Ocean Ships at Owen Sound: Schooner Days MXXIX (1029)

by C. H. J. Snider

ALMOST the last letter written by Capt. James B. Foote, of the Foote Transit Company Limited, who died this summer at his home in Toronto, was this comment for Schooner Days on Owen Sound harbor pictures of 65 years before. Small as was the reproduction of the picture by photographer Holmes which Mr. L. C. Julien sent with his lively reminiscences, Capt. Foote, one of the best informed navigation men in this country, had no difficulty in identifying the vessels shown. His comments carried so much freshness of recollection and information that we feel impelled to pass them on, in tribute to the memory of a valued friend. He wrote:

"The picture of Owen Sound harbor greatly interests me as it is a reminder of the days of my youth where I played about that water-front. Picture is that of the harbor looking south and well up the Sydenham River towards the old swing bridge that never swung, and was eventually replaced by a concrete structure. The photograph was taken perhaps about the spring of the year 1885, or a year or two after that date.

THE CAMPANA

"Referring to the steamers themselves, the one on the left forefront of the picture is that of the Campana, an iron twin screw steamer of special design, built in England and registered in London. I understand she was built to carry cattle from South America to Britain and was originally named the 'North.'

"Apparently the overseas cattle trade did not develop and the ship was brought to Canada by Smith & Keighley, wholesale grocers and businessmen of Front st. east, Toronto, and sent on up to Owen Sound where she arrived, as I recall, under the command of Captain Kennedy, late in the fall of the year 1882.

"That winter the passenger cabin accommodation shown in the photograph was installed, and the ship thereafter was employed for some years trading from Owen Sound and Collingwood to Port Arthur and Duluth. Captain Edward Anderson was in command of her for a year or two, but subsequently transferred to the command of the Canadian Pacific Railway steamer Alberta in the spring of 1884, when she came as a new ship on the lakes. She was built at Whiteinch on the Clyde in 1883.

"Some few years later, perhaps in the early nineties, the Campana was transferred to carry passengers and cargo between Kingston, Ont., and Chicago. Again she was later sold to a shipping firm for employment between Charlottetown, P.E.I., and Quebec, and I believe she was eventually lost on the Gaspe Coast about the year 1900.

"Immediately ahead of the Campana would appear to be the small steambarge Kincardine engaged in the lumber trade of that day in the Georgian Bay area; and though the outline of the picture is dim, it could be that the government fisheries cruiser lies just ahead of her with the side wheel Steamer Cambria well ahead upstream.

BAYFIELD'S COMMANDER

"On the right front of the picture and the west side of the Sydenham River, the government hydrographic steamer Bayfield is moored next to the dock; while in commission as the Bayfield, she was in command of Commander J. G. Boulton, R.N., with Captain Murray McGregor of Clinton, Ontario, as sailing master, and John Nesbit of Owen Sound was her chief engineer. At a later date she was bought and operated for some years by the Harrison firm as a towing tug, and I believe eventually broken up.

METEOR WAS ERINDALE

"Alongside of the Bayfield, the two-stacked sidewheeler, is the towing tug "Meteor" at that time employed in towing logs for the Cooks of Serpent River. She was later made over into a small passenger steamer and named "City of Owen Sound." Still at a later date she was known as the "Erindale" and ran out of Toronto for a time; but was eventually burned at some port on the north shore of Lake Ontario.

"Immediately astern of the Bayfield and Meteor, is what I believe to be the sidewheel steamer "Carmona" (nee Manitoba). She in company with the Cambria, for some four or five years in the late eighties, maintained a sailing schedule carrying passengers and cargo, between Owen Sound and Sault Ste. Marie, and intermediate ports of call.

"Upstream and not discernible in the picture it might well be that the cargo steamer Scotia, and the small passenger steamer "W. M. Alderson" were still at their winter moorings.

"Photographer Holmes in this picture takes no account of the lower harbour, where if they had arrived for the C. P. Railway service, the ships Alberta, Athabasca and Algoma would be moored on the east side of the river and north of the "Campana."

Owen Sound Harbor, Steamer Filled, Analyzed by the Late Captain J. B. Foote