETWING

15. FLEET WING, built 1863; John V. Pease, Benjamin Dearborn and Orrin Quick, owners; 127 tons; first captain, Orrin Quick. (The Fleet Wing was enlarged in 1866 to 180 tons.) She, too, was owned in Brighton, Ont., for most of her life, although she voyaged all over the lakes. She, had a tragic history, drowning her captain's wife and child and cook on an early voyage, when she capsized and, years later, losing "Let" McCrimmon, of Prince Edward County from her mainboom, while getting under weigh off Snake Island, near Kingston, in tne aarxness of a cold April morning. The remnants of the Fleet Wing are visible at Port Milford in Prince Edward County. When on her "last legs," in 1906, the Fleet Wing was just able to make Toronto harbor with a very frightened green crew and much water in her hold. She died soon afterwards. Capt. Malcolm Shaw succeeded Capt. Quick in her after the capsize and sailed her for many years. She carried cribstone for the new Eastern Gap in Toronto in 1891.

ANOTHER CANADIAN

16. PILOT, built 1866; Roswell H. Sweet, owner; 37 tons; first captain, Roswell H. Sweet. She long hailed from Pultneyville, N.Y., and later from Kingston, Ont.

17. Scow LIVE OAK, built 1868, Henry Putnam, owner; 2,800 bushels capacity; first captain, Henry Putnam.

18. Schooner PLOW BOY, built 1875, Roswell H. Sweet,, owner; 41 tons; first captain, Roswell H. Sweet.

19. TRADER, built 1875, Wm. L. Ackerman, owner; 10 tons; first captain, W. L. Ackerman.

20. UNION, built 1875, Wm. L. Ackerman, owner; 25 tons.

And now there is nothing left of this port where the caulking mallets clinked on nineteen wooden hulls but the hole in the bank where it once was.

Perhaps the last sailer out of Wilson was the Toronto schooner Snow Bird, which came to an icy end in Toronto Bay in the winter of 1904. Excursion steamers ran there for a few years longer. Lighthouse, piers, harbor entrance, wharves and warehouses are all gone. Canoes, fishboats, and launches of summer cottagers can still creep into the creek mouth, and the good folk of the bright village a mile and a half up the river have hopes that Uncle Sam or New York State will restore the vanished harbor works, to develop tourist trade.

PRESENT DAY PORT OF WILSON, N.Y., where once were piers, lighthouse, dredged channel, wharves, warehouse, and fleet of nineteen schooners, besides excursion steamers calling daily. The shipyard where the schooners were built was to the left of the picture, in the creek mouth which now shelters only launches and summer cottages. Wilson is about forty miles southeast of Toronto. It is twelve miles east of Niagara. You can still pick it out from the lake by a high water tank a few miles inshore. It is not far from the lively little yacht port of Olcott - but the Olcott water tank, six miles along, is painted lighter than the Wilson one, and is closer to its harbor.