Editor's Note: The following text is a verbatim transcription of an article written by George W. Murdock, for the Kingston (NY) Daily Freeman newspaper in the 1930s. Murdock, a veteran marine engineer, wrote a regular column. Articles transcribed by HRMM volunteer Adam Kaplan. See more of Murdock's articles in "Steamboat Biographies". See more Sunday News here.

                                                                 No. 31- Iron Witch
The “Iron Witch,” built in 1844 by Hogg and Delamater of New York, was constructed for Hudson river service and was one of the “freaks” of the early forties, having an iron hull. She was designed by John Ericsson, designer of the famous “Monitor” which engaged the Confederate ram “Merrimac” in the first battle of iron-clad vessels during the Civil War, and was fitted with a special type of engine and very small side-wheels.

The “Iron Witch” appeared on the river on August 10, 1846, and was placed in service on the Albany day route in line with the “Metamora”, forming an opposition line.

The first trip, from New York to Albany, required nine hours and 23 minutes. This time, which was the best she could do, placed the “Iron Witch” as a failure, and she was withdrawn from service in September. During the winter her side paddle wheels were removed and side screw wheels geared to the shaft were substituted, but they were of less value as a sped producer, and the steamer was abandoned.

After a time a beam engine with ordinary radial wheels was placed in the hull of the “Iron Witch”, and she was renamed the “Erie”. Under this name she was placed in service between New York and Piermont, the terminus of the Erie Railroad before the Civil War. In 1861 this engine was removed and placed in the ferryboat “Pavonia”, the first ferryboat built for the Erie Railroad Company to operate between New York and Jersey City. The “Delaware” and “Susquehanna” were the next two ferryboats built for the Erie Railroad in 1863. Then in 1869 the Erie Company had the “Jay Gould” and the “James Fisk, Jr.” built and added to their fleet of ferrys which were at that time the most handsome ferryboats in New York harbor.

Thus to the “Iron Witch” goes the honor of being the beginning of the Erie Railroad Company’s present fleet of ferryboats. 

“The maintenance of a merchant marine is of the utmost importance for national defense and the service of our commerce.” President Calvin Coolidge

“In peacetime, the U.S. Merchant Marine includes all of the privately owned and operated vessels flying the American flag – passenger ships, freighters, tankers, tugs, and a wide miscellany of other craft. Merchant Marine vessels ply the high seas, the Great Lakes, and the inland waters, such as the Chesapeake Bay and navigable rivers.”  Heroes in Dungarees by John Bunker

During the colonial period, businessmen and legislators realized that prosperity was connected to trade. The more shipment of imports and exports through colonial ports the more money there was to be made. Carrying American produced goods to market in American made and managed ships kept the money in American pockets. Formation of the United States Merchant Marine is dated to 1775 when citizens at Machias, Massachusetts (now Maine) seized the British schooner HMS Margaretta in response to receiving word of  the Battles of Lexington and Concord. 

After the Revolutionary War American ships were no longer under the protection of the British empire.  The new nation offered incentives for goods to be moved on American ships. Wars on the European continent turned attention away from American activity as U.S. ships opened up new trade routes in the early Federal period. The Empress of China  reached China in 1784, the first U.S. registered ship to do so. American shipping and shipbuilding flourished in the early 1800s.

The years between the War of 1812 and the Civil War saw the development of canal systems connect the western interior with seaport markets. “Those years saw the merchant marine rise to its zenith in terms of the percentage of American trade carried. Only in the aftermaths of World Wars I and II would its percentage of world tonnage stand as high.” America's Maritime Legacy by Robert A. Kilmarx

Sail powered packet ships, carrying passengers, pushed their crews hard. There was money to be made in quick passages across to Europe and back. Clipper ships also relied on speed as they carried high value cargoes of silk, spices and tea across the Pacific and the slave trade across the Atlantic.

The hybrid sailing ship/sidewheeler steamer  Savannah’s 1819 Atlantic crossing, the first with a steam powered engine, signaled the start of the transition from sail to steam. The May 22 date for National Maritime Day commemorates the day Savannah set sail from Savannah, Georgia to England. The Savannah transported both passengers and cargo. More information about the SS Savannah is here: 

Restoration of the merchant marine after the disruption of the Civil War was a national political issue in 1872. The Republican party advocated adopting measures to restore American commerce and shipbuilding. Mail packets, carrying mail around the world were active in this period. Financial scandals were associated with mail packet contracts. Training sailors in an academic setting began in the last quarter of the 1800s, predecessors of the present day Maritime Academies. The period between the end of the Civil War in 1865 and the European outbreak of World War I was a dynamic time for shipping. American raw materials and agricultural products were shipped to world markets and products from those markets received and used by American industries.

​John Bunker writes: “When we entered the war, the Merchant Marine, although still privately owned, came under government control. The men who sailed the ships were civilians, but they also were under government control and subject to disciplinary action by the U.S. Coast Guard and, when overseas, by local U.S. military authorities. Compared with soldiers and sailors, merchant seaman had much more freedom of movement. After completing a voyage, they could usually leave a ship but had to join another vessel within a reasonable period of time or be drafted into the U.S. Armed Forces. There was no uniform required for merchant seamen. Some officers wore uniforms; many did not. During the war, merchant ships were operated by some forty steamship companies, and the War Shipping Administration assigned new ships to them as they were completed. A total of 733 U.S.-flag merchant ships were lost during World War II. More than 6,000 merchant seamen died as the result of enemy action.”p12

​U.S. Maritime Service personnel operated the 2,700 Liberty ships during World War II. The U.S. Maritime Service was the only service at the time with African American crew members serving in every capacity aboard ship. Seventeen Liberty Ships were named for African-Americans. Approximately 10%, 24,000, African Americans served in the Merchant Marine during World War II.

During World War II the U.S. Merchant Marines moved war personnel and material under conditions shown above.

​The American Merchant Mariner’s memorial in Battery Park, New York City reads: "This memorial serves as a marker for America’s merchant mariners resting in the unmarked ocean depths." Poignantly the sailor in the water is covered twice a day at high tide.  Installed in 1991 by sculptor Marisol Escobar designed based on a photo of the sinking of the SS Muskogee by German U-boat 123 on March 22nd, 1942. The photo was taken by the U-boat captain. The American crew all died at sea.

​

​Merchant mariners who served in World War II were denied veterans recognition and benefits including the GI Bill. This despite having suffered a per capita casualty rate greater then those of the U.S. Armed Forces. In 1988 a federal court order granted veteran status to merchant mariners who participated in World War II.

