​Editor's note: The following article was originally published in the New York Tribune, November 19, 1858. Thanks to Contributing Scholar Carl Mayer for finding, cataloging and transcribing this article. The language, spelling and grammar of the article reflects the time period when it was written. {Ton is used to measure the weight of objects, while tun is used to measure the volume of liquids. Source: Engram]

SHIPMENTS OF ICE TO SOUTHERN (U. S.) PORTS AND TO FOREIGN COUNTRIES.
The business of exporting ice from places of its natural formation to southern ports and countries, was first commenced by Mr. Frederic Tudor of Boston. He began operations in the Fall of 1805 by sending agents to the West Indies to procure information, and soon after determined to make his first experiment in that region. But, when he sought to charter a vessel for his proposed cargo, he found no one willing to receive on shipboard so strange an article as this new commodity in commerce. Hence, he purchased one expressly for the purpose — the brig Favorite, of about 130 tuns. During the following February (1806) he shipped the first cargo of ice ever exported from this country, and probably from any other. He obtained it from a pond on the grounds of his father, in Saugus, which then formed a part of Lynn. It was cut with axes and saws and was taken in wagons to the vessel which was loaded at Gray's Wharf, Charlestown. From that time to this[,] Gray's Wharf has continued to be the center of the wharves from which ice is shipped in the port of Boston. This first shipment was dispatched to St. Pierre, Martinique, and, although Mr. Tudor went out with it, it resulted in a considerable loss, (stated at about $4,500.) This happened in consequence of the want of ice-houses, and the expense of fitting out two agents to the different islands, to announce the project and to secure some advantages. But a greater loss arose from the dismasting of the brig in the vicinity of Martinique.

The second shipment was made in 1807, and was to the amount of 240 tuns, per brig Trident to Havana, and this too was attended with a heavy loss. The enterprise, however, was continued until our second war with Great Britain, when the embargo was laid, and put an end to our foreign trade. To this period, 1812, Mr. Tudor had confined his operations mainly to Martinique and Jamaica, and had received no profit from them. In 1815, after the close of the war, Mr. Tudor recommenced his business by shipments to Havana, under an arrangement with the Cuban Government, by which certain privileges and a monopoly were granted. Thus he continued his undertaking, and extended it — in 1817 to Charleston, S. C.; in the following year to Savannah, Ga.; and in 1820 to New-Orleans. In the mean time it had been tried again (by other parties) at Martinique and St. Thomas, and failed; and by Mr. T. at St. Jago de Cuba, where it also failed after a trial of three years.  As late as 1823 successive disasters attended the business, which much impaired both the finances and health of its projector; but after an illness of two years he was enabled to prosecute his trade and to extend it to several of the Southern States and to various portions of the West Indies, In 1832 his whole shipment of ice amounted to 4,352 tuns, which was taken entirely from Fresh Pond, in Cambridge. On the 18th of May, 1833, he made the first shipment of ice to the East Indies, per the ship Tuscany, for Calcutta; and subsequently he commenced exportations to Madras and Bombay. This first cargo to Brazil was sent out to Rio Janeiro in 1834. The trade was almost wholly carried on by the originator until about the year 1836, when other parties engaged in it; and it was also established in other northern seaports, but at none has it been so extensive as at Boston. In fact the immediate vicinity of Boston is extraordinarily favored by nature for this business, since it contains numerous excellent and large ponds, and thus it can obtain supplies at very cheap rates, which advantage, with others, has kept this item of commerce at the port where it was instituted. Some years since the amounts shipped from New-York were relatively greater than at present. The quantity now annually consumed in New-York and vicinity is so vast, and the demand for it so active, that there is little or no inclination among the ice dealers to go south for better markets,

The following table exhibits the decennial progress of the aggregate export trade (coastwise and foreign) from Boston:
In 1805,   1 cargo ...                130 tuns
In 1815,   6 cargoes ...         1,200 tuns
In 1825,   15 cargoes ...       4,000 tuns
In 1835,   45 cargoes ...     12,000 tuns
In 1845,   175 cargoes ...   63,000 tuns
In 1855,   363 cargoes ... 146,000 tuns
At present, as has been the case for many years, the coastwise trade is considerably more important than the foreign. The ports of our southern cities are in several respects the best markets for ice. The quantity shipped to them is usually twice as much as that shipped abroad. However, there is proportionally a greater profit from the foreign trade, unless attended with unforeseen losses. The total amount of ice shipped from our northern ports to our southern cities cannot be stated correctly except by personally collecting statements from each firm or dealer in the trade. Vessels engaged in the coastwise trade are not required by law to enter or clear at the customhouse unless they have foreign goods or distilled spirits on board. The quantity thus reported as shipped from Boston during 1856 was 81,301 tuns; during 1857, 75,572; and in 1858 to August 31st, 42,468 tuns. The amount shipped and not reported exceeds 20,000 tuns yearly. We give the following summary of the reported shipments this year [1858]:
                                    Jan. & Feb.     March & April  May & June     July & Aug.      Total
Philadelphia ... tuns           .  .                    .  .               300                  700               1,000
Baltimore  ..............            .  .                    .  .                  675                  875               1,550
Washington, DC ....       200                   214                   .  .                  275                 689
Richmond ..............            .  .                    .  .                    .  .                  300                  300
Wilmington ............            .  .                   420                   .  .                    .  .                  420
Charleston ............       1,822                   777              2,520                  830               5,949
Savannah .............           563                   505                   .  .                  310               1,378
Florida, 4 Ports .....        346                   500                 380                    .  .               1,226
Mobile ...................            760                1,942                 250                  636               3,588
New Orleans .........       6,844             15,064                 550               2,739             25,200
Franklin .................            .  .                       244                   .  .                  120                  364
Galveston ..............             275                1,450                   .  .                    .  .               1,725
TOTAL ...................           10,810             21,104              4,675                6,879            42,483
[Some numbers were difficult to read. That may be one reason the totals are not quite accurate.]

According to The Boston Shipping List, the quantity shipped during July last to Southern ports, which was not entered at the Custom House, amounted to about 10,000 tuns, and this was sent principally to Philadelphia and Baltimore, and a considerable quantity was also sent to these ports during August.

Part of these shipments to southern ports are sent by railroad into the interior. This Summer we clipped a paragraph from The Knoxville (Tenn.) Whig, which mentioned the arrival at that place of a freight car through from Savannah in thirty-three hours, filed with ice from Boston. Its editor congratulates the citizens on being able to cool their parched tongues during the Summer with ice thus imported, when the mildness of the last Winter had prevented them from collecting it in their own vicinity.

California, some years ago, received considerable quantities of ice from the New-England States. In 1850 the shipments from Boston were — to San Francisco, 1,299 tuns; to Sacramento, 260; and in subsequent years larger amounts. But most of the ice contained in that State has been obtained from sources on the Northern Pacific coast and other places, and chiefly, we learn, from the Sitka Isles (Russian American possessions). Of the actual whole amount we have no information save by inference from a tabular statement of imports at San Francisco during the last quarters of four successive year, viz: in last quarter of 1853, 1,459 tuns; 1854, 375; 1855, 1,870; and 1856, 1,020 tuns. In a San Francisco paper of July 1st of this year a statement of imports at that place from the 14th to the 28th of June mentions 1,128 tuns of ice, but nothing further is specified about it.

