Prints as Windows to Our Nautical Past

by Mike John - Grandchester, Queensland - Australia

and Paul Austin - Dallas, Texas - USA

Part One - Part Two - Part Three

The ship had three boats and a lifeboat capable of holding just half the people on-board. (We will refer to them all as lifeboats.) If this sounds familiar, the Titanic didn't have enough lifeboats, either. Some vessels tried to help the stricken Lexington but low tide and ice on shore hindered their attempts with some vessels running aground in the attempt. Launching lifeboats with the ship still going at full speed is impossible, or so it proved. The crew failed to secure the rope on the first lifeboat to the ship and it disappeared useless, perhaps also damaged by the paddle-wheel. The other two lifeboats were launched full of people but they were swamped.

Panic had now set in and mistakes were made. The crew threw water onto the fire in anything they could find. The engine had died by this time but the choice was dire. Jump into the water and die from the cold or drown, or stay on-board and die from the fire. The survivors managed to grab on of the one hundred and fifty bales of cotton on board or other floating objects and just survived the cold. One survivor, David Crowley, floated on top of a bale of cotton for two days and traveled 50 miles before being rescued. The Lexington burned to the water line and sunk.10 Approximately, one hundred and forty people were known to be on-board and only four survived clinging to bales of cotton tossed into the water as life preservers. The survivors were: Chester Hilliard (the only passenger but also a captain); ship's pilot Captain Stephen Manchester; one of the ship's fireman Charles Smith; and, second mate David Crowley. The exact number dead was uncertain as it seems the exact number of people on-board was unknown. 11 There were first-hand reports from the survivors, such as Chester Hilliard, but the reports did themselves no favors.12

There was an inquest into the fire that January and the verdict of Jury was reached 31 January 1840. 13 The crew was blamed by the Coroner's Jury for not fighting the fire effectively and putting their own lives above the lives of others. Finding an impartial jury would have been difficult due to the public outrage about the incident. Nevertheless, the idea of carrying cotton on a passenger ship and the lack of effective leadership were challenged.14 The boiler's wood to coal burning conversion was not properly done. Coal burns hotter than wood and extra coal was used because of rough seas.15

Benjamin Vincent (foreman) and Joseph Mount (juror) (1840) wrote their summation, which appeared in the journal 'The Friend', that the fire was started either from the heat of the smoke pipe, or from sparks from the space between the smoke pipe and the steam chamber as the fire was first seen near the casing of the steam chimney on the promenade deck. The Jury continued to argue that the ship was not designed to burn coal with a blower. If the fire had been smothered quickly with buckets of water earlier, the fire could have been extinguished. It is worth noting here that filling buckets on board a moving ship is no easy task. If the engine had been shut down as needed, the outcome would have been different because the lifeboats could have been better used. The jury also found that the government inspector of steamboats should not have allowed the vessel to continue in service as compliant with the laws of the United States as it did not meet those laws. Further, steamboats should not be allowed to use blowers. It also found that the Captain and Pilot left the steamboat to its own devices and thus put their lives above the lives of passengers and saved themselves. The Captain and Pilot did not go aft and operate the tiller by hand, or order anyone else to do so, but rather they seemed to have put their own self-preservation first. 16 Yet, the jury "…fully exonerate and exculpate Captain Stephen Manchester from any blame or censure after the breaking out of the fire on-board". 17 This seems contradictory after the jury observing his alleged attitude of self-preservation. What did Captain Manchester say to deserve this consideration?

Captain Manchester did indeed have his say in testimony at the inquest. He was one of the four saved from the fire and this account is from his testimony. Manchester was a steamboat pilot for five years prior to the incident and on the Lexington as pilot for the previous three years. He was in the employ of the New Jersey Steam Navigation Company since March 1839. Manchester stated that he had never before seen a boat steered "wholly with rods and chains". The Lexington was steering with rope which was weaker than rods and chains.

Manchester continued that he was unaware that the Lexington was on fire before approaching the dock until after this incident. Having nothing to do with the loading of the ship, his function was to go into the wheelhouse and stay there. The cotton was loaded in the usual manner; some bales were on the sides, some on the end and some on the boiler hatch. There were some men on-board repairing the furnace blower but they left the ship before departure. The repairs were the result of a previous fire.

The fatal fire broke out about 7:30 and when told of it, he turned the ship towards shore. Captain Child entered the wheel house and put his hand on the wheel and at that moment the steering ropes broke. The wheelhouse became thick with smoke and Child and Manchester were forced to leave.