On May 31, 1993, the Hudson River Maritime Museum received a brass plaque reading: “The United States Merchant Marine. This plaque is dedicated in memory of those who served in the U.S. Merchant Marine during W.W. II and in particular to those who did not survive “The Battle of the Atlantic”. Their dedication, deeds and sacrifices while transporting war material to the war shared their sacrifices and final victory, we, their surviving shipmates dedicate this memorial with the promise that they shall not be forgotten. Died 6,834. Wounded 11,000. Ship Sunk 833. P.O.W. 604. Died in Prisoner of War Camps 61. American Merchant Marine Veterans – May 31, 1993.”

Today, the Maritime Administration (MARAD) is the Department of Transportation agency responsible for the U.S. waterborne transportation system. Founded in 1950 the mission of MARAD is to foster, promote and develop the maritime industry of the United States to meet the nation’s economic and security needs. MARAD maintains the Ready Reserve Fleet, a fleet of cargo ships in reserve to provide surge sea-lift during war and national emergencies. A predecessor of the RRF, the Hudson River Reserve Fleet of World War II ships, popularly referred to as the Ghost Fleet, was in the Jones Point area from 1946 to 1971. More about the Maritime Administration including a Vessel History Database can be found here: https://www.maritime.dot.gov/

Modern day training of merchant marines is held at seven academies, two of which U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and SUNY Maritime College, are in New York State.

The U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, Kings Point, NY (USMMA) is one of the five United States service academies. When the academy was dedicated on 30 September 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, noted "the Academy serves the Merchant Marine as West Point serves the Army and Annapolis the Navy."

​USMMA graduates earn:

• a Bachelor of Science degree;
• an unlimited US Coast Guard License as a Merchant Marine Officer, either 3rd Mate or 3rd Assistant Engineer
• a Commission as an ensign in the U.S. Navy Reserve Strategic Sealift Officer Program (see: Navy Reserve Merchant Marine Insignia), or if accepted, as an ensign in the U.S. Navy, U.S. Coast Guard, or National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, or as a 2nd lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps, U.S. Army, or U.S. Air Force. Graduates who choose military service must serve at least five years in the active duty force of their respective service.

USMMA graduates fulfill their service obligations on their own, providing annual proof of employment in a wide variety of MARAD approved occupations. Either as active duty officers in any branch of the military or uniformed services, including the Public Health Service and the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration or entering the civilian work force in the maritime industry.
​
State-supported maritime colleges:
There are six state-supported maritime colleges. These graduates earn appropriate licenses from the U.S. Coast Guard and/or U.S. Merchant Marine. They have the opportunity to participate in a commissioning program, but do not receive an immediate commission as an Officer within a service.

• California State University Maritime Academy 
• Great Lakes Maritime Academy 
• Maine Maritime Academy 
• Massachusetts Maritime Academy 
• State University of New York Maritime College 
• Texas A&M Maritime Academy 

​More information about the U.S. Merchant Marines can be found here:

• https://www.maritime.dot.gov/about-us
• https://www.usmma.edu/
• https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/museums/nmusn/explore/photography/wwii/wwii-atlantic/battle-of-the-atlantic/merchant-ships/merchant-marine-service.html
• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Merchant_Marine
• https://www.archives.gov/news/articles/merchant-marine-records-document-maritime-service
• https://ammv.us/
• http://righttofightexhibit.org/during-war/merchant-marine.php 
• “Heroes in Dungarees: The Story of the American Merchant Marine in World War II” by John Bunker
• “America’s Maritime Legacy, A History of the U.S. Merchant Marine and the Shipbuilding Industry since Colonial Times” by Robert A. Kilmarx

Thank you to John Phelan, HRMM Wooden Boat School Coordinator and Dock Master for suggesting this blog post topic. John graduated from the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy and held the title of Chief Mate working on product tankers for a major oil corporation during his years at sea.

​​If you enjoyed this post and would like to support more history blog content, please make a donation to the Hudson River Maritime Museum or become a member today!

Editor’s Note: The following text is a verbatim transcription of an article featuring stories by Captain William O. Benson (1911-1986). Beginning in 1971, Benson, a retired tugboat captain, reminisced about his 40 years on the Hudson River in a regular column for the Kingston (NY) Freeman’s Sunday Tempo magazine. Captain Benson's articles were compiled and transcribed by HRMM volunteers. See more of Captain Benson’s articles here.
This article was originally published April 14, 1974.

​​Back in the 1930’s when I was a deckhand and pilot on tugboats of the Cornell Steamboat Company, Cornell had a helper tug captain by the name of Edward N. Van Woert from Athens.  Captain Ed worked for Cornell for 55 years, most of that time as captain of the tugboat “G. C. Adams.”

Captain Van Woert was a good source of stories of old time steamboating on the Hudson.  He once told me of his father’s experience as a little boy at Athens following the wreck of the steamboat “Swallow.” The event had taken place way back in 1845 on the night of April 7, now nearly 130 years ago. 

When Captain Ed told me his “Swallow” incident in the 1930’s, he was nearing the end of his boating career.  He related how his father in turn had told him how he had been awakened by his mother with the news that there had been a steamboat wreck the night before.  As a small boy his father went down to the shore at Athens and remembered seeing the bodies of those who had lost their lives in the disaster lying on the shore and being placed in wagons for removal. 

The wreck of the “Swallow” was one of the more spectacular disasters of the era and created a vivid impression all along the river.  Occurring as it did before the age of photography, several artists scurried to the scene and soon their impressions of the wreck were immortalized for posterity in lithographs that quickly appeared on the market for sale. 

The “Swallow” wreck took place some six years before the railroad was to reach Albany from New York.  In the absence of a railroad, virtually all passengers, freight and mail moving between New York and Albany did so by steamboat.  It was an era of fierce and unfettered competition.  Steamboat racing was a frequent occurrence, the idea being that the first steamer to reach a landing would be the one to get the waiting passengers. 

Old time records describe the season of 1845 as a particularly lively one.  A total of 18 steamboats were engaged in service between New York and Albany, although not all at the same time due to engine breakdowns, accidents and other mishaps.  Frequently, however, there were as many as six departures daily in each direction. 

Due to the highly competitive nature of the service, fares for passage would vary widely depending on he extent of the competition.  During 1845, the fee for one way passage is said to have ranged from a high of $1.50 to a low of 12 1/2 cents.  Presumably, what was lost in passage fares was made up by what was charged for a berth and meals once the passengers were safely aboard and the steamer had left the dock. 

On the night of April 7, 1845, the night the ‘‘Swallow” was to meet her end, she was one of three steamboats scheduled to leave Albany at 6 p.m.  Later accounts stated the “Swallow” had been racing with the steamboats ‘‘Rochester” and “Express."  In any event, as the steamers neared Athens at about 8 p.m., the “Swallow” was in the lead. 