The exports of ice to foreign countries were not specifically mentioned in the annual Treasury Report on Commerce and Navigation previous to 1848. The following table, compiled from the reports since that time, exhibits the estimated value, at place of shipment, of the amount shipped to foreign countries in each fiscal year ending June 30; also the number of tuns for the last three years:
 
Years.              Tuns.               Value.
1847-48 ........                          $75,517
1848-49 ........                            95,027
1849-50 ........                          107,018
1850-51 ........                          106,305
1851-52 ........                          161,086
1852-53 ........                          175,056
1853-54 ........                          202,118
1854-55 ........  41,117             170,791
1855-56 ........  43,150             191,744
1856-57 ........  51,593             219,816
 
These “values" are small, indeed, but it must be borne in mind that they represent only the cost of the cargoes when placed on board. It is, perhaps, impossible to make a reliable estimate of the sums realized for the same when delivered to eager consumers in tropical countries. To the original cost must be added the much greater expense for the shipment out and return trip, and a liberal estimate for profits to all interested.
 
Amount and Cost Value of Ice Shipped to Foreign Countries for Two Fiscal Years ending June 30:
 
                                                1855-6                                     1856-7
Countries.                  Tuns.               Dols.               Tuns.               Dols.  
Cuba                            8,399               33,666             8,846               25,849
Porto Rico                      460                    931                767                   1,681
British West Indies     3,608               11,503             3,009                 8,365
Danish West Indies        860                 2,050               638               ..1,550
French West Indies        641                 1,659                409                 1,002
Hayti                                                                                   50                     150
New-Granada               1,312                 3,247                845                 2,172
Venezuela                        228                   588                610                 1,431
British Guiana               1,177                 3,000                807                 2,142
French Guiana                                                                    15                      45
Dutch Guiana                 212                    529
Brazil                           2,607                 7,790             2,873                 8,990
Buenos Ayres             1,774                 4,909             1,365                 3,528
Chili                                                                               1,135                 3,513
Peru                             6,754               21,351              5,731               17,921
Equador                         730                 2,555             1,760                 5,535
England                          291                    657
Spain                              128                    290
Gibraltar                         187                    514
British East Africa          976                 2,931
British East Indies       9,236               82,165             18,531             124,262
Dutch East Indies         1,146                 3,661             1,997                 6,066
China                                 371                 1,295                310                 1,001
Manila and P. I.                 560                 1,700                517                 1,500
Australia                         1,485                 4,683                596                 1,800
Canada                                 5                        50             ....... 2                      20
British Am’n Colonies         3                        20                777                 1,293
Totals                            43,150               191,744           51,598             219,816
 
The next table is a statement of these exports by districts (no previous returns on this point have been published by the Treasury Department), and shows that nearly the whole were exported from Boston:
 
                                                1855-6                                     1856-7
Districts.                      Tuns.               Value ($).         Tuns.               Value ($).
Portland                            175                    515                      
Saco                                                                                   777                 1,293
Boston                         41,414             187,374           48,888             214,109
Salem                                                                                 15                      45
New-York                      1,556                 3,805             1,916                 4,349
Detroit                                  5                      50           ..   .......2                      20
                                ________        _________      ________          _________
Totals:                         43,150               191,744            51,598             219,816
 
The succeeding table exhibits the destination and amount of the foreign exports of ice [in tuns] from Boston during the last two calendar years, and is compiled from the semi-official custom-house returns published in the Shipping List of that city:
                                    1856.               1857
Havana                       5,801               3,624
Cuba, indef                    314               5,382
Matanzas                       605                  454
St. Jago                          445                  . . .
Cardenas                       422                  . . .
Manzanillo                       57                  . . .
Remedios                         10                  . . .
Porto Rico                      181                    49
Kingston                      1,594               1,952
Barbados                       877                  250
Port Spoin [sic]              704               1,209
Nassau                           180                  180
St. Thomas                    793               1,037
Martinique                      211                  494
Guadeloupe                   . . .                   183
Vera Cruz                       . . .                    103
Bermuda                          40                  . . .
So. America                    375                  . . .
New-Granada                390                  . . .
Aspinwall                        557               1,125
Rio Hache                         10                  . . .
Porto Cabello                   50                  . . .
La Guayra                        218                  753
Demerara                      1,100                  625
Brazil                                   43                  220
Pernambuco                    257                  250
Bahia                                 375                  . . .
Rio Janeiro                     1,762               2,512
Buenos Ayres                  530                  . . .
Montevideo                     893                  . . .
Valparaiso                        614                  557
Peru                                1,194                  592
Callao                             6,744               2,150
Guayaquil                      6,023                  810
Liverpool                        . . .                      298
Malta                              . . .                      430
Egypt                              . . .                      761
Cape Town                    . . .                      498
Mauritius                        . . .                      654
East Indies                  14,330               8,843
Ceylon                            467                 1,352
Melbourne                      596                  . . .
Sidney                            520                  . . .
Totals: [sic]                  44,419             37,400
[Actual Totals:             49,282             37,347]
The corresponding amount for the present year, up to Sept. 1, [1858], is 25,764 [tuns], being a considerable decrease from last year.
 
For many years after its commencement, the business of shipping ice was decidedly of a bothersome character. The domestic business alone involved much expense and vexation — in devising and experimenting with instruments for cutting ice, machinery for storing it, and storehouses for preserving it. The outlay and work connected with shipping it was considerably greater. Ice-houses were required abroad as well as at home. Ship owners objected to receiving ice on freight, fearing its effect on the durability of their vessels and the safety of voyages. Peculiar arrangements were required for lowering it into the holds of vessels. Long-continued and costly experiments were made to ascertain the best modes of preparing vessels to receive cargoes. Various methods and materials were successively adopted. Formerly the holds of vessels were sealed up at the sides, bottom and top, with boards nailed to joist ribs secured to the skin of the vessel, and with double bulk heads forward and aft. The spaces thus formed were filled with refined tan, rice hulls, meadow hay, straw, wood shavings, or like materials. These spaces were made of a thickness proportionate to the length of the voyage, and with reference to the season. The immediate surface of the ice was covered with the same materials, excepting tan.

On the 4th of May, 1838, a patent for an improved method of packing and stowing ice was granted to Mr. Tudor, the projector of the trade. The improvement consisted simply in filling the spaces usually left between the separate blocks of ice, with any non-conducting material (such as saw-dust, chaff, pulverized cork, &c.), it having been found that by so doing the ice would be preserved from melting for a much longer period than usual. The interstices between the blocks would admit air, and whenever it might be of a temperature above the freezing point, of course the ice would melt.

