Aboard these semi-derelict ships — many of which had been laid up for years before being pressed into service in 1897 — maximum passenger limits were blatantly disregarded, and vessels were often crewed by a motley assortment of drunks and seamen of dubious distinction in order to get paying customers to the gold as quickly as possible.
The Clara Nevada was one such ship. Built in 1871, the 151-foot-long vessel made only one voyage north, in late January 1898. The Clara Nevada was well past her prime, having served the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey (USCGS) as the Hassler between 1872 and 1897. Her subsequent purchase and refit by the Pacific & Alaska Transportation Company (PATC) had seemingly involved little more than changing the name on her bows and slapping a coat of white paint on her hull. But the Maguire Brothers — the shady duo behind the PATC — were intent on getting her into service as quickly as possible, before the competition found out. Purchasing her for a fraction of her total worth in July 1896, the Maguire Brothers insisted the payment take place via mail so as to avoid any unwanted publicity.[4]
For anyone paying attention, all the warning signs that this was going to be a disastrous maiden voyage were there. Upon backing out of her berth in Seattle on January 26, 1898, she immediately ran full astern into the revenue cutter Grant, scraping her hull along the length of the other ship in a shower of sparks and steel screaming in protest before simply continuing on her way into Puget Sound as if nothing had happened. Fights among the crew — most of whom were reportedly drunk on a round-the-clock basis — were commonplace, and passengers found their accommodation to be completely unsuitable. Things had deteriorated so much on board that several passengers had a petition drawn up and ready to be presented by the time the ship reached Port Townsend, Washington, in order to convince customs officials to place them aboard another ship. That probably wasn’t a hard sell; witnesses report that the Clara Nevada crashed into the pier at Port Townsend as she came alongside.
The ship was in such poor mechanical condition that it took her captain, C.H. Lewis — a man who, months before, had made a dubious name for himself by trying unsuccessfully to sail a wooden paddle steamer out into the open Pacific in pursuit of gold — nearly two hours to successfully berth his ship once she had arrived in Skagway. Owing to the fact that the ship’s bridge-to-engine-room telegraphs were no longer operational, Lewis had to bark orders across the deck to another officer, who in turn yelled at the chief engineer, who then shouted commands down to the second engineer who mechanically controlled the ship from the engine room. If passenger reports that the officers and engineers were continually drunk throughout the voyage north are taken at face value, the situation on deck likely bordered on the absurd as the Clara Nevada moved repeatedly in and out of port in Skagway, trying unsuccessfully to dock. Once again, docking manoeuvres seemed to be completed only once the ship had physically struck the dock, just as she had back in Port Townsend.
The Hassler in one of the only surviving photographs of her short life as Clara Nevada. She would go to the bottom of Lynn Canal in February 1898.
Jefferson County, Washington, Historical Society.
These reports are only known due to the few lucky passengers who eventually disembarked in Skagway, blissfully unaware of the dangerous situation they’d just escaped. On the evening of February 5, 1898, as the Clara Nevada made her way back down the turbulent waters of Lynn Canal on her first southbound voyage to Seattle, Captain C.H. Lewis sailed her straight into a near-hurricane-force blizzard that raced through the mountain ranges of Lynn Canal and barrelled down on the ship with enormous force. Several witnesses remember seeing her deck lights through the blowing snow as she sailed south down Lynn Canal near Eldred Rock. Without warning, a fireball erupted into the night sky. It tinted the snow and ambient light a ghostly amber colour for miles around. When it had dissipated, the Clara Nevada was nowhere to be found.
Speculation still rages to this day as to the exact cause of her sinking. There’s substantial evidence to indicate her boilers were in a dangerous state of disrepair and liable to explode at any time. If they did, it might have sparked another, equally devastating, chain of events, since the Clara Nevada was rumoured to have also been carrying large quantities of dynamite; a strict “no-no” for vessels in passenger service, even in the lax regulations of 1898. Maintenance was not likely to have been the crew’s first priority, and there was the inescapable fact that the Clara Nevada had drunkenly bumped and crashed her way north.