The night was dark and overcast.  Just above Athens a heavy early spring snow squall set in, obliterating the nearby shorelines.  What then took place varies somewhat in the retelling.  One account has it that the first pilot, a Mr. Burnett, had been down to supper and coming from the brightly lighted dining area into the darkened pilot house, his eyes had not yet become adjusted to the darkness of the night.  Another account has it the first pilot came into the pilot house and immediately said to the second pilot, "Sir, you are off course.”

What no one questions, however, is the fact that shortly thereafter the “Swallow,” proceeding at full speed, piled up on a rock outcropping a short way off the Athens shore — then known variously as Dopers Island and Noah’s Brig.  From that moment, onward — and to this very day — the point of impact has been known as Swallow Rocks. 

The steamboat was driven some 30 feet upon the rocks and her wooden hull nearly broke in two at the forward gangway.  The force of the impact caused the ‘‘Swallow’’ to catch fire and the after part of the steamer immediately began to sink. The “Swallow's” stern section sank rather quickly — which fortunately extinguished the flames — but unfortunately trapped a number of passengers in the berthing section. 
​
The following steamboats “Rochester” and “Express” soon happened upon the scene and were able to rescue about 200 of the"Swallow’s” approximately 300 passengers who were aboard the night of the disaster.  One of the rescued was a Robert Thompson of Kingston. 

The residents of Athens and Hudson across the river were said to be alerted to the accident by the tolling of church bells ... and a large number of people of both communities soon gathered along the river banks and started large bonfires. 

A number of small boats put out from both Athens and Hudson and rescued other survivors who were swimming in the chill[y] waters of the river, clinging to floating debris, or who had climbed over the steamer’s bow onto the rocks the “Swallow” had hit.  A number of both passengers and crew were not so fortunate and lost their lives in the disaster.  The exact number of those who lost their lives varied in accounts of the time from a low of 15 to a high of 40. 

The impact of the wreck of the “Swallow” made an impression in the Hudson Valley that lasted for generations and is one that is always mentioned in any recounting of old time steamboat accidents on the Hudson River.  In addition to achieving a lasting fame of sorts in the naming of Swallow Rocks at Athens, the steamer’s name was perpetuated in a dwelling at Valatie, a few miles inland and north of Hudson.  The wreck was dismantled and timbers and lumber from the steamer were used to build a two-story house at Valatie which became known locally as the Swallow House.  As far as I know it is still standing.

Reminiscences of the North River – Major Noah’s reminiscences of olden times, are no less famous for their abundance than for their interest. In a recent number of his Sunday Times he gives some interesting information, showing the progress which has been made in the navigation of the Hudson within the past half century. He says:

In the year 1800, merchants residing a hundred miles or more from New York, and distant from the North River ten or fifteen miles, sent their bed and bedding to the landing from which they were to sail for the city, by a team, and themselves followed on horseback. At the landing, their bed & c., was placed on board the sloop that conveyed their produce to market, and by it they took passage for the city. The horse was put to pasture or in the stable until their return, when the owner rode him home; and by the team that went for merchandise the bed and bedding were returned. Such was the convenience of riding at that day.

Six years afterwards, according to the Major, a company composed of five individuals associated themselves together and built the sloop “Experiment,” for the purpose of “rendering the passage between N.Y. and Albany by water more expeditious, convenient and pleasant to ladies and gentlemen travelling north and south through the State of New York, as well as to promote the interest of those concerned, (as expressed in the words of the agreement,) by building a packet of one hundred and ten tons burthen, for the purpose of carrying passengers only.

The next year, 1807, the company was increased and another sloop was built, which performed the trip between Albany and New York in 27 hours – a remarkable trip in those days. This was the same year that Fulton made his successful trip by steam in 36 hours, and from thence steady progress was on its feet.

The old North River Boat, (says the Times,) in her original construction, had a strange appearance. Her water-wheels were without any houses as at the present day; and had crossheads connected with the piston, instead of the walking beam now in general use. The countryman, when he first saw her from Hudson, told his wife he had seen the devil going to Albany in a saw mill.

The experiment was at one time made to run horse-boats on the River, but signally failed.
​
Steamboats on the North River first performed their trips with wood. Lackawanna coal was afterwards introduced, by which the expense of fuel was reduced from $150 a trip to $30. This was the commencement of a new era in steamboating, hardly less in importance than the original application of steam to boats. – Ex. Paper.

Editor’s Note: The following text is a verbatim transcription of an article featuring stories by Captain William O. Benson (1911-1986). Beginning in 1971, Benson, a retired tugboat captain, reminisced about his 40 years on the Hudson River in a regular column for the Kingston (NY) Freeman’s Sunday Tempo magazine. Captain Benson's articles were compiled and transcribed by HRMM volunteers. See more of Captain Benson’s articles here.
​This article was originally published April 30, 1972.

In the days when the Hudson River was relatively pollution free, every spring shad fisherman could be found with their nets from New York City north to Castleton.  Shad fishermen would frequently venture far from home, going to a spot on the river that was particularly to their liking and there set up their operation.  One of these was Bernard “Nod'' Washburn of Sleightsburgh.  

When I was a boy, "Nod" Washburn was a neighbor of ours.  He was then an old man.  and would fascinate me with the recounting of his shad fishing experiences.  “Nod” also impressed me as a boy with an expression he would use when something especially caught his fancy.  He would say, “By the handle of the great horned spoon!,’’ an expression I never heard anyone else use. 

In the 1880's, 1890's and the early years of this century, “Nod" and his father always fished for the spring run of shad at Cranston’s, later known as Highland Falls.  The steamboat landing at that point was then known as Cranston’s after the large hotel then located there.

The hotel later became what is now Ladycliff Academy, just south of Highland Falls village. 

A Portable Shanty
With the coming of spring, “Nod” and his father would load their round bottom shad boat with nets, floats, supplies and a portable shanty to live in.  They would then leave Sleightsburgh and row over to the Romer and Tremper steamboat dock at Rondout. 

There, their boat and gear would be hauled aboard either the “William F. Romer" or the “James W. Baldwin.”  Leaving Rondout at 6 p.m., they would then sail down the river, as the old timers would say, on the “night boat.”

On the way down river, the Washburns would sleep right in their shad boat that was being carried on the freight deck.  Being known by the crew, they would have their supper down in the crew's mess room.  “Nod" told me he always preferred to go down on the “Romer” because he knew the steward, Henry Bell, would always give them a good supper.  In return, the Washburns always saw to it that Steward Bell and his family received their share of fresh shad for the season. 