In 1840 and 1841 the Patent Office authorities had under consideration a somewhat similar claim for a patent, which was denied. Beside its bearing on this subject of the ice-business, the case illustrates some features of Patent Office procedure. The following is a summary of it: — On March 20 [or 26]th, 1840, John F. Kemper, of Cincinnati, applied for a patent for “improvements in the manner of constructing vessels for the stowing and carrying of ice, and also for an improvement in the manner of stowing the same in “vessels and ice-houses.” No objection was made to that part of his claim relating to the novel construction of vessels for the transportation of ice, but the Commissioner (Hon. Henry L. Ellsworth), decided that he was not entitled to a patent for his manner of stowing ice, which consisted in placing all of the blocks edgewise, that is[,] upon their narrowest side. From this decision an appeal was taken in February, 1841, under the Act of March 3rd, 1849, to the Chief Justice of the District of Columbia, and this was the first appeal taken under that act to that court. On March 22d following, Chief Justice Cranch confirmed the decision of the Commissioner. The Commissioner, in defense of his decision, said:

"It had long been common to place blocks of ice edgewise in vessels for transportation, although it was not known that there was a very beneficial result from so doing, and although there was no custom of placing all the blocks edgewise.”
In illustration of his view of the claim he said:

“If apples keep best on end, a patent would not be granted for parking them thus. If cider keeps better by placing the bottles horizontally rather than perpendicularly, this could not be patented, as both methods are used. In neither case is there anything new.”

As the attorneys of the claimant had referred to the Tudor patent, the Commissioner remarked concerning it thus:
"This fact (i. e. about the air melting the ice,) was a discovery in distinction from an invention, and was not patentable. But Mr. Tudor contrived a mode of preventing the melting by filling up the interstices with non-conducting material, which was an invention, and, as such, the subject of a patent. Yet, if previous to that time, the interstices had been filled up with any non-conductor for some other purpose, and Mr. T. had merely discovered that it would prevent the admission of air, and thus the melting of the ice, he would not have been entitled to a patent. If the contrivance or invention patented by Mr. Tudor was not new at the time the patent was granted, then it only shows that the patent ought not to have been granted, but it is no argument in favor of the present claim.”

The Commissioner further said concerning the Tudor patent, ‘‘the novelty claimed in that case appears questionable.” He also ruled that Mr. Kemper's application covered two distinct inventions, which cannot be included in one patent. Judge Cranch in his decision referred to the Tudor patent thus:

"No judicial decision is produced affirming the validity of that patent, and it seems to me to rest upon very doubtful grounds; but it is to be presumed that the Commissioner who issued it was satisfied that the means used were a new invention.”

At the present day, in shipping ice for voyages of considerable length, saw-dust is used almost exclusively. It is placed immediately between the ice and the skin of the vessel. That used at Boston is obtained from Maine, and before its use for this purpose was entirely wasted at the saw mills, and [by]  falling into the streams[,] occasioned serious obstructions. Its average value as delivered at Boston is $2.50 per cord, and several thousand cords are required yearly. Not only do the sawmills find customers for their saw-dust which they are glad to be rid of, but the planing-mills likewise dispose of their shaving with which they formerly were bothered. The companies engaged in shipping ice from Boston now annually expend about $25,000 for shavings, saw-dust and rice-chaff. Thus these small things which were formerly a subject of cost to get rid of, now produce income.
There is a considerable variation in the original cost of the ice-crops of successive Winters, caused by the character of the seasons, which may or may not be favorable to securing ice. There is also a difference in the cost of stowing ice on board vessels caused by the greater or less[er] expense of the fittings required for voyages of different duration, or by difference of season when the shipments are made. Last year, 1857, the average cost of ice at Boston when stowed on board was estimated at $2 per tun, which is about the ordinary rate in common seasons.

Shippers of ice usually pay the expenses of loading and discharging their cargoes; and hence the freight money earned by a vessel is passed over to its owner or charterer without cost or deduction. The average rate of freights paid for ice shipped at Boston (for both coastwise and foreign ports) has been stated, in a report to the Board of Trade, to be about $2.50 per tun clean and clear to the ship owner. Vessels bound into the Gulf of Mexico take from 50,000 to 60,000 tuns annually, from which their owners derive on the average $120,000 freight. The receipts for a ship's cargo of ice to India are from 10 to 15 per cent of the earnings for the whole run of the ship out and home. It is considered that the ship owner generally derives as much profit from the business as the owners of the cargo, and often more.

The weight of ice for shipment is usually determined at the wharves immediately before being put on board, by scales constructed for that purpose; and this single operation settles the weight to be paid for by the party for whose account the ice is shipped, the amount due for freight on shipboard, for transportation to the wharf, and that which is to be received by the owner of the ice.

In the export as well as in the home trade there is always a large loss of ice from melting, breaking, etc. The waste varies according to circumstances, and ranges from 30 to 60 per cent. To deliver a shipment in India requires a voyage of 16,000 miles, occupying four or five months, during which the equator is crossed twice; and if one-half of the original cargo is delivered, it is considered a successful delivery.

The existence and increase of the export ice trade has materially benefited the commercial marine of Boston. Formerly, a large portion of the vessels employed in the freighting trade sailed from that port in ballast to southern latitudes, where they obtained cargoes of cotton, tobacco, sugar, rice, etc.; and the earnings of their return trips covered the expenses out and home. Now, something can be earned for the transportation of ice to those places where freighting vessels ordinarily obtain cargoes. The ice trade has generally been unsuccessful to places where profitable return freights cannot be obtained, because a considerable amount must be paid for conveying the ice to those places, and this it cannot bear; also because southern places which do not produce valuable exports are usually unable to consume expensive luxuries. It is probable that the ice trade of Boston has been one of the principal means of preserving to that city almost the whole of the American trade with Calcutta; and that it would effect an important increase of the Boston trade with China if that country was in a more quiet condition.

The exportation of American ice to England has now almost wholly ceased. The main reason for this is that the London and Liverpool dealers obtain large supplies from Norway more quickly and at cheaper rates than from any other foreign source. The cost, when delivered in the Thames, is from four to five dollars per tun. The great difference in the price has rendered the American article unsalable, although it is superior in quality to the Norwegian. Another reason is, that a difficulty has always existed about obtaining suitable storehouses in London; and this with other drawbacks has frequently been productive of much loss to shipping. Some years ago the St. Katherine's Dock Company built a dock warehouse expressly for ice, but it proved to be an imperfect protection. Mr. Lander, who first introduced the Wenham Lake ice into London, and Mr. Gould, who succeeded him in a large business, were pecuniarily ruined by the trade, though both were shrewd and experienced men; and several London ice dealers became bankrupts [sic] at subsequent periods.

In some of the cities of Italy the use of ice is more general among all classes than in any other portion of Europe. In Naples, Catania and the adjoining towns[,] the sale of ice and snow preserved in the caverns of Vesuvius has long been a considerable branch of trade. A recent letter from Turin refers to the warmer weather there, and contains the following:

"There is an abundance of ice, and the price is exceedingly low. The vendors do not weigh it, but give a large block for two or three sous [a French coin]. Generally speaking, it is perfectly clean, and as transparent as crystal; it is cheap enough to be in common use among the poorer classes. One sees fruit-women eating their dinners by their stalls, with a large lump of ice in their drinking jugs. The evenings, until 10 or 11 o'clock, are nearly as warm as the days; and the demand for frozen drinks in the cafés is prodigious.”
​
We have but few items relative to the trade among other nations. The actual importance of the business in any community where it has been established, may best be estimated by a consideration of the result which would follow from the immediate discontinuance of it. In the United States a complete failure of the ice crop for any reason would occasion a positive loss of many millions of dollars. But no such disaster can be anticipated. So long as the earth endures[,] the seasons will continue their circling succession, and each will forever be characterized by the reproduction of its peculiar blessings.

