Ripple's Fresh Start: Schooner Days 1153 (MCLIII)

by C. H. J. Snider

Toronto-Manitoulin, 1868 - 2

SCHOONERS have figured in the Royal Canadian Yacht Club fleet from the beginning. Dr. E. M. Hodder, early commodore, had the schooner yacht Cherokee a hundred years ago. She was about 35 feet long and 10 feet beam, and was in the founders' fleet in 1852. A later schooner was the Ripple, built in 1865 for young Edward Blake, who became the Hon. Edwald Blake, Q.C., one of the great guns in law and politics. The large timber schooner Edward Blake, built at Port Burwell, was named after him. She was, of course, bigger than the Ripple, twenty times over. As a lad of 16 Aemilius Jarvis sailed before the mast in her in a voyage with square timber to London, in 1876. She went to South America from England, before coming back to the lakes.

The Blakes' Ripple was little larger than Commodore Hodder's Cherokee. She won the great club trophy, the Prince of Wales Cup, in 1866 and 1867, in long races to Port Dalhousie and back and to Port Credit and back. There is question as to the outcome of the race of 1867. From the inscription on a medal treasured by the Robertson family of Newmarket the contest would appear to have been won by the cutter Dart, owned by T. J. Robertson.

At any rate, the Ripple was in other hands by 1868, the capable hands of Wm. Cooper Campbell, an ardent sailor who three years later was one of the owners of the first of the Orioles. Three of the Orioles were schooners, the fourth and last a ketch. This last survives to train the Royal Canadian Navy in sail at Halifax. She looks very smart with the change from white to black paint, and a five-piece rig with three headsails.

Through the courtesy of Mr Walter F. Campbell, of Port Credit and Toronto, a younger son of Cooper Campbell, Schooner Days was able to give recently an extract from the logbook of a voyage Mr. Campbell and friends made from Toronto to Manitoulin Island in the Ripple in 1868.

This told of the near shipwreck getting to the Welland Canal, and its triumphant outcome. The voyage went well after that. The Ripple's logbook, singularly fresh and modern, may be an inducement to our yachtsmen of today, who compass sea and land to race in Finland and Britain and Bermuda and New England, to do more cruising on their own lakes.

Anyway, here is the next installment of it, which takes the Ripple through the "raging canal" of 28 wooden locks—the second Welland—from Port Dalhousie to Port Colborne. The passage is made in 8 hours on the present canal. It is the fourth.

The Ripple's log resumes:

Port Dalhousie

July 28, Tuesday

Repairs finished and painting all done and we anxious to be off, waiting only for the insurance agent to come and inspect her. We received a telegram saying he could not be here until tomorrow and so we are obliged to lose a whole day.

We engaged Capt. Wagner as pilot as far as Goderich. He seems a first rate hand and we feel much more comfortable in having some one on board well acquainted with that troublesome Lake Erie.

July 29, Wednesday—Canal Received a telegram to say the Inspector would be here at noon. Made all our arrangements and at 1 p.m. hauled out of the dock. At 2.30 we were fairly started in the "raging canal" and made splendid time. By 8 p.m. we had passed lock 12 and decided to tie up for the night. We have still 16 more locks before us. Canaling is not very easy work, what with the snub, the bowline and stern line, the heaving out and the hauling taut, and looking after the fenders, and then coiling all the lines up each time. It was quite enough for one day to get through twelve locks.

We made a raid on the Thorold station of the G.W.R. and got some ice water, a comfort we were longing for all day, but could not get.

July 30, Thursday

Weather fine, with a stiff breeze

Up bright and early at 4 a.m. Breakfast dispatched and we are under way at 4.45. We reach Welland at 9, Allanburg at 12 and finally Pt. Colborne at 5.30, all safe and comfortable.

Distance to Pt. Colborne 28 miles.