They would arrive at Cranston's about 2 a.m. in the lonely morning hours, after making all the landings between Rondout and Highland Falls.  "Nod" said they couldn't get much sleep because at every landing there would be the noise of loading freight, the rumble of the hand freight trucks, and the mate hollering at the freight handlers to hurry up so the steamer could get away on time. 

Leaving the ‘Romer’
After the “Romer” left the dock at Cranston’s, she would pull out in the river and stop, swing out her forward davits, lower the Washburn's boat and all its gear in the river, and then continue on her way to New York City.  "Nod" and his father would then row over to Boat House Point on the east shore, pick out a good location and set up their shanty.  They would then get their fishing gear ready "to get on the make" with the first flood tide.

If the tide was right, they would make their first drift at about 8 or 10 a.m.  Sometimes they missed the first flood tide, and after getting things all set, would be so tired they would sleep until late morning.  They camped and fished off Highland Falls yearly from about the first of April until Memorial Day. 

On nights when the Washburns had shad to ship to New York, they would raise a red lantern to let either William Mabie, the pilot on the “Romer" or Abram Brooks, the pilot on the "Baldwin” know there would be shad to be put aboard the steamer.  When put on the steamboat, the shad were packed in long boxes filled with ice on the freight deck, and the mate would see to it they were well taken care of.  “Nod" and his father preferred the Romer" as their friend "Billy" Mabie[,] the pilot, would always drop a copy of the Kingston Daily Freeman in their boat to be read when drifting with their nets on the flood and ebb tides. 

When the steamboat reached New York, a representative of the New York markets would meet the boat at the Franklyn Street pier and buy the shad.  The mate Henry Kellerman of the “Romer" or the mate of the “Baldwin" did all the financial transactions in the big city.  When the steamboat came back up the  next night, the fishermen would have to be over at the dock at Cranston's to collect their money, which was always right to the penny.  Then they would settle their account with the mate. 

‘True Blue’ Mate
Washburn said never once was anything written on paper.  Everything was left to the honesty of the mate.  Always he was ‘‘true blue," as a boatman would say. 

As spring wore on and it came to the latter part of May, changes would come to the river.  The south wind of summer would begin to blow up through the Highlands, bringing with it the smoke from the chemical works at Manitou; the “Mary Powell” would commence her daily runs to New York; the mosquito[e]s would rise from the marshes in back of Conn's Hook; the water would start to get warm and the shad would start to get soft. 

One morning, “Nod" Washburn's father would say, "Well 'Nod', who comes up tonight?” “Nod" would answer, "Well, Pop, it’s the ‘Romer,’ she went down last night."

His dad would say, "We are going to get her up tonight.  I’m getting homesick for Sleightsburgh.  When I get aboard, I am going up in the pilot house and shoot the breeze with ‘Billy’ Mabie and find out all that we missed since we've been away from Sleightsburgh and Port Ewen.  When we get home tomorrow, I can sleep all day."

Back in Rondout
When their boat was put off the "Romer" in Rondout Creek, the Washburns would just row across the creek to the shore by the old sleigh factory that used to be east of the shipyard, pull their boat up on shore, and go up the hill to their home and go to sleep.  Then, later, they would go back down, unload their boat, and put their shad nets away for another season. 

Back in those days, "Nod" said you could leave your boat down on shore with all supplies in it and nobody would touch a thing — even if it sat there for a week.  So ended another long ago day of shad fishing in the lordly Hudson.

​If you enjoyed this post and would like to support more history blog content, please make a donation to the Hudson River Maritime Museum or become a member today!​

Like many nautical terms, the words “barge” and “scow” are fraught with diverse definitions depending upon timeframes, local usages and individual perspectives and backgrounds. In this way, these words are not unlike “ship,” which in common usage refers to anything big capable of independently making its way across the water. At various times in history, the word ship referred only to sailing vessels with square sails on three masts (as opposed to brigs, barks, barkentines, etc.) while also meaning the collective team of crew and officers of any vessel. Paradoxically, the big steamers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries on the Hudson were never called ships; they were always referred to as boats regardless of size or capability.
 
Historically, the words barge and scow have applied to everything from the flat bottomed sailing barges of the Thames, floating pleasure palaces and funerary boats to the garbage boats of the first half of the twentieth century. Today, these terms generally bring to mind simple floating boxes that carry cargo and are pushed or towed by tugboats. They often suggest craft with flat bottoms and shallow drafts. Let’s take a brief look at what these words have represented here on the Hudson River.

Simple barge-like cargo boats that could be easily built and poled, rowed or sailed appeared in New England and possibly in New York. Some of these, referred to as gundalows, were typically rectangular in plan and featured flat bottoms, inclined ends, retractable masts near the bow and rudders and tillers aft. They were well adapted for carrying lumber and hay and persisted into the late nineteenth century in some rivers.
 
With the inauguration of canals in New York State, specialized boats based on narrow boat prototypes in Europe were introduced. Some of these found their way to the Hudson River. Flat bottomed, horse-drawn packet boats and line boats carried passengers or a mix of passengers and freight. But with a few notable exceptions, they remained in the canals. However, mule-drawn freight barges often plied the Hudson when they were gathered up in the huge steam tows of the nineteenth century and taken with their cargo to New York. These barges and scows featured specialized designs based on intended trades and the building preferences of yards all across New York and the neighboring states. Barges carrying coal were markedly different from those intended to carry perishable cargoes such as grain. They also differ depending upon the dates of policy changes on the canals (squared bows prohibited due to embankment damage) and the dates of canal expansion projects when the dimensions of the canals and the lock chambers were enlarged allowing deeper and wider barges to grow simultaneously. A number of canalboats were fitted with sail rigs for use when these barges reached the open water of large lakes and rivers where animal towing was no longer possible. Hoodledashers, powered canal barges usually towing a second, unpowered barge, became a feature of the greatly expanded NYS Barge Canal of 1915. One, the Frank A. Lowery, was abandoned in the Rondout in 1953 and remains identifiable. Many canal barges have found their way to the bottom of the Hudson and its tributaries, including a rare bifurcated and hinged Morris Canal barge from the nineteenth century.