The preceding part of this article describes the general features of the ice business as carried on alike, or nearly so, by all the companies and firms dealing extensively in the article, whether they supply the market of New-York, or Boston, or other large cities; and we will now proceed to give separate accounts of the business in each city.

Nearly all the ice used in New-York and Brooklyn is furnished by two extensive joint-stock companies — the Knickerbocker and the New-York — which, as they now exist, were organized about three years since by the union of several of the principal firms in the business. By thus consolidating their capital, and placing the direction of the various departments of the business in the hands of a few experienced persons, there is such a command of facilities as almost to defy competition.

The Knickerbocker Ice Company was formed of three leading firms —  viz., Messrs. John  D. Ascough & Co. (previously known as the Knickerbocker Ice Company), Alfred Barmore & Co., and C. R. Wortendyke & Co. — and its business dates from March 1, 1855. Its capital is $900,000, divided into 9,000 shares, at a par value of $100 each. Its officers are: Richard T. Compton, President, and Wm. J. Wilcox, Secretary. Its office is at No. 432 Canal street.

The New-York Ice Company was organized in 1856, from the former New-York and Brooklyn Ice Company, (which had been formed a year before, with a capital of $130,000) and from the Independent and the People’s Companies. Its present capital is $500,000, divided into 2,000 [sic: 20,000?] shares, having a par value of $25. It is incorporated under the general laws of the State of 1855, and its affairs were managed by nine Trustees, &c. Its officers are: A. Thorp, President; Wm. Jackson, Secretary and Treasurer. Its office is at No. 440 Canal street. Its stock is pretty widely distributed, and perhaps not more than one third is held by ice-dealers.

The amounts gathered by these Companies are so immense that whatever is provided by other parties seems small in comparison, even if it is, of itself, a large quantity. The greatest amount collected last winter, outside of these Companies, was taken, as we are informed, at Athens and Catskill, by a dealer formerly interested in the New-York Ice Company, and was somewhat more than ten thousand tuns.

According as the businesses has increased, attempts have been made in each successive season to secure a greater supply for the New-York market. The whole amount actually obtained during the last four seasons has been about as follows:
In Winter of 1854-'5 .... 200,000 [?]  tuns.
 "          "  1855-'6 ........ 363,000         "
 "          "  1856-'7 ........ 500,000          "
 "          "  1857-'8 ........ 500,000          "
The greater part of the last season was quite unfavorable, much more so than the preceding, or a greater quantity would have been secured. Until near its close, the ice-dealers expected a very short yield; and some offered 75 cents a hundred pounds, to be supplied.

The sources of these supplies are situated at considerable distances from the city, and mainly at different points upon the Hudson River, or near it. From the following statements, one may form an approximate estimate of the amount of ice that now is housed (or is sought to be housed) annually, from each source:

The Knickerbocker Company have ice-houses with storage capacity as follows: at Rockland Lake, houses covering four acres, and capable of containing 120,000 tuns; at Highland Lake (Fort Montgomery), 30,000; at Esopus, 23,000; and at Rhinebeck and other points on the Hudson, over 60,000 tuns. Rockland Lake is at a distance of 33 miles from New-York, and about a mile from the Hudson River. Its shape is somewhat elliptical, and resembling an egg; its length is about a mile; its circumference two and three-fourth miles and twenty rods; and its area 285 acres. Its area is indeed much less than than is generally supposed, even by those familiar with its appearance — and we have heard doubts expressed as to the correctness of its surveyor's report. Its surface is 146 feet above high tide in the Hudson. It is surrounded by a graceful sweep of hills. To the north of it is Verdrietege's Hook — a bold headland, which rises majestically from the river, just below Haverstraw Bay. This lake consists of unusually pure water, and the ice obtained from it is as clear and solid as possible. Its outlet is one of the sources of the Hackensack River. Highland Lake, near the Hudson (almost half a mile from it), is opposite Anthony's Nose, and a few miles below West Point. It has not been accurately surveyed, and its exact area is unknown, but it is not probably more than one third of that of Rockland Lake. Its vicinity is called Fort Montgomery, after the old fort of that name of Revolutionary celebrity, which was there erected. Near it was old Fort Clinton, of equal renown.

The New-York Company obtain most of their ice from the upper part of the Hudson. Last winter they gathered in Athens about 75,000 tuns; at Catskill, some 60,000; at New-Baltimore, 12,000, &c. This company owns Crystal Lake at New-Rochelle, from which about 15,000 tuns were taken last winter, though the usual yield is more. This lakelet has a cutting surface of about forty acres, and the storehouses there erected cover an acre of ground. This company also obtain[s] ice from near New-London, Conn., as well as other sources in this State. In March last, several of their storehouses at Athens were destroyed by fire, involving a loss of over 25,000 tuns of ice.

The conveyance of ice to this city is effected entirely by barges, towed by steam-tugs. These are of peculiar construction, and in several respects are very different from those formerly used for the same purpose. A few years ago they were built to carry two hundred tuns — but now to carry six hundred. On each barge there are usually three hands, regularly employed for the season. In taking the ice out from the storehouses and loading the barges, from fifty to sixty men are sometimes engaged, and a portion of these are employed permanently. The Knickerbocker Company has 14 barges, with an aggregate capacity of 6,000 tons. The New-York Company has twelve barges, with aggregate capacity of 5,000 tons, half of them old and half new. The latter cost from $12,000 to $13,000. The companies sell at wholesale to the ice dealers, who come with their wagons to the barges, and obtain their supplies. Ice-dealers who are stockholders, in either or both companies, pay the same rates for ice as those who have no stock in them. At the barges all ice is sold by weight, excepting the shovel ice. The prices of this year are — From 100 to 2,500 lb, 30 cents per 100 lb; for 2,500 lb and upward, 20 cents per 100. Shovel ice is sold by the basket (holding a bushel or so), and the price for that quantity is 25 cents.

The New-York Company sells at wholesale entirely, and thus has no wagons nor horses except those used at the storehouses. The Knickerbocker Company has a retail business, supplying its customers daily like any ice dealer, but this part of its business is much more extensive than that of any single firm. It has 100 or more wagons, of which about 75 are in regular use; 50 in New-York and 25 in Brooklyn. The number of wagons and horses kept by dealers depends, of course, upon the extent of their business. Most of the dealers have from 12 to 20 horses; some not more than two or three. The whole number of dealers is in the vicinity of 40. The list given in Wilson's Business Directory for this year, comprises 23 names, beside the companies, which have in all ten offices at their barges, &c.; but, as just intimated, there are a considerable number of extensive dealers whose names should have been given. The whole number of ice wagons used in the city is over 300; of which about one-sixth, perhaps more, are drawn by two horses. The most noticeable feature about the ice-wagons is their solidity of construction and consequent weight. A single wagon averages from 1,700 to 1,900 lb; and some weigh 2,100 lb. A double wagon will average from 2,500 to 3,000 lb. The average cost of the single wagons is $185, and of double wagons of the same class, $200; for spring wagons the prices are $200 to $250.