Child gave no orders upon leaving. Manchester ordered the men on the forecastle to fight the fire. Child, it seems, did not take command and got in one of the boats where he was lost at sea. It was thought at the time, if he had taken command a different outcome may have been achieved. Manchester thought, up to this point, there was a chance for a seaman to get to the hand tiller, and he would have done so, but he assumed others would already be there doing that. He argued his services were more needed forward. He requested that the lifeboat be not launched with a rope attached and this was done but it was not secured to the steamboat. One person after another was forced to let go of the line until he too had to let go. The engine slowed and just about stopped. Passengers were putting together a makeshift raft in the hope of saving some lives. The engine now stopped, worked, he claimed, for about fifteen minutes after the fire broke out. Manchester, feeling there was nothing more they could do, attached a line to the rail and lowered himself on the raft which sank under his weight. He raised himself on the rope, grabbed part of the ship's rail which was floating nearby. From the rail he got onto a bale of cotton and joined another man named McKinney on top. Noticing the bale was attached to the ship, he cut the line and then he was asked by another person on ship if there was room on top for them. He did not answer and the person jumped from the ship only to knock McKinney off the bale. He hauled McKinney back on the bale.

Grabbing a piece of board floating by, he pushed the bale off the ship and began to float down the Sound. McKinney was near dead by dawn when a wave knocked him off the bale and he sank. Manchester's hands were so frozen he could not bend his fingers. He noticed the ship sank about 3am.

Manchester was of the opinion that fire started from the smoke stack being close to stored wood. He noted on several occasions the pipe was red hot, including that night. He thought the fire outbreak to be of burning wood and not coal. There was a great deal of smoke aft which he thought probably prevented a man from manning the manual tiller at the stern. Manchester argued that rope or chains for steering would have made little difference as chains would have broken.18 The truth of this claim is later challenged.

This is the testimony of passenger Captain Chester Hilliard. He heard the cry fire about an hour after supper. After leaving his berth and arriving on deck, he saw the casing of the smoke pipe on fire. He was surprised by the rush of passengers for the boats. The crew were rigging the fire engine but buckets were not being used. The fire engine did not seem to work. The starboard boat was being lowered until "she took the water" but someone cut the forward tackle and she filled and went astern.19 About twenty people were in her when it happened. Another boat was lowered full of people and much the same thing happened again. He did not think she was cut loose but the rope ran through the blocks and she seemed not to have a painter on her or it came loose. Hilliard then went to the wheelhouse but the pilot had already headed the boat to shore, which was the goal of the visit, and the wheelhouse was rapidly filling with smoke. Going aft, he found much more smoke and the communication between forward and aft on the ship seemed to be lost.

It was about fifteen or twenty minutes between the cry of fire and this point in time when the engine was fully stopped. Hilliard suggested they throw the cotton overboard as it was the best option for saving lives. About twelve bales were tossed overboard. He prepared a bale with rope, got onto it and lowered it with another person named Cox. They released the line and got a knot and a half away from the Lexington by 8pm. Hilliard and Cox saw a two people and a woman on deck screaming to save her child near them but she (the child) was floating on her back dead. Seeing this they drifted away and saw the fireman on the forecastle.

It was a big task staying on the bale of cotton and his feet was still in the water. The Lexington sank at 3am. Hilliard said it was not intensely cold but it required exertion to keep his blood circulating. About 4am the bale capsized from the swell but when he and Cox got up on it again, they lost their paddle. Cox was giving up. He was lightly dressed. He fell off the bale about two hours after capsize as he lost the use of his hands, and just could not hold on. Hilliard struggled to hold on the bale; Cox simply sank.

10 Grohman, A. (2008). Claimed by the sea. New York: Underwater Historical Research Society, p. 27.
11 LeBeau, B. (2001). Currier and Ives. Washington, D. C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, P. 14.
12 Ibid.
13 Vincent, B. and Mount, J. (2015). The Lexington: Verdict of the Coroner's Jury. The Friend, 13 (20), pp. 155-156.
14 Grohman, A. (2008). Claimed by the sea. New York: Underwater Historical Research Society, p. 27.
15 Walsh, L. (2014). The battle for transportation supremacy. [Place of publication not identified]: iUniverse.Com, p. 7.
16 Vincent, B. and Mount, J. (2015). The Lexington: Verdict of the Coroner's Jury. The Friend, 13 (20), pp. 155-156.
17 Ibid.
18 Senate of the United States, First Session of the Twenty-Sixth Congress, 1840, p. 18.
19 Ibid, p. 19.

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