Cindy Vallar's Blog - Posts Tagged "mississippi"

Sinking the Sultana: A Civil War Story of Imprisonment, Greed, and a Doomed Journey Home by Sally M. Walker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


On 27 April 1865, Frances Ackley joins her husband on deck of the USS Tyler in the wee hours of the morning. The Mississippi River, where the gunboat is docked, runs higher than normal because of the winter thaw. At 2:30 in the morning, the sky should be dark, but glows orange. All around them, voices plead for help. Two navy cutters quickly launch and, despite her husband’s objections, Frances climbs aboard one. For the next hours, she helps rescue man after man. For each man saved, dozens more float past, too far to reach with the boat hook. Sinking the Sultana recounts the nightmare of that night, as well as the days and months before, and the terrible tragedy that killed so many who had endured so much, but were finally going home.

Walker begins this story by first laying the groundwork so readers understand the river, the evolution of travel on the Mississippi, and time period. Then she introduces some of the men who joined the Union Army, were captured by Confederate forces, and ultimately found themselves aboard the Sultana. Michael Dougherty was a recent emigrant from Ireland. Robert Hamilton came from Tennessee, but fought for the North because he opposed secession. Too young to fight, Stephen Gaston became a bugler. A lawyer in civilian life, J. Walter Elliott had to lie about his identity to stay alive. John Clark Ely, a teacher, kept a record his life in the army and in prison.

The next four chapters examine what life was like inside the notorious prisoner of war camp known as Andersonville, as well as the less familiar, but equally horrendous, Cahaba in Alabama. It quickly becomes apparent why so many died, but readers also learn how the five men mentioned above managed to survive until the war ended and were transferred to Camp Fisk in Vicksburg, Mississippi until transportation home could be arranged. Also covered are the use of steamboats during the war; the building and fitting out of the Sultana (including her lifesaving equipment); a problem that developed with her boilers; and how more than 2,000 POWs ended up aboard a boat that was only supposed to carry 376 passengers.

The final five chapters cover the explosion and its aftermath, how individuals reacted, rescue efforts, and the investigations into what happened and who was found culpable. Walker also discusses the rumors of sabotage, as well as what scientists of today believe caused the accident. To reinforce the magnitude of how many lost their lives, she compares the sinking of Sultana with the sinking of Titantic. Equally revealing are the reasons why the former tragedy isn’t as well known as the latter. In addition, she shares efforts by survivors, and later their descendants and interested parties, to make certain that no one forgets this tragedy. In her epilogue, Walker informs readers what happened to the five men she introduced early in the book, where the steamboat is now, and how the Mississippi has changed in the years since that fateful day.

Aside from Walker’s chronicling of events, what makes this book come alive are the passages from primary documents, such as Ely’s diary, and the many contemporary illustrations. Not only do these put faces to names, they vividly portray the realities of the prisons and the horror of that night. Two particularly poignant photographs show the effects of illness and starvation on an Andersonville prisoner, and the soldiers packed tighter than sardines on Sultana’s decks, while an engraving from Harper’s Weekly’s illustrates the burning inferno and survivors floating in the river. Also included are several maps, a glossary, source notes, a bibliography, and an index. Interspersed throughout the book are several special sections (pages with gray borders) that cover key points that require greater explanation than can be revealed in the normal telling of the story. These are explained in clear language that middle grade readers will readily understand without feeling as if they are being talked down to.

Walker’s depiction of this historical event is powerful, moving, and horrifying. After experiencing this book, readers come away with a better understanding that it’s never a single event that leads up to the crisis and that when the worst happens, people with disparate beliefs and life experiences willingly set aside their differences to help others, regardless of whether the disaster occurs today or in the past. Sinking the Sultana is a compelling retelling that graphically and realistically portrays the consequences of decisions made and the price paid by innocent people because of “fraud, greed, and clout.” (64)




View all my reviews

Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana: The Worst Maritime Disaster in American History by Gene Eric Salecker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