The following is a comparison of the retail rates of this Summer and of the last. It is a statement of the number of pounds of ice furnished daily during the season, to families, counting-houses, offices, etc., for certain fixed sums:
                                           1858.              1857.
For 6 cents ................... lbs. 8 to 10           12
For 9 cents ................... lbs. 14 to 15         20
For 12 cents ................. lbs.  ---    20         30
For 15 cents ................. lbs. 25 to 30          --
The prices of larger qualities are compared thus:
                                             1858.              1857.
For 50 lb  daily ................... 26 cts.             20 cts.
For 100 lb  daily ................. 50 cts.             38 cts.

The great hotels, and the ocean and river steamers are the largest consumers of ice; and, after these, come the butchers, fish dealers, confectioners, &c. These classes of customers are charged for ice by the tun, as delivered, viz: in 1858, $3.30; in 1857, $3. The consumption of ice at the very largest hotels probably averages, for the whole year, as much as two tuns a day; in Summer amounting to three tuns or more daily, and in Winter to only a tun or sometimes less. The Cunard and other ocean steamers take twenty tuns or more for each trip.

For the successful prosecution of the ice-dealing business in New-York, quite a large amount of capital is (or hitherto has been) requisite, because of the system of giving long credits to customers. During this season, however, the ice dealers have to some degree introduced a system of collecting their bills from families oftener than formerly — say monthly, and in some cases weekly. The independent drivers (i. e., those having each but one or two wagons) have hitherto been the only class that collected once a week or month. Part of the butchers pay monthly, while others (of a higher class) pay quarterly, or as often as their customers pay them. A great many families do not pay their ice bills but once a year; but this numerous class is among the best portion of Ice customers.

Some of the New-York ice dealers have been in the business for over ten years, and a few for a longer period. These have fairly earned whatever competence they have thereby acquired. As a general matter, persons do not remain long in the business; they find that the profits of one season are counterbalanced by the losses of another; and with that natural love of change which affects all Americans, they engage in some other pursuit, that promises a more uniform remuneration for equal labor.

Senator Preston of South Carolina said of Massachusetts that, though she was the most prosperous State in the Confederacy, she literally exported none of the products of her soil but her rocks and her ice. The succeeding tabular statement concerning the ice business in Massachusetts was prepared in 1855, and its statistics refer mainly to the preceding Winter. It lacks much of being a complete return for that period, and still more of representing the present condition of the business in the State:
                             Tuns of Ice
Countries        prepared for market.      Value  annually.          Capital invested.      Hands employed.
Essex ................     13,900                                 $76,200                       $25,000                       65 
Middlesex ........ 366,200                                550,400                       660,700                    362
Bristol ...............      16,200                                   10,000                         16,000                       10
Plymouth .........          800                                     2,500                          3,000                         8
                        -----------------                   ----------------            -----------------         ----------
                        397,100                                   $639,100                     $704,700                     445
 
Every county of Massachusetts contains several beautiful sheets of water from which ice may be gathered. At short distances from Boston there are a score or more ponds of considerable size, from which are yearly obtained the vast quantities of ice used in that city, and exported from it. If these were at greater distances in the interior, there would be additional cost for bringing their ice into the city, or to the wharves for shipment, which would enhance its retail price and diminish its consumption. As matters are, the transportation of ice to the seaboard from the towns where it is now obtained, forms one of the largest items in the business of some of the railroads entering Boston.

The County of Middlesex has much the largest share of the ice business of the State, as is evident from the preceding imperfect table for 1855. The returns for 1850 show that the value of the ice obtained in Middlesex, “as an article of merchandise,” was $148,000; but this did not cover one-half the value of what was that year gathered in the county, even if we suppose that the merchandise ice was all returned, which probably was not the case, for the amount collected for private use was certainly not less than that exported. In 1853 several more ponds and streams were operated on than there were three years before; and from these new sources there was taken in 1853 a larger amount of ice than, according to the returns, formed the entire Middlesex crop of 1850. The county contains[,] with the exception of Wenham Pond, all the most celebrated ponds from which ice is taken in Massachusetts for exportation. These we will enumerate and briefly describe. The most noted are Fresh and Spy Ponds (and with these, adjoining the latter, is Little Pond), which cover an area of about 200 acres, Until about 1846-7, the ice used in the Boston trade was almost wholly (say nine tenth) taken from these ponds, and mainly transported from their houses to Charlestown and Boston on the Fitchburg Railroad, which passes midway between them, and the branches constructed from it to them. Fresh Pond, the most important, is about five miles north-west from the State House in Boston, and half a mile from Mount Auburn Cemetery. It is pleasantly nestled among hills of a moderate height, and ties within the limits of Cambridge, Watertown and West Cambridge, about one third in each. It is one of the principal resorts around Boston at all seasons, the route to it being one of the most attractive drives in the city's suburbs. In Summer, boating and fishing are the chief amusements. From a description of the scene at this pond at the time of gathering ice, written in 1855, we condense the following:

"On a pleasant afternoon of a Winter's day, hundreds of sleighs may be found there filled with well-dressed persons of both sexes, full of life, on the qui vive to witness the wonderful operations before them. If they are making their first winter visit, the sights before them are strange indeed — the silvery pond glaring under the oblique rays of the sun; the dark blue water from which the ice has already been removed; the curious and huge buildings that fringe its shores; the hundreds of laborers with scores of horses that almost darken the pond; the methods of removing the snow and snow-ice; of cutting the marketable solid, of floating it through narrow canals, and of storing it by steam power. All these operations fill the crowds of spectators with admiration, and they feel paid if they have made a journey of thirty miles merely to witness them. It is quite common to cut and, by steam-power to house, two tuns a minute, and this is only a moderate rate; and when a sufficient force is at work together, six hundred tuns are often stored in a single hour. When there are several parties on a single pond, each laying up ice at this rate, the scene cannot but be exciting.”

Spy Pond, in West Cambridge, is a mile N. N. W. from Fresh Pond, and is somewhat smaller than that. About a mile north of Spy Pond is the southern end of Mystic Pond, or Medford Lake, which stretches northward for a mile or so, and lies partly in West Cambridge, Medford and Winchester. Horn Pond, in Woburn, one and a half mile north from Mystic Pond, is surrounded by evergreens, and is so remarkable for its beauty as to attract many visitors from a distance. Souhegan Lake, or Reading Pond, in South Reading, eleven miles north of Boston, is large and beautiful, and the source of Saugus River. Spot Pond, in Stoneham, eight miles north of Boston, is a beautiful sheet of soft and pure water. It covers an area of 283 acres, and is 143 feet above high-water mark at Boston. Beside these, are Eel, or Long Pond, in Melrose, (formerly north part of Malden); Malden’s Pond and Asabet [sic: Assabet] River, in Concord; Sandy Pond, in Groton; Mill Pond, in Townsend;  —  all noted for their ice crops, and there are several others, though as yet less celebrated places.

Wenham Lake, in Essex County, was for a consid[er]able period of much celebrity for the ice, resulting from it having been used for export to London, and having received the “special approbation” of Queen Victoria. It is otherwise called Enon Pond, and received this name about 1636 [WIKI says 1638], from the circumstance that the first sermon in the town was then preached on its border by the celebrated Hugh Peters[,] Minister of Salem, from the text: “At Enon, near Salem [Aenon near Salim] because there was much water there,” (John Iii., 23.) It is about a mile square, and is probably the most beautiful pond in the county, presenting an exceedingly romantic appearance. It is six miles north of Salem, and twenty from Boston. In the town of Salem there are three pretty ponds, one of which, Spring Pond, on the border of Lynn, has a surface of 60 acres.