More sinister speculation also can’t be ignored. Clara Nevada was thought to have been carrying as much as $300,000 in gold. Though figures vary wildly, and no one seems to agree on what form it was shipped in, the Clara Nevada likely was transporting gold, which was never found despite the wreck lying in relatively shallow waters off Eldred Rock. Accusations that her inexperienced and morally dubious crew had intentionally wrecked the Clara Nevada in order to make off with her cargo seem far-fetched, but have persisted for over a century — largely due to the fact that it can’t be disproven. Not a single soul who was on board that night is known to have survived.
The tale of the Clara Nevada, sadly, is not all that unique — except in that her story is still known to many southeast Alaskans. She was one of many ships to go to the bottom of Lynn Canal during the untamed days of the Klondike gold rush, the vast majority of which have long since vanished into obscurity.
For all those who went to Skagway in search of untold wealth, the vast majority left penniless. J. Bernard Moore, who became one of the first pioneer settlers in Skagway (he initially named the beachhead “Mooresville” after his family name) and who would also be relieved of much of his own fortune later in life, kept a detailed journal of his struggles against the harsh elements in the Klondike. Just weeks before gold was discovered there, on Saturday, July 18, 1896, Moore wrote that his group had been unable to move all day due to unrelenting rain and bitterly cold temperatures.[5] “Still lying here, stormbound,” he wrote. “Heavy, cold southerly wind with drizzling rain. I certainly did not expect weather as chilly as this at this season of the year.”[6]
The weather — not to mention the mosquitoes — caught many a would-be prospector off guard. The physicality of prospecting also drove others away. Describing his own provisions — which were actually quite sparse for the time — Moore rattles off a laundry list of things that must be carried through the elements: one half-sack of flour, ten pounds of bacon, twenty-five pounds of sugar, fifteen pounds of beans, two small cans of yeast powder, two rolls of butter, two pounds of coffee, five pounds dried mixed fruit, and five pounds of rice.[7]
At the height of the gold rush, between 1897 and 1899, the prices of even the most basic supplies soared. Mediocre horses could fetch as much as $700 — over $20,000 in 2014 currency, and merely getting to the Klondike cost the average person more than a mid-sized car would today.[8] Fewer than four thousand prospectors found gold, and those who did frequently lost their fortunes in subsequent years or spent it all on grandiose (and often bizarre) gestures. Bill Gates — the frontiersman, not the software tycoon of the same name — earned his place in Dawson City lore when he reportedly presented a local dance hall girl, a nineteen-year-old named Gussie Lamore, with her exact weight in gold.[9] To keep the competition away from his beloved Dawson City, he also famously bought up every available egg in town to ensure that would-be prospectors would lack basic provisions.
The gold rush ended in late 1899. Towns like Skagway and Dawson City gradually became less lawless and started to diversify their economic offerings, while gold was found in other parts of Alaska. The transient prospectors who had come to the Klondike went with it, always in search of an even bigger payday.
By October 1918 the Klondike gold rush had been over for nineteen years. Both Dawson City and Skagway still retained permanent populations, though their numbers were far from those of the boom days of 1898. Dyea had boasted between five and eight thousand inhabitants in 1898, and by 1903 that number had drop
ped to less than a dozen.[10] In towns like Skagway that had managed to struggle through the post-gold rush hangover, the population was largely seasonal, with only the heartiest “sourdoughs” choosing to stay behind to weather the dark loneliness of the Alaskan winter.
Marine transportation in the autumn of 1918 was scheduled, regulated, and reliable, and provided towns with necessary provisions, freight, and passenger services. Ships would operate from Vancouver and Seattle up to Skagway, where the eighteen-year-old White Pass & Yukon Route Railroad would take passengers safely to Dawson City, bypassing the old Chilkoot Trail that prospectors had to traverse in 1898. No one went to Dyea anymore; the town had been virtually abandoned since 1902, and was a full-fledged ghost town in 1918.