​Unlike the canals, barges built for use on the Hudson River were less limited in terms of configuration or dimensions. One of the few commonalities among them was the presence of log fenders suspended from the rails along the sides. A large number of box-like barges with living cabins aft were built to carry coal in their holds. Many measured 100 feet in length and 25-30 feet in beam. Some included midship houses for collapsible masts, derrick booms and winches to facilitate loading and unloading. Rectangular scows with inclined ends were built in large numbers to carry deck loads of trap rock, sand, brick and other bulk or non-perishable freight. They often featured deck cabins for their keepers and families and bulkheads fore and aft to contain the material and separate it from the living quarters. Barge hulls were readily used for dredging equipment, pile drivers and derricks used in salvage and construction. Specialized dump scows were built by the New York Sanitation Department with trap bottoms that could release garbage and refuse when outside of New York harbor. The weathered wooden bones of scows and coal barges can be found all along the river as well as in our own Rondout Creek. A prominent derrick barge lies abandoned in Athens.
 
The railroads were major barge builders in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Their ferries, tugs, lighters and barges and car floats (the term used for the long narrow barges that carried rail cars between terminals) were legion and referred to as the “railroad navy.”  All of this floating equipment was necessary to move freight from ships to railroad terminals and to move freight and rail cars between terminals and to customers across a metropolitan region divided by rivers, bays and inlets. Among the specialized barges built by the railroads were the hundreds of covered barges built to transport perishable and high value freight throughout the New York area. These distinctive boats with scow-like hulls and boxy cabins with double barn doors on each side made their way up the Hudson on occasion. A number of them found waterfront retirement homes as shad fishing cabins and marina headquarters when no longer useful to the railroads. The Pennsy 399, built in 1942 for the Pennsylvania Railroad, has been restored and is currently docked in the Rondout.
 
Then there were the early nineteenth century “safety barges” built to transport squeamish passengers afraid of dying in the notorious steamboat explosions or fires that characterized the early years of steam navigation. These were often double decker affairs that looked like steamboats without the paddlewheels or the stacks. A closely related barge type that appears to have grown out of the safety barge model was the hay and produce barge. These craft appear to have proliferated after the Civil War when New York City’s demand for upstate hay became insatiable. Towed in great rafts by paddlewheel towboats and later by tugboats, they were typically double-deckers with shallow draft moulded hulls, tall masts to carry stiffening stays, pilothouses and rudders. In addition to their workaday role carrying hay, livestock and produce, they were popular for inexpensive passenger excursions on Sundays. One example, the Andrew M. Church, built in New Baltimore in 1892, was 139 feet long, carried three decks and was equipped with a rudder and a pilothouse to facilitate tracking and docking. She made her inaugural voyage taking four Sunday School classes to a local picnic ground. Sometimes, these barges were rafted together and towed in pairs or even groups of four. They were still in use carrying hay in the 1930s, and a specialized version, the cattle barge, persisted even longer.

Barges were also built in the nineteenth century for oyster processing and sales, chapels and even municipal bathing pools. Hospital barges appeared in the 1870s initially through the philanthropy of the Starin Line and were towed around New York harbor in good weather to offer fresh air and a change of scenery to invalid patients. Ultimately, the concept evolved into that of a floating clinic set up in disadvantaged communities. The last of these, the 1973 Lila Acheson Wallace is now docked on the Rondout Creek waiting to be repurposed.
 
Specialized lumber barges also made an appearance with moulded hulls based on the hay barge model. They were built with aft cabins and pilothouses and appear to have carried large deckloads of lumber.
 
Another distinctive Hudson River barge is the ice barge. Transporting the blocks of ice cut from the river during the winter months and stored in enormous white warehouses along the river shore to urban centers where refrigeration was essential, these barn like barges with rounded bows and sterns carried distinctive windmills to pump out melt water and derrick masts and booms to facilitate loading and unloading.
 
There is no less variety in the steel barges plying the Hudson River currently. Many are specialized to carry and handle petroleum products, steel recycling, turbines, rock and dry cement. They are typically pushed by diesel tugs but on occasion they are breast towed or towed aft in the nineteenth century manner to facilitate handling and docking. Some are still named for places or members of the respective towing company families and are routinely maintained and painted with pride. Articulated tug and barge combinations (ATBs) represent a relatively recent innovation. They are designed to allow the bow of a tug to precisely fit a notch in the stern of the barge so that when underway, a single unit is created, simplifying handling while avoiding the regulations entailed in designing and operating a comparable motorship.
 
While less visually interesting than their nineteenth century antecedents, today’s barges carry far more tonnage and operate more safely and efficiently.   

Editor's Note: These articles are from 1761 to 1818. ​See more Sunday News here.

March 23, 1761 - New York Gazette (Weyman's) 
To Be Sold. By the Widow Egberts, in Albany.
A good sizable Sloop, used in the Trade between that City and New York, together with her Apparel, & c. As also, a likely young Negro Man, fit for Town or Country

January 9, 1809 - New-York Gazette & General Advertiser 
for sale, The fine and staunch sloop EDWARD, 73 tons burthen, built on the model of the patent brig Achilles, and is supposed to be the swiftest sailor on the North River; has been employed as a packet between Poughkeepsie and New-York, and has elegant accommodations for passengers; her rigging and sails (which are new) in prime order.  She may be viewed in Lent's bason, near Whitehall.  Price low and terms of payment liberal.  Apply to JOHN RADCLIFF.

March 21, 1818 - Mercantile Advertiser (New York, N. Y.)
FOR SALE The staunch sloop KNICKERBOCKER, burthen 93 tons, built of the best materials, 18 months old, well calculated for a coaster or the North river trade.  One half or the whole, will be disposed of on liberal terms.  Apply to WM. R. HITCHCOCK & CO. corner Peck-slip and South-st.

​Last week, we discussed the impacts of cholera and yellow fever on Rondout in the 1830s and ‘40s, but New York City underwent similar epidemics throughout the early 19th century. At the same time, rising population in New York City, as well as efforts to fill in its brackish wetlands and shorelines, was creating a problem with the water table and pollution. Fresh drinking water was becoming more and more scarce in the growing city and natural water sources were increasingly contaminated by sewage and industrial wastes. 

Enter a pie-in-the-sky idea for yet another enormous engineering marvel (New York’s canals being the previous pipedreams turned reality) – the Croton Aqueduct. The idea was simple – pipe clean water from the relatively unspoiled Croton River through gravity-fed aqueducts to New York City. Aqueducts were certainly not a new idea – the Romans had invented them, after all – but to construct something on this scale was a rather startling idea.

Following the cholera epidemic of 1832, Major David Bates Douglass, an engineering professor at West Point and one of a new school of civil engineers, surveyed the proposed route in 1833. Bates was an excellent surveyor, but had proposed no practical plans for physical structures, and so was fired in 1835.
​
As early as 1835, before construction even began, the project was gaining national attention. An article from the Alexandria Gazette (Richmond, VA) from December 25, 1835 discussed the plan, writing, “In carrying into effect the contemplated plan of supplying the City of New York with water from the Croton River, an aqueduct, we believe, is necessary across one of the rivers. If this is so, the experience gained to that city and the county in submarine architecture, by the works now going on at the Potomac Aqueduct in connexion with the Alexandria Canal, will be invaluable.” 