But we have not space to notice severally all the valuable sources whence ice is obtained in large quantities around Boston. Silver Lake, Plympton, Plymouth County, is one of these. Jamaica Pond, which formerly supplied Boston with water, is another, and from which 10,000 to 12,000 tuns of ice are gathered yearly to supply Roxbury, Brookline, &c.

During the last ten years the aggregate storage capacity of the ice-houses at the ponds in the vicinity of Boston has been more than doubled. In 1847 the total (exclusive of the ice houses on the wharves at Charlestown and East Boston, in which ice is stored for short periods) amounted to 141,332 tuns, of which at Fresh Pond 86,732 tuns; at Spy Pond, 28,060; Little Pond, 2,400; Wenham Pond, 13,000; Medford Pond, 4,000; Horn Pond, 4,000; Eel Pond, 2,000; and at Saumer’s [SP?] Pond, 1,200. In 1848 the total was 159,600 tuns, showing an increase in year of 18,228 tuns, of which at Fresh Pond, 2,228 tuns; at Spy Pond, 3,000; Silver Lake, Plympton, 5,000; and at at Souhegan Lake, South Reading, 8,000. In 1854 the total capacity was 300,000 tuns; and there has since been some increase.

In January, 1856, the report of the Boston Board of Trade stated the following: “The money permanently invested in wharves, ponds, ice-houses, tools, &., for carrying on the ice business in and near Boston amounts to about $600,000. This, of course, does not include the working capital, nor the money invested in ice-houses abroad. There are twelve Companies engaged in the business, employing in the Winter, when all are at work, 1,200 to 1,500 men. The business has trebled within ten years.”

The domestic consumption of ice in Boston and vicinity has, for the last few years, been about 60,000 tuns annually, supplying 18,000 families, hotels, stores, and factories, and employing (in 1856) 93 wagons and about 150 horses in distributing it. In 1847 the domestic consumption was but 27,000 tuns.

The amount of ice yearly exported from Boston is usually two to three times greater than that used in supplying the city (in some years a still larger proportion). This export business brings in vastly greater receipts, and usually proportionate profits. In a subsequent and separate account we will give a full exhibit of this export trade.

The following is a summary of the whole ice business of Boston as reported to the Board of Trade in January, 1857, by Messrs. F. Tudor (the originator of the trade) and T. T. Sawyer, formerly Mayor of Charlestown: The gross sale, at home and abroad, approaches a million of dollars. In the preceding year, 1856, there was paid for railroads and wagons, $100,000; to laborers, $160,000; towns for taxes of ice-privileges and ice in store, $1,500; wharves, $20,000 to $25,000; aggregate so far, $281,500 to $286,500;  for materials used in shipment and otherwise useless, $25,000; for freight on ice shipped, $365,000 -— or in all over $570,000.

The ice-dealers in Philadelphia have for the least two or three years done very well. In the season of 1857, the companies and firms on the Schuylkill, 25 in number, obtained 120,500 tuns. This was a somewhat greater quantity than was obtained in 1856; and its quality was also far better. It ranged from 6 to 18 inches in thickness, and was very clear and solid. Even in the best seasons, Philadelphia imports considerable quantities of ice from Boston.

Baltimore and Washington, in favorable seasons, secure in their respective vicinity a large portion of the ice used by their inhabitants; but, in unfavorable seasons, the greater portion is imported from Boston, &c.; and, in all seasons the best and thickest ice, such as is used in the first-class hotels, is likewise brought from northern lakes.

To Charleston, Mobile and New-Orleans, great shipments of ice are now made for each season with much regularity, particularly to the latter city, where there is at least $200,000 invested in ice-houses, wharves, &c. To some extent ice has been sent to New-Orleans, and to other towns on the Mississippi River, in flat-boats from Illinois and other northern States which have access to that river.

At Chicago, the principal supply of ice is obtained from Lake Michigan; but a portion is received from sources in the interior.

We have now presented the principal facts concerning the business of gathering ice in this country, and of preserving it until used, with the details of its consumption in the principal cities. In another article we shall give an account of the export trade, coastwise and foreign, and trace its progress to the present time.

In this age of the world, each succeeding generation employs some means of increasing the pleasures of living that were unknown or unused by its predecessors. In regard to the subject of this article, Ice, we cannot say, with correctness, that its use was not known before the present century; but it is quite certain that it never came into general use in civilized nations until within a very recent period.

The domestic use of ice, to a limited extent, is very ancient. Among the Greeks and Romans, various means were used to preserve snow and ice to cool their drinks; but their methods were simple and of little account in comparison with those of the present day. By freezing mixtures[,] the ancient Romans cooled their Tiberian and other wines that the poet Horace so graphically describes. In some tropical countries, particularly in India, several processes of forming ice have been known for many centuries; so that those who had this knowledge could, with but little trouble and expense, readily prepare ice, and enjoy its benefits.
​
About the middle of the sixteenth century, the custom of cooling drink with saltpeter was introduced into Italy. Afterward, the method of increasing the cold of snow and ice by a mixture of saltpeter became common. In the fore part of the seventeenth century, ice-cups were introduced, and fruits frozen in ice were brought upon the tables. Soon after this, the French began to freeze the juices of all savory fruits for desserts.

In this country, ice was used for domestic consumption previous to the present century. An account before us, referring to the year 1799, mentions that some farmers in Maryland and Pennsylvania then had ice-houses, and it is probable that farmers in other sections of the country also had them. In course of time, the custom of housing ice in the Winter increased, and yet very slowly, because it was regarded as luxurious, or at least was practiced only by the wealthy. But, during the period of the last twenty years, we may safely say that the general consumption of ice, especially in our American cities and large towns, has increased in a rapid ratio annually.

Ice is now considered as one of the inexpensive comforts of life, desirable to be secured during the warm months by every family; indeed, it is a necessary article, and one of the most economical for any household. Hence, the use of it at the present period in this and many other cities is general with all who can afford it, as the saying is, or, in fact, with all who properly appreciate its value.

In regard to the actual extent of the ice business throughout the United States at the present time, we have but little reliable information, our facts being confined to the Cities of New-York and Boston and a few other large places. In that part of the Census of 1850 which relates to the "occupations of the free male population over fifteen years of age” (the statistics of which embraced about half of the free population above that age), we find the following statement of persons reported as ice dealers:
New-Hampshire.......   2
Massachusetts... ....  30
New-York................  88
Pennsylvania..........  72
District of Columbia..  2
South Carolina.........  2
Louisiana................. 13
Mississippi...............   1
Kentucky..................   2
Ohio.........................   5
Indiana.....................   2
Total....................... 219

At the close of 1854, a gentleman of Boston, writing on this subject, stated the following:
“Already, from all that we can learn, there is invested, in this branch of business, in all parts of the United States, not less than from $6,000,000 to $7,000,000. And in ten years, judging from the past, it may be twice as great as at the present time. The number of men employed more or less of the Winter, in the business in Boston and vicinity, is estimated at from 2,000 to 3,000, and in the whole country there are supposed to be from 8,000 to 10,000 employed.”

