Watertown Daily Times
Friday afternoon, May 4, 1923

Ill Luck That Followed
Launching of St. Lawrence

Boat Stuck On Ways An Ill Omen to Sailors--Misfortune Fol-
lowed Misfortune and Ship Seemed to Be a Hoodoo.

By THE OBSERVER
In The Clayton On the St. Lawrence.

Old sailormen the world over, are a superstitious lot, believing as they do, that disasters great and small to shipping are foreordained to come to pass, and are made manifest in advance by various ways.

No old sailor will ever embark either as passenger or employee on the ship that is unknown to have stopped after being started to slide down the ways, or greased timbers, at launching time, he believing disasters to finally go to the bottom.

Many big sailing vessels and big steamboats have been built at the Clayton shipyards, the site of which is now occupied in part by the town hall, and it is remembered when a small army of ship carpenters were employed at the building at the same time of two big sailing vessels, and the big steamboat New York, that but a few years ago, and probably is yet in use as an excursion boat on the Potomac river. 

But on no other craft ever built at the Clayton yards was there bestowed such an admiration and pride as upon the steamer St. Lawrence, that for its size was a masterpiece of marine architecture.  The St.Lawrence was launched in June, 1884.  The date being accepted and made use of as a general holiday. 

An immense congregation of Clayton residents, and those of the surrounding country and villages, and of river and Canadian ports was on hand to witness the plunge of the graceful craft into the waters after which it was named.  The timbers had been unsparingly greased, the props removed, and as the last brace was knocked loose and the start was made there was a mighty roar of  applause from the assembled multitude.

Half way down the greased track and the boat stopped dead still.  The cheers became changed to groans to be heard on all sides.  Ship builders and sailors muttered to each other "She's a hoodoo.  Bad luck will be with her every day she floats and as long as she lasts."

All the giant jackscrews and force providing machinery of the yards sufficient to move a battleship was brought to the rescue, but not an inch of movement was to be seen.

Three hours of strenuous effort made no impression, and as last resort the steamer Maud came from Kingston to pull the victim of ignoble failure into the water.  Two weeks later and the St. Lawrence made its first trip from Cape Vincent to Alexanderia Bay, and when near Linda Island a deck hand fell overboard and was drowned.

Three weeks after that, and while the new steamer was made fast for the night at the dock now occupied by the Consaul coal company, a storm of almost tornado force came from the south to lift the entire roof of a large building nearby to drop it flat down upon the boat to smash the whole upper deck, with lifeboats and smokestack, to a mass of debris.

It was right in the height of the season when travel was booming.  The boat,  a sorrowful sight, was towed to Kingston for repairs that consumed two weeks of valuable time and great expense of drydock use and repairs.

Hardly a season thereafter but came disaster.  A rowboat was run down when near Washington Island and its occupants drowned.  There were break downs of machinery that to replace had to be made to order and come from long distances.

On a July day, a dozen seasons after the illfamed launching, and with an eight hundred person excursion party on board, the St. Lawrence came to a stop with half her length on a submerged rock ledge near the north shore of Grindstone Island.  At the stern of the board the rock was straight up and down as a wall to a depth of fifty feet, and the result may hardly be imagined if the boat slipped backward into deep water and a panic ensued among the passengers.

As the locality was far distance from any port, and there were no means of  communication but by rowboat, it was hours before the small steamer J. F. Maynard appeared.  The passengers were taken off a hundred at a time to be landed on a barren island to remain there, many of them until 10 at night.

There are yet photographs owned by some of our residents showing the wrecked steamer and the famished and seasick passengers huddled together on that island, an experience probably that none of them will ever forget. 

That disaster caused a three weeks loss of time and great expense to the company for drydock use and repairs.

A season later and there came the collision between the St. Lawrence, and the steam yacht Catherine, near the light house at Alexandria Bay, the yacht sinking so quickly that escape through cabin doors was impossible, and five passengers were drowned, the result later on being a series of damage lawsuits by friends of the victims to cost the steamboat company many thousands.

From the day of the unfortunate launching of the St. Lawrence, and for years after, there was succession of misfortunes sufficient to discourage the owners, and happy the day when they were finally rid of it. 

Return to Shirley Farone's Homepage