​December, 1835 gave New York City another reason to want abundant supplies of water – the Great Fire of New York of 1835 wiped out most of New York City and bankrupted all but three of its fire insurance companies. The fire would spur a number of reforms, including an end to wooden buildings (a boon for the Hudson Valley’s brick, cement, and bluestone industries). But many wondered, had the aqueduct already been in place, if more of the city would have been saved.

John B. Jervis, who cut his teeth on the construction of the Erie, D&H, and Chenango canals as well as early railroads, became Chief Engineer on the Croton Aqueduct project in 1836, and construction began the following year.
​
The Croton River was dammed and thousands of laborers, many of them Irish, commenced digging tunnels by hand and lining them with brick. On August 22, 1838, the Vermont Telegraph published a good description of the work: “The Aqueduct which is to bring Croton river water into the city of New York, will be 40 miles long. It will have an unvarying ascent from the starting point, eight miles above Sing Sing to Harlem Heights, where it comes out at 114 feet above high water mark. A great army of men are now at work along the line, and at many points the aqueduct is completed. The bottom is an inverted arch of brick; the sides are laid with hewn stone in cement, then plastered on the inside, and then within the plaster a four inch brick wall is carried up to the stone wall, and thence the top is formed with an arch of double brick work. It will stand for ages a monument of the enterprise of the present generation.” 

On November 11, 1838, a newspaper in Liberty, Mississippi reported on a bricklaying contest – “In a match at brick-laying in a part of the arch of the Croton Aqueduct, between Nicholson, a young man of Connecticut, and Neagle, of Philadelphia, the latter was a head when his strength gave way, having laid 3,700 bricks in 5 ½ hours. Nicholson continued a half hour longer, when he had laid 5,350. The work was capitally done.”

On September 12 of that same year, the Alexandria Gazette chimed in again, noting, “There are full four thousand men employed on the line of the Croton Aqueduct, which is to supply the city of New York with pure and wholesome water. About six of the sections will be completed this fall. The commissioners will now proceed to contract for the ‘Low Bridge’ across the Harlem river, according to the original plan. The whole, when finished, will be the most magnificent work in the United States.” 

The Low Bridge the Gazette referred to was originally planned to go under the Harlem River, but this was quickly abandoned. Instead, what is now known as the High Bridge was constructed in stone – its arched support pillars strongly reminiscent of Roman aqueducts. High Bridge was designed by Chief Engineer John B. Jervis and completed in 1848. It remains the oldest bridge in New York City.

Indeed, the High Bridge and the whole aqueduct warranted a lengthy newspaper article – almost the whole page – August 27, 1839 edition of the New York Morning Herald. Cataloging the extant Roman aqueducts around the world, defining the difference between an aqueduct and a viaduct (aqueducts carry water across water – viaducts carry water across roads), and in all comparing the Croton Aqueduct, and especially the High Bridge, quite favorably to all its predecessors.

But not all was well in construction. The Morning Herald wrote extensively of the aqueduct again on September 4, 1839 claiming, “owing to the gross mismanagement that has prevailed in the office of the water commissioners, the expense of the work has been twice as much as it ought to have been, and after all it will be very defective in many of its most important points; and independent of the immense trouble and the large sums of money that will perpetually be required to keep the whole of it in repair, we have not the least doubt that, when the work comes to be proved by passing a large body of water through it, at least one-sixth part of it will have to be pulled down and rebuilt.”

The article continues on in that vein for quite some time – the principal complaint besides cost being that, unlike the Romans (who also used better quality brick and cement), the Croton Aqueduct would be largely hidden from sight, and the iron pipes would “burst upon the first pressure,” claiming that the commissioners “wanted to oblige some friend who was an iron founder, and to give him a fat contract, by which he could get rid of a quantity of old metal.”

Of course, the editor of the Morning Herald seemed to have ulterior motives, as he negatively connected the Croton Aqueduct with President Martin Van Buren’s campaign for reelection in July of that year, and blamed politicking for the delays and purported graft. He also seemed to hold a grudge – the Morning Herald reported endlessly about the aqueduct, but also about purported mismanagement. No other newspaper from the era reported similar claims. However, an article in the Richmond Gazette (Richmond, VA) from July 28, 1842, does hint at the enormous cost of the project, but brings up the 1835 fire and its enormous cost as a justification for the price.

At 5 A.M. on June 22, 1842, water began flowing through the Croton Aqueduct. The water commissioners, aboard the small vessel the Croton Maid of Croton Lake, went with it. The 16 foot long, four-person barge was especially built to traverse the tunnels and continued until High Bridge, which was not yet completed. On June 27, the Croton Maid was carried across the river and the commissioners continued back into the aqueduct, arriving at the York Hill Reservoir to a 38 artillery gun salute.

The following day, the Board of Water Commissioners submitted a report to Robert H. Morris, the Mayor of New York City. It was printed in the New York Herald on June 25, 1842.

“SIR – The Board of Water Commissioners have the honor to Report, that on Wednesday, the twenty second instant, they opened the gates of the Croton Aqueduct at its mouth, on the Croton Lake, at 5 o’clock in the morning, giving it a volume of water of 18 inches in depth.

“The Commissioners, with their Chief and Principal Assistant Engineers, accompanied the water down, sometimes in their barge, ‘the Croton Maid of Croton Lake,’ and sometimes on the surface of the Aqueduct above.
“We found that the water arrived at the waste gates at Sing Sing, a distance of 8 miles in 5 hours and 48 minutes: here we suffered the water to flow out at the waste gates until 12 o’clock, M., when the gates were closed on a volume of about 2 feet in depth. The water then flowed on and arrived at Mill River waste gates at a quarter past 3 o’clock, a distance of 5 miles.

“It was there drawn off through the waste gates for half an hour, and was, at a quarter before 4 o’clock, allowed to flow on. We continued to precede it on land, and to accompany it in our boat, in the aqueduct, to Yonkers, a distance of 10 miles, where it arrived at half past 10 o’clock at night. Here we permitted it to flow at this waste gate until a quarter past 5 o’clock in the morning, when the waste gates were closed, and it flowed on and arrived at the waste gate on the Van Courtlandt farm, a distance of five miles and a half, in three hours and a quarter. Here we permitted it to flow out of the waste gates for two hours when the gates were closed, and it flowed, in two hours and twenty minutes, a distance of about four miles and three quarters, down to the Harlem river, where the Commissioners and their Chief Engineer emerged to the surface of the earth in their subterranean barge at 1 o’clock, June 23d.