And those poor fellows who died in that awful catastrophe! They had gone through four long years of war, had undergone countless hardships, and suffered hunger, pain, and sickness, on the battlefield, and in the prison, and after all these, they were now going home to loved ones, their hearts filled with a great shout of joyous thanksgiving that all war and strife and danger were over, and that they could once more greet the dear ones at home who they knew were waiting anxiously for their return. (387) -- James R. Collins, survivor

We sometimes come across a disaster of the past that strikes a particular chord within us. For me, Sultana is one such episode in American history. Twenty-twenty hindsight suggests any number of ways in which the calamity might have been avoided, but the dominos of greed, arrogance, shoddy construction, avoidance, weather, and conditions on the Mississippi led to disaster a mere eighteen days after Lee surrendered to Grant at Appomattox Courthouse. More than a century and a half have passed since that fateful morning of 27 April 1865, and yet what occurred in the wee hours of that day remains the most wretched disaster in America’s maritime history.

Sultana, a sidewheel steamboat, was launched on 2 January 1863. She measured 260 feet in length and 42 feet wide. The diameter of each of her two paddlewheels was 34 feet, and she could carry up to 1,000 tons of cargo safely. Her original owner sold her the following year to four residents of St. Louis, Missouri. One of these became her captain, James Cass Mason. At the time of the explosion, she carried nearly 2,000 Union soldiers who had recently been released from prisoner of war camps, including the most notorious one, Andersonville. After time spent in horrendous conditions, these men were finally going home to reunite with loved ones. There were also around forty civilian passengers aboard – including a minstrel company, a couple returning from their honeymoon, children – and about eighty-five men and women who worked on the vessel. She also carried cargo – more than 200 hogsheads of sugar and almost 100 boxes of wine, sixty hogs, and forty to fifty horses and mules – and the sidewheeler’s mascot, a live alligator in a wooden box. Two years after her launch, Sultana exploded, caught fire, and sank. Many on board died. Some survived and lived to share their stories.

Twenty-nine chapters comprise this account of the Sultana and those aboard her at the time of her demise. In addition to the who, what, when, where, and why, Salecker shares what happened afterward and what became of her survivors. He provides extensive notes, a bibliography, an index, maps, and photographs of people and steamboats connected to this story.

In the intervening years, much has been written about the disaster, but as often occurs over time, legend and myth have crept into the historical details. One might wonder why another book needs to tell this story, but what sets The Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana apart is two-fold. First, the author undertook a deep-dive into many different archives to provide the first exhaustive study of the subject that relies principally on primary documents. Secondly, Salecker is a leading authority on what occurred and is the Sultana Disaster Museum’s historical consultant. He also owns the largest collection of materials pertaining to the event. In writing this book, he set out to answer four specific questions:

What caused the explosion?
Exactly how many people were on board at the time?
How many people survived, and how many died?
Who were these people?

He succeeds in doing this and, in the process, separates the wheat (the facts) from the chaff (the myths and legends). He uses the actual words of those involved to relate the truth about what transpired.

Witness and survivor accounts vividly bring the events into focus. Details that the study unearthed are enlightening. Salecker has been able to identify beyond a doubt the majority of people who were aboard Sultana during her three-day voyage upriver. Equally telling is the fact that when compared with the number of dead in Civil War battles, this disaster ranks twelfth. Nearly half of those aboard lost their lives.

This is far more than just an examination of the sidewheeler and those aboard. Salecker also delves into the people ashore who were involved in the overloading of Sultana, as well as local residents who went above and beyond to help the survivors, including Southerners who had spent the last five years fighting the North. The condition of the POWs upon their release, as well as what they had endured, is also recounted.

If you just want a book that recounts the story of the Sultana and what happened, any number of books will fulfill that desire. If, however, you want an in-depth analysis that relies chiefly on firsthand evidence, The Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana is the volume to read. You will come away knowing what happened, but, more importantly, remember the people, the sacrifices they made, and their determination to survive.

(This review originally appeared at Pirates & Privateers: http://www.cindyvallar.com/Salecker.html)




View all my reviews