In late October of 1918 one ship quietly pulled into her berth in Skagway, threw out her lines, and tied up. She didn’t crash into the dock as Clara Nevada had twenty years earlier, and, in fact, her arrival was wholly unremarkable except for the fact that she was running a little behind schedule.
In both design and quality of her crew, the Princess Sophia was far different from the derelict craft that was the Clara Nevada. One of four nearly identical sister ships in the coastal service fleet of the Canadian Pacific Railway, she was completed in 1912 and operated the Inside Passage route from Vancouver. Her voyages took her up the coast of Alaska, where she would eventually arrive at Skagway before beginning the return journey south. Like her sisters, she was a popular, if simple, ship. On Wednesday, October 23, 1918, she was also fully booked — the perfect escape for those fleeing the north for the winter. It would be her last sailing of the year, and demand for passage south was so strong that additional berths were added to the ship to keep up with demand. Scheduled to leave at 7:00 p.m., Princess Sophia’s departure would be delayed until 10:10 that evening to allow for the additional passengers and cargo to be loaded, and to sort out a rather chaotic situation at the docks when stowaways were discovered on board.[11] Those who were fortunate enough to wave to the bystanders on Skagway’s docks that night might have thought differently about their luck as Princess Sophia made her way south into the darkness of Lynn Canal, chased by fierce winds and a blinding snowstorm that seemed to get worse with each passing hour.
The only similarity Princess Sophia bore to the Clara Nevada that night was the fact that she, too, was leaving Skagway forever.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 23, 1918
SKAGWAY, ALASKA
The last embers of the late October sun had just disappeared behind Face Mountain when the 5:30 p.m. train from Whitehorse chugged its way along the centre of Broadway. Like nearly every other person who crowded Skagway’s hotels and bars that cold, wet Wednesday evening, the daily “boat train” was packed with passengers bound for the petite little Canadian Pacific steamship known as the Princess Sophia.
Fall was the only time of year when Skagway really came alive again, and it was for all the wrong reasons. If the Klondike gold rush twenty years earlier had brought people to Skagway in droves, the winter of 1918 was driving them away. The population in Skagway had had a seasonal quality to it since the gold rush ended in 1899; every year a small yet hearty contingent stayed behind to brave the wind and the cold and the darkness. Not to mention the snow. The deep, thick, never-ending snow that made roads impassable and periodically stopped the trains between Skagway and Carcross, despite the best efforts of the rotary plow that was sometimes buried up to its cab. It’s no wonder that those with the means to travel south each year did so, preferring to winter elsewhere and return to Skagway in the spring when temperatures had warmed up. Those who stayed on throughout the dark Alaskan winter remained, ostensibly, out of an undying love for their community; though it’s equally likely they could not afford to book passage themselves.
That year, the fall exodus seemed more pronounced. Like a nail in the coffin, the last ship of the season marked the official start of the long winter ahead — and this would be the last time that Princess Sophia would grace Skagway with her presence. More than usual, people in Skagway seemed to not only notice, but understand this. Hotels were packed, and cargo — which would eventually total 266 pieces ranging from horses to Christmas presents to war supplies — was already clogging the pierside sheds, with dock workers trying desperately to keep up with the continuous stream of supplies.
Pre-departure festivities held in Skagway went on unabated for nearly a full week. The evening of Saturday, October 19 was noticeably more festive than in years past, with The Daily Alaskan proclaiming the annual Sourdough Dance held that night, “one of the most enjoyable affairs ever held in Skagway.”[1] The paper, run by L.S. Keller, was the only source of news in Skagway following the shutdown of the Skaguay News in 1904. Additional parties continued throughout the week: on Monday evening the White Pass Athletic Club threw a dance in honour of those heading south, and Tuesday evening brought with it a large fundraiser put on by the Skagway Popular Picture Palace to refurbish St. Mark’s Church. Once again, Keller’s paper waxed nostalgic about the event, which featured the “rich baritone voice” of a Mr. William O’Brien of Dawson City. O’Brien was no stranger to Skagway — indeed, The Daily Alaskan billed him as the man who “hardly needs an introduction.” This time, though, he was in town for a limited engagement: along with his wife and five children, William O’Brien was due to set sail on Princess Sophia the following evening, like so many others in town that night. By the time The Daily Alaskan came off the press Wednesday morning, the jubilation of the night before had already evaporated, replaced with a town filled with travellers anxious to board the Princess Sophia and finally get underway.