“The average current or flow of the water has been thus proved to be forty-five minutes to the mile, a velocity greater, we are happy to say, than the calculations gave reason to expect.

“It is with great satisfaction we have to report, that the work at the dam, on the line of aqueduct proper, the waste gates and all the appendages of this great work, so far as tried by this performance, have been found to answer most perfectly the objects of their construction.

“In conclusion, we congratulate the Common Council of the city, and our fellow citizens, at the apparent success of this magnificent undertaking, designed not for show, nor for luxury, nor for glory; but for health, security against fire, comfort, temperance [note: a reference to the habit of mixing New York water with alcohol to make it safe and palatable to drink] and enjoyment of our whole population – objects worth of a community of virtuous freemen.

“With great respect, we remain, your obedient servants, Samuel Stevens, John D. Ward, Z. Ring, B. Birdsall.
​
“P.S. – We expect the water will be admitted into the Northern Division of the Receiving Reservoir on Monday next, at half-past 4 o’clock, P.M. at which time and place we shall be happy to see yourself and the other members of the Common Council.”

In fact, the water did not begin to fill the Manhattan reservoirs until July 4, 1842. The official celebration was reserved for October 14, 1842. The New York Herald reported the following day, “The celebration commenced at daylight with the roar of one hundred cannon, and all the fountains in the city immediate began to send forth the limpid stream of the Croton. Soon after this, the joyous bells from a hundred steeples pealed forth their merry notes to usher in the subsequent scenes. At and before this moment, over half a million of souls leaped simultaneously from their slumbers and their beds, and dressed themselves as for a gladsome gala day – a general jubilee.”

Workers were given the day off and an enormous parade, with representatives from every official organization in the city followed, ending at City Hall Park, where an enormous fountain was flowing. Again, the New York Herald, “For several days previous, thousands of strangers had been pouring into the city from all parts of the country, to see and join in the procession, until there must have been at least 200,000 strangers in the city, making an aggregate with the resident inhabitants of half a million of souls congregated in our streets.”

The opening of the Croton Aqueduct marked a period of transformation for New York City. Already one of the most important port cities in the nation, the abundance of clean water meant that urban and industrial growth could continue apace. The aqueduct was expanded several times, but in 1885 the “New Croton Aqueduct” was constructed. The Old Croton Aqueduct continued to be used until the 1950s, and is today a park – many of its old aqueduct bridges are now pedestrian bridges, as had been suggested during their original construction. The New Croton Aqueduct is still in use, still bringing Croton River water to New York City.

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                                                       Poison in the River
Large Amounts of Sewage Filth is Being Dumped into the Hudson at Albany
[By telegraph to the Herald}
Albany, N.Y., Oct. 17, 1888 - Danger threatens our river towns and possibly the metropolis. It arises in the wholesale contamination of the Hudson River with tons of festering filth now being dredged from the Albany basin.

For years complaint has been made of this basin as a plague spot. Once a valuable part of the canal system, it has become gradually filled up and useless. The filling was chiefly the silt from the spring freshets, the refuse from mills and factories, and, worst of all, the washings from the city sewers.

When the health of the city was threatened by the accumulated nastiness the State Board of Health rose up and demanded that something be done. The city officials joined in the demand and an appropriation was secured to clear out the basin and restore it to the canal system.

                                  A Large Mass of Sewage Deposit
An amount of filth, nearly equal to 150,000 cubic feet, is to be removed, and dredges are now at work upon it. Sanitarians recommended that steps be taken to compost this filth as it lay, but nothing of the kind was done. It is simply scooped up, loaded into scows and tugged off down stream.

The workman say these scows are dumped some distance below the city. This leaves tons of putrid matter to be spread out along the shores by the tide or by every slight freshet, or to be carried on down stream by the current.

The danger arising from such a proceeding is that the filth is likely to contaminate the water to an extent which should fill with alarm all residents of cities and villages whose water supply is taken from the river.

                                        Contaminating the Ice Crop
Nor does the danger stop there. The same source of contamination threatens the ice crop. The officials of the State Board of Health agree that this danger is even greater than the other. The ice crop is gathered for distribution over a large territory and can easily be contaminated by sewage poison. Physicians recognize ice gathered from impure water as a frequent source of enteric troubles, and warn the public against it as strongly as against the use of polluted water itself.

The work of dredging out the Albany basin is well under way, and unless prompt action be taken by the proper authorities, a large increase in typhoid troubles may result in the section of country to which the filth is likely to be carried by the river.

In these days of pandemics, it is sometimes helpful to look back at the past to see how people coped with them at the time.

Although epidemics were not uncommon in New York State throughout the 18th and 19th century, the cholera epidemics of 1832 and 1849 seemed to hit especially hard. Cholera is a waterborne bacterial infection that usually attacks the small intestine and is often fatal. Transmitted through the water supply, especially through water contaminated with fecal matter, cholera causes severe diarrhea and dehydration and is sometimes called "Blue Death," because of the grayish tone skin can take from extreme dehydration. ​

Prior to the 1850s, few cities anywhere in the U.S. had made any organized attempts at sanitation and drinking water supplies were often contaminated by the raw sewage most municipalities dumped right into waterways, or allowed to build up in underground pits and cesspools for outhouses. 

In account of the 1832 cholera epidemic at Poughkeepsie, Dr. Sherrill Hunting, author of numerous medical texts, described the symptoms thusly [editor's note: paragraphs have been added to assist with readability of this historic text],

"About the time when the Epidemic Cholera appeared in this village [Poughkeepsie], in a confirmed manner, some changes took place in the character of diseases, and in the situation of the health of the inhabitants, which subsequent observation showed to be precursory symptoms of the cholera.

"A langour and uneasy sensation was complained of by many, and diseases of the stomach and bowels were very common. At length cases of diseases occurred, attended with symptoms of unusual severity, and somewhat novel; they excited a great deal of anxiety and alarm, and finally engaged the attention of the public authorities.

"As has generally been the case, professional opinions were divided, as to the nature of the features of the new complaint that occurred. During the prevalence of the epidemic, every person in the village seemed to be affected with the primary premonitory symptoms; all had a preternatural red tongue, which sometimes was covered with a whitish slimy moisture; the pulse was small, quickened and rather chocked, it seldom beat free and easy, and in some cases it was very obscure, while the person was about and apparently in good health. In most persons, there was an uneasy sensation of the alimentary canal.