In 1856, one familiar with the business compiled the following estimate of the annual domestic consumption of ice in the larger cities, to which was added this remark:
“In the smaller towns, especially in those where water is introduced by reservoirs, the consumption of ice is about two-thirds as great in proportion to their population.”
Boston....... tuns 60,000
New-York.......  300,000
Philadelphia...  200,000
Baltimore.......    45,000
Washington...    20,000
Charleston....    15,000
Mobile...........    15,000
New Orleans.    40,000
St. Louis........    25,000
Cincinnati......    25,000

As will be seen from subsequent statements, the amount consumed in this city [New-York], at the present time, is much greater than in 1856, and so probably in other cities.

The common uses of ice are so well known that it is unnecessary to particularize them. It is a general cooler of most articles of food and drink. One writing on this subject of ice, in illustrating its usefulness, says, and rather enthusiastically: "Take a large city that uses aqueduct water, how could the inhabitants use it for their daily beverage unless it were cooled, for  six or eight mouths of the year? If they could subsist without ice, so they could without fresh meat, and without fruit. But a people highly civilized must more than subsist; they must live — they must live comfortably; they must have the necessaries and some of the luxuries that a gracious Providence has cast into their path. Fruits of the most delicate kind, and flowers are preserved fresh and blooming by the use of ice.” Every year many extensive cargoes of fruits, vegetables and provisions, being surrounded with ice, are shipped to tropical countries, where otherwise these articles could not be sent. The benefit of ice to steamers and passengers is very great, in enabling them to take on board a large supply of fresh provisions, and keep them fresh for the entire voyage, and has almost entirely abolished the nuisance of live stock at sea. Many fishermen carry ice with them to the fishing banks, and return with their fish as fresh as when first caught. There are several branches of manufactures [sic] which derive aid from ice. In some towns of New-England, engaged in the oil business, Winter-strained oil is no more heard of, it being now strained better in Summer than in Winter, by means of a freezing mixture made with salt and ice. Ice has its medical uses. It is a tonic, and almost the only one that in its reaction produces no injury. In its common use for beverages, taken in moderate quanties [sic], it serves to keep the system in such healthy condition that food gives it more strength. Frequently in India the first prescription of a physician to his patient is ice, and it is sometimes the only one.
Almost the whole returns from the ice business are a gain to the country. If there was no demand for ice, it would be worthless; no labor would be used in collecting it, no expense would be incurred in preserving it. Because it is in regular demand, the business of gathering it gives employment at fair prices to a great number of men at a season of the year when employment is the scarcest, and to many persons throughout the whole year. In the preservation of the ice there is a demand for a large stock of building materials, and this promotes the trade in those articles. This preservation also calls into use some articles for filling store houses — such as sawdust, rice-chaff, &c. — which would otherwise be valueless. The transportation of ice not only requires the labor of men, but brings about the construction of vehicles, vessels, &c.; and, like the other branches of the business, gives additional activity to many departments of productive industry. In the exportation of ice, ships frequently receive it for freight, and earn their expenses and profits when they could not otherwise obtain any cargo. Thus it is seen that the money and labor expended in the ice business contributes in a very considerable degree to the development of other interests. The amount directly expended by the public for ice as delivered, not merely rewards the ice-dealer for his labors and the investment of his capital, but more or less benefit all who have in any way been connected with the work of collecting, preserving and selling it, and those who are dependent upon their labor.

Fortunes have been made in the ice business and others have been lost. It is a department of human effort that requires the strictest attention and the most judicious management. Formerly, the trade, though not suffering from competition, was so now [sic: new] as not to be well understood; now, the ice dealer is liable to suffer by the active competition that he meets on all sides. Still, as the use of ice is constantly increasing, both at home and abroad, and as the crop is often a partial failure, he who thoroughly understands the business will find it about as safe and remunerative as any other.

The bodies of water from which ice is taken are, on that account, regarded as very valuable, and are taxed as the property of the abutters. Their valuation has advanced as the business has increased, and the value of real estate in their vicinity has augmented in a similar ratio.
When the land surrounding a valuable ice-pond is owned by different parties, it is customary to determine the exact proportion of the pond to which each is entitled. The rule is, that each owner has the right to the same proportion of the contiguous surface of the pond as the length of his shore line is to its whole border. At some ponds near Boston, where the ice privileges are very valuable, the boundaries of each party are accurately marked. This system of division originated at Fresh Pond, Cambridge, Mass., in the year 1839. Owing to the great quantity of ice that was secured there and the absence of any arrangement as to boundaries, differences arose among the proprietors of its borders as to where each should take ice. This induced them to agree to distinct boundary lines, and the matter was referred to three Commissioners —Messrs. Simon Greenleaf, Levi Farwell, and J. M. Felton, who settled it on the plan just mentioned. This settlement was made by partition deed, executed by all the owners, and recorded in the registry of deeds of Middlesex County. Published maps were also placed in public institutions and private hands. These maps show the direction and length of the boundary lines and the area of each owner. This arrangement proved to be of great advantage to the parties, enabling them to secure more ice than they otherwise could.

At Rockland Lake, some years ago, there were three companies, previous to their consolidation, that took ice from it, and though they had boundaries, &c., they would open and take the ice together, from agreement, since it was found that the opening of a side by one of the parties would frequently allow the wind to open the whole of the Lake.

The instruments and machines used in securing ice are especially constructed for the purpose. As the business increased, various implements were devised, and different methods were adopted, which were successively superseded by better ones. Those now used on the ice-field are the wooden scraper, snow-plane (or snow-ice plane), ice-marker, ice-plow (or ice-cutter), ice-saw, ice-splitting bar, ice-hock, &c. The plane costs about $75, the marker about the same, and the plow (of which there are different sizes) from $60 to $90. Of the latter there are several, say half a dozen, for each large ice-house. At West Cambridge, Mass., there is an establishment extensively engaged in the manufacture of the implements; and at Rockland Lake there is another. These and their uses are subsequently described. Their importance in saving labor is very great. In the Winter of 1854-5, it was estimated that by means of the ice-plow, or cutter, the reduction in the cost of cutting the ice in the neighborhood of Boston was equal to $15,000 per annum. By the labor of forty men with twelve horses, some 400 tuns can be cut and stowed away in a single day.

The yearly crop of ice is collected mainly during the latter part of January and the greater part of February. In the vicinity of Boston, February is the month most relied on for the bulk of the annual yield. At Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, ice is secured in the early part of the Winter, as far as then formed, and afterward, if possible. The New-York ice-dealers generally secure most of their crop in January. About the middle of that month those experienced in gathering ice can estimate approximately the value of the Winter’s crop. The portion of an ordinary Winter which is really favorable to securing ice is comparatively short — generally not more than twenty days in the season. Hence, during this time the ice companies are very active; and in some locations near Boston they sometimes carry on their operations both day and night. This is more particularly the case when there is a prospect of unfavorable weather. In this region such rapidity has but rarely been necessary.

