Treasure Trove and Turkey Trail: Schooner Days CMXXXVIII (938)

by C. H. J. Snider

More Passing Hails

THAT DYNAMITE hulk in Great Sodus harbor with the dubious name like EUGIE remains unidentified by readers, but we'll get her yet. The three-master, with her ribs showing, has been pinned to the board by several. Capt. Kirk, who submitted it, has such good eyesight that he can identify Capt. Dan Rooney and his first mate, Onnie Marks, on the scow alongside.

But staying with the Turkey Trail for a moment, D. A. Stevenson, R.R. 1, Ridgeville, Ont., adds: "When I identified 'The Current' I didn't know that it was my first cousin's card photo, Grant Turner's, that was printed. . . . He will be amused . . . I have crossed in the '90s from Massey, across the North Channel ice, to the Current, in a-closed-in canvas covered stage, with a wee stove at the front end, the route marked by small spruce trees in the ice. Teams sometimes went through and drowned, but passengers got out, wet and COLD, 20 to 30 below!"

Ralph A. Black, 83 Forty-third street, Toronto 14—sounds like New York—wants to know if Schooner Days has been compiled in a book. Not yet, but soon.

Sir—My answer to Walter F. Kirk's submission in last week's Telegram is the schooner is the Charlie Marshall, and the place is Cobourg.

CAPT. H. REDFEARN,

from Old Cat Hollow, at

present at Stoney Creek.

Right both times, captain.

Hector Mayes, formerly of Port Hope, 184 Glenholme ave., Toronto, spotted Cobourg in this picture by the old freight warehouse, but did not recognize the schooner, because her bulwarks had been torn out while the stanchions were being renewed.

Margaret L. Rogers, writing from the Ford Hotel, guessed: "The port is lovely Cobourg. The schooner is Sophia J. Luff."

Pretty close, for Capt. Dan Rooney, who owned and sailed the Charlie Marshall, also sailed the Sophia J. Luff, and at the same time — an unprecedented feat. While the Marshall was unloading in Cobourg he would speed by train to Oswego where the Luff was already loaded, and sail her across to Kingston, and then take the train to Cobourg to take the empty Marshall down the lake for her next load.

Edgar P. Jewell, 8th avenue, Woodbridge, says: "I would say it was the schooner John Magee, and the captain was Capt. Beaupre, of Kingston or Portsmouth, Ont., early in the 20th century. As I remember, the schooner she carried coal from Oswego to Gananoque."

Yes, but the John Magee's mainmast had been lifted out at that time, had it not?

GOOD BROTHER

Gordon Youell Emery writes politely from Vancouver to correct a detail in the "Launch at Port Burwell" story. "William Youell was never married. He was very kind to the children of his deceased brother, George. Clara Youell's mother, George's widow, lived until all five children were in their late teens and twenties." Thank you, Mr. Emery. Your name recalls the schooner W. Y. Emery of Port Burwell, well known here sixty years ago.

TREASURE UNTROVE

Sir,—I would greatly appreciate any assistance you could give me with regard to the following queries. I have been following your series Schooner Days, and wonder if any of the boats were salvaged for cargo or not. Secondly, was any salvage done on the boats "Dean Richmond" on Lake Huron, "City of Detroit" and "R. G. Coburn" in Lake Erie, if not, any reason for same.

—F. BUTCHER, 449 Ontario st.

Many of the vessels lost by stranding were salvaged for cargo, as were some that foundered, but in general the depths of the Great Lakes make diving operations off shore impossible. The coldness of the water is another factor. There is said to be a million dollars worth of coal waiting to be mined from sunken hulls in the lakes. My understanding is that the Dean Richmond foundered between Dunkirk and Erie, on the south shore of Lake Erie, not Huron, and that the Murphy Wrecking Co. of Buffalo spent a season searching for her with divers, but found no trace of her or her $50,000 cargo of spelter, or zinc in pigs. The City of Detroit, with a $50,000 cargo of copper, and the R. G. Coburn, lost with another copper cargo in 1871 when she drowned a crew of thirty, are, as far as is known, both at the bottom of Saginaw Bay. This, like Lake Erie, is comparatively shoal water, and it is surprising that the wrecks have not been located. They may have sanded over quickly, but radar might find them.

Sorry to have kept you waiting.

—Compiler, Schooner Days.

VETERAN OF THE TURKEY TRAIL

This is the North Channel steamer E. K. ROBERTS, about 1900 renamed CITY OF WINDSOR, which Capt. J. L. Baxter sailed before he commanded the MANITOU. He had the Algoma mail route between Gore Bay and Cutler, and when the ice was new in the fall he used three light sleighs and dog teams; when it became heavy he used the heavy stagecoach on runners. In the spring he would return to the Turkey Trail, as the Manitoulin run was called, with his steamer. Turkeys, potatoes and politics used to be the Manitoulin's principal exports. Capt. Baxter and the City of Windsor both came to Lake Ontario, though at different times. The captain was well known in Toronto for his gentlemanly handling of the R.C.Y.C. launches Kwasind and Hiawatha. He was with the yacht club for several seasons before his death.