"What was considered the premonitory stage was a diarrhoea, pain and uneasiness of the stomach, nausiea or vomiting, and a difficulty of breathing, as though there was a deficiency in the supply of oxygen.

"When the symptoms passed this stage, the features constituting the formed state of the disease, have often been enumerated, and were about the same here, as were noticed to have existed in other places. Connected with the aforementioned symptoms, they consist of pain and uneasiness of the bowels, and more particularly of the stomach; a weighty or vacant sensation, a tight fullness of that organ, diarrhoea, vomiting, the discharge generally watery, whitish, and fluculent, sometimes dark brown or reddish; spasms generally more or less severe across the stomach, extending to the extremities; in some cases there are no spasms; coldness of the extremities and of the body; pale, purple or leaden colour of the skin; hands and feet moist; fingers shrivelled, withered and soaked in appearance; features livid; eyes sunken and surrounded with a dark zone; voice small, feeble, sepulchral; respiration very laboured; tongue in the moderate cases, red, furry, covered with whitish slime, or a white erect scurff, sometimes entirely clean and red; in violent prostrated cases, tongue pale, cold, blueish; pulse in mild cases, sometimes tense, generally in all, soft, small, slow, gurgling, nearly imperceptible, or entirely so.

"Some have had excessive thirst, others very little - no one case is marked with all those symptoms, but more or less of them are present to constitute the disease; but the invasion is not always in a regular train, sometimes it attacks suddenly, without the premonitory symptoms, except a red tongue and an altered pulse; this I believe always attends."

- From: An essay on epidemics: as they appeared in Dutchess county, from 1809 to 1825; also, a paper on diseases of the jaw-bones; with an appendix, containing an account of the epidemic cholera, as it appeared in Poughkeepsie in 1832 by Sherrill Hunting (1783-1886), published in 1832. 

Sadly, Dr. Hunting's methods of treatment were the common ones at the time - he bled the patients and administered an emetic, or something to make the patient vomit. In severe cases, sometimes "external warmth and friction" were used to try to bring the patient around. He did note that in some severe cases, the blood drawn "remained black and unchanged in the bowl; it seemed to have lost the property of attracting oxygen from the atmosphere, as blood generally does when thus exposed." But dehydration was the real culprit with cholera, and in a time long before the use of intra-venous solution to re-hydrate patients, there was little period doctors could do once a patient was infected. 

You can read Dr. Hunting's book yourself, along with the accounts of individual patients he oversaw. A digitized copy is available online courtesy the US National Library of Medicine. There are reports from the period that the book sold very well in Ulster County as well as Dutchess.

Cholera is spread when infected people contaminate water supplies. Rondout was particularly susceptible to these sorts of diseases due to its role as a busy port. A New York State Department of Health report from 1911 recalled, "Owing to the easy means of intercourse with the seaboard, Kingston has suffered severely on several occasions from epidemics and plague. In 1832 a cholera visitation was felt and in 1849 a repetition caused a fearful loss of life and a great depression in business. In 1852 it broke out again but the lesson learned in 1849 was so well taught and the city was so well cleaned that the epidemic gained no foothold and was soon stamped out." 

The Jeffersonian Republican, a Pennsylvania newspaper, reported the national numbers in an article entitled "The Cholera" on Thursday, July 12, 1849. After the headline of cases and death (outlined above), the very first words of the article were, "The cholera has been fearfully prevalent at Rondout, the terminus of the Delaware and Hudson canal, where a large number of vessels are constantly lying, taking in coal." 

A few days later, on July 16, 1849, the Oneida Morning Herald, based out of Utica, NY, reported, "The little village of Rondout, Ulster Co., situated at the terminus of the Delaware and Hudson canal has suffered greatly. So far there have been 60 cases and 27 deaths by cholera. Rondout is a village containing about 2,000 inhabitants."

​Despite the deaths, several local residents pitched in to help. Dr. Abraham Crispell, a descendant of New Paltz French Huguenots, moved to Rondout in 1849 to start his medical practice. Almost immediately he was confronted with the cholera epidemic. He later served as a surgeon in the Union Army during the Civil War, working in South Carolina and Buffalo before returning to Rondout at the end of the war.

Daniel B. Stow was another Rondout resident commended for service during the cholera epidemic. A harness-maker, he and three others "performed the heroic work of burying the dead and administering to the needs of the afflicted," according to A History of Ulster County, Volume 2. He was married to Emily B. Delaney the same year, 1849. After the epidemic, he opened a his own harness making shop. 

The cholera epidemic had a negative effect on the D&H Canal, however, as scores of boatmen, lock tenders, and other canal workers left the area to search for work elsewhere. The D&H Canal Company move 50,000 fewer tons of coal than estimated.

In all, over 80 people died in Rondout alone. 

​1849 was a momentous year for Rondout, and not only due to the cholera epidemic. It was the first meeting for the election of officers for the village (election held May 1, 1849). At their first meeting, a fire company was established for Rondout and taxes were raised to outfit it. They also established a board of health to "adopt suitable precautions against the danger of cholera" and set up the store house of the steamboat Emerald as a hospital. 

Perhaps most interestingly was that the following year, in 1850, the rural cemetery of Montrepose was founded - a direct result of the deaths from the cholera epidemic.
As with many cities in the mid-19th century, urban churchyard cemeteries were becoming overcrowded, and public health officials worried about the spread of disease from miasma. Rural cemeteries were a popular, park-like alternative, and Montrepose was no exception. Many bodies were exhumed and reburied at Montrepose.

The need for the new cemetery became clear decades later. On March 30, 1909 the Kingston Daily Freeman reported that workmen at the site of the Holy Spirit Church found a skeleton where one was not expected. The church yard graves had previously been exhumed and moved to Montrepose. "An old man who stopped to watch the workmen digging said he could remember hearing folks tell that when the cholera epidemic was prevalent in Rondout, scores of bodies were buried at that spot with little ceremony. As soon as people died they were carried on wagons and dumped into holes dug in the ground and the drivers hurried away for more corpses." 

For a town of a little over 500 people to have 80 deaths just a few years after two other epidemics must have been shocking. But it was the beginning of the end for epidemics at Rondout. Although several others broke out over the years, often introduced by steamboat, the losses were never as severe as in 1849. 

Today, as officials in New York City are contemplating turning once again to Hart Island to bury those who have died from coronavirus, and as ships and individuals undergo quarantine, it can be helpful to remember that people in the past weathered such disasters as well. 

Stay tuned next week for a follow-up article on sanitation and water quality projects begun in response to disease outbreaks and epidemics like the cholera epidemic of 1849. 

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