One such person was twenty-five-year-old Walter Harper, who was travelling with his wife, Frances, on a one-way trip to Philadelphia. Harper had gained notoriety, at the young age of twenty-one, after becoming the first person to successfully ascend Mount McKinley on June 7, 1913, along with fellow climbers Harry Karstens, Hudson Stuck, and Robert Tatum. Even after achieving such a monumental feat, things were still looking up for the young mountaineer. He’d survived a frightening bout with typhoid fever in 1916 and just a few weeks before sailing, on September 1, 1918, he’d married Frances Wells — the nurse who had treated him at Fort Yukon’s Mission Hospital. Now, Harper and his new wife were bound for the east coast, where he had been accepted into medical school in Philadelphia. The arduous but enjoyable journey ahead would serve as their honeymoon.
Others gathered on the docks in Skagway for far less glamorous reasons. A total of eighty-seven passengers — all employees of the White Pass & Yukon Route Railroad and the American Yukon Navigation Company — were making the journey south. They were steamboat men, having just finished their contracts on board the steamers that ran seasonally along the Yukon River from Whitehorse to St. Michael and back. Four of the men were certified master mariners, while the others ranged from deckhands to cabin stewards. With their work done and their ships tied up for the season, they too were headed south to escape the winter freeze-up.
Booking passage south in 1918 was far from being an exact science. For those employed on a seasonal basis — as nearly everyone was — changing schedules had a way of creating absolute chaos with passenger lists. Ships that were booked full one day suddenly had available berths the next day, and vice-versa. The Princess Sophia was a well-liked vessel among northerners, and many passengers went out of their way to book their tickets aboard her in advance. Even in the days leading up to her departure, it was unclear exactly how many people would be travelling aboard the Princess Sophia.
Confusion wasn’t merely limited to a few latecomers whose plans had changed. In fact, so many last-minute travellers had turned up in Skagway looking for passage south that those who lacked tickets (and nearly everyone did) suddenly became priority number one for the shipping lines. As early as October 17, while Princess Sophia was still in tied up in Vancouver, Canadian Pacific’s Skagway agent, Lewis H. Johnston, telegraphed word that between six and seven hundred ticketless passe
ngers had already arrived in town, and were all eager to get out of Skagway before the winter freeze-up. The fall exodus was among the most lucrative for Canadian Pacific, and Johnston advised that if Canadian Pacific could squeeze more berths onto Princess Sophia for her last run south, he would have no issues selling them immediately — presumably at a premium.
Four years earlier, adding additional berths would have been a walk in the park. But in the early morning hours of Monday, April 15, 1912, the largest ship in the world — White Star Line’s RMS Titanic — had foundered in the North Atlantic after striking an iceberg, taking more than 1,500 souls down with her. Her loss had changed the way maritime authorities regulated lifesaving equipment on board, which would no longer be measured by tonnage but instead by the maximum number of passengers on board.
Based on Johnston’s wire to the company, Canadian Pacific determined they could add an additional fifty berths to the Princess Sophia before she set out on her last northbound trip to Skagway. To account for the increase in overall passenger capacity, extra life rafts were quickly installed at the same time. They were stacked, one atop the other, on the roof of her smoking room, next to the lifeboats mounted in davits. The new rescue craft were made of wood and not steel like Princess Sophia’s existing boats. They were, for all intents and purposes, merely window dressing; reassurances that, if an emergency were to occur, all passengers and crew on board would be able to safely abandon ship. As they were hoisted aboard the Princess Sophia pierside in Vancouver, few if any of the workers or crew supervising the installation of these new craft ever seriously thought they would be needed.
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