Occasionally, while the ice is forming in December and January, the icemen pass over its surface, after it is thick enough to bear their weight, and break holes in it, if there is no snow on it. In this way the formation is accelerated by the overflow of the water, and the ice itself forms faster at the bottom. The surface is kept as free as possible of snow, because this greatly retards the formation. Ordinarily snow falls before there has been cold enough to form ice of suitable thickness. If this occurs when the ice is four or more inches thick and the snow is not heavy enough to sink the ice, it is usually removed by the “snow-scrapers,” which are made of wood and are drawn by horses, one or two to each scraper — in New-York, generally two horses, On some ponds in Massachusetts, from which several different parties take ice, it was formerly, if not now, customary to pile up the snow on their respective boundaries. This plan is objectionable, since the  snow, by its weight, tends to sink the ice, and in New York is not practiced, but the snow is entirely removed. If the snow falls so heavy as to bring the water above the surface of the ice[,] it congeals with the water into what is termed “snow-ice,” which is not fit for market but is removed by another scraper, called in New-York the “snow-plane,” in some parts of Massachusetts the "ice-plane." This is made of iron, with a sharp cutting instrument of cast steel attached to its bottom; it is drawn by two horses and a man rides upon it. It is guided by inserting its “guides” into grooves previously made with the "ice-marker.” It takes off a roll of snow-ice about two inches thick and twenty-two wide, which breaks up and is scraped off in the same manner as dry snow, or it may be removed into the water from the surface of which the ice has already been taken.

These preliminary operations are often very costly. Frequently, after much expense has been incurred to remove a body of snow or snow-ice, the weather becomes warm, and melts the ice, and this previous labor is wholly lost. And, on the other hand, if it is not done, and the cold continues, there will be little or no increase of thickness to the ice, which is equally a disaster. 

The cutting of the field of ice may be commenced when it has formed to a thickness of six inches, or more. If its thickness is less than six inches, it cannot be cut by the machines with the use of horses, since it will not bear their weight. The ice companies of this city usually commence cutting when the thickness has reached seven inches, unless there is, at the time of being ready to commence, a prospect of there being colder weather immediately, and consequently of an increase to the thickness. In the Winter of 1855-'56, the ice cut for the New-York market had an average thickness of fifteen inches, and considerable quantities were twenty-two inches; in 1856-'57, the blocks were from twelve to fifteen inches thick; but the last Winter was a very poor season, and the average thickness of the ice was still less. For the retail trade thin ice is preferred on account of the diminished waste in cutting it up. Of the ice cut around Boston, the thickest is always reserved for foreign shipment, because of its greater solidity, or compactness and durability.

Having cleared the field of whatever snow and snow-ice there was upon it, and being otherwise ready for cutting, the next process is to mark it off into blocks of uniform size by the "marker." The first part of this process, however, is actually done by hand, viz: the cutting of two straight grooves (one at right angles to the other) in the ice, to which all the other grooves produced by the marker are to be parallel. A man cuts these first grooves in the same way that a carpenter draws straight line on a board with a pencil, or nail, alongside his mule; he lays down a board or plank as a guide, and draws alongside of it, through the ice, a chisel sufficiently sharp and large to cut a groove of the desired size, and continues to extend them until they reach across the pond, or as far as wished. (When the plane is previously used to remove snow-ice, grooves of this sort, or one of them, are cut by hand before the plane is used, and in that case, as previously remarked about the plane, the marker forms grooves for the guides of the plane.) This marker is drawn by horse. To it handles are attached, and a man holds and guides it as he would a plow. With it he marks and cross-marks the field. The grooves formed by the marker are parallel, which is effected by its having a guide that is placed in the groove last made. When they have been made in one direction, others at right angles with them are produced in the same manner. When the ice is quite thin, this marker cute it sufficiently deep to allow of its separation by the ice-splitting bar into the blocks that are stored in the icehouses; but this is not often the case. The size of the blocks for both New-York and Boston markets, for a long period, was 22 inches square. This size, we believe, is still used at Boston. For the last two or three years, the New-York Companies have cut to the size of 22 by 27 inches, the extra amount for length having been found more convenient for packing in wagons.

The next and the main process is the use of the plow (or cutter, as it is otherwise sometimes called), which is also drawn by one horse, and follows directly through the grooves made by the marker. This instrument is generally similar to the marker (and both remind one of a carpenter's plow) but its knife or chisel is longer, or rather its chisel is compounded of a series of small cutting chisels, one succeeding another and deepening the groove. At one passage it cuts about two inches deep (each small chisel cutting about one-forth of an inch); and at each succeeding passage another equal amount. For ice of different thickness, there are plows of different sizes — chiefly 9 inch and 12 inch — the latter serving for a thickness of 20 inches, When the field of ice has been cut through in one direction by the plow, it in cut through in the other grooves, at right angles; and thus it is all cut into regular blocks.

These are then completely separated by sawing slightly between them with handsaw, and are floated by the men to the shore of the pond through little canals cut in the ice for that purpose.

At many places the ice-houses are built upon the immediate borders of the water, and then the blocks are floated up directly to their receiving doors. In other cases the blocks are drawn off from the pond or creek or river on sleds, and from the shore are conveyed to their storehouse.

Various modes of elevating the ice into its houses are practiced. The New-York companies, and many of those around Boston, now use the endless chain in combination with the inclined plane, and steam power chiefly, this having been attended with better success than horse power. Some years ago the latter was chiefly used. In some instances, where the ice-house in pretty near the shore, the blocks are immediately taken by steam power, piece by piece, up an inclined plane to a sufficient elevation, and are thence directed down a more moderate inclined plane to the doors of the buildings into which they are lowered by steam, and packed away by the requisite number of men. In Massachusetts, where the blocks are cut square, they are laid in the storehouse in regular courses, every block exactly covering the next below it. In New-York, where the blocks are 22 by 27 inches, there is an alternate arrangement of the courses — in opposite directions — to prevent their pressing against the house and breaking it open. When a vault of a New-York house has been filled, it is covered with a layer of salt-marsh hay, from New-Jersey, four to five feet thick, and the receiving doors are fitted up to prevent waste until the contents are required for use. Near Boston, wood shavings and other articles have been used for covering material.

The storehouses of the ice companies often are immense structures, but they vary considerably in size. The largest in this State is at Athens, and will hold 58,000 tuns; it belongs to the New-York Ice Company. The Knickerbocker Company have two at Rockland Lake, which will each contain about 40,000 tuns, one at Highland Lake holding 30,000, and one on the Hudson River holding 20,000. Generally, these buildings are very broad, and from 100 to 200 feet and upward in length. They present a singular appearance, neither looking like storehouses nor barns, and one unacquainted with the ice business would be almost certain, on seeing them for the first time, to ask, “What are they?” Most of the valuable ice-ponds have several of these structures on their borders. Fresh Pond, Cambridge, has its shores almost covered with some fifty of them.

The construction of these storehouses must be regulated by several circumstances, viz: by the climate, the amount to be stored, the material nearest at hand, and their nearness to the sources of supply. It is especially desirable to have a cool location, where the influence of the sun and warm atmosphere shall be least. The ice must be preserved as much as possible from wasting, and this is effected by surrounding it with materials that are poor conductors of heat, such as sawdust, rice-hulls, hay, leaves, charcoal, tan, shavings, &c. Any or all of these are used, according to circumstances, both in the ice-houses and on board vessels that export ice.

Most of the storehouses are built of wood, [and] because of its relative cheapness. Their walls, or sides, are double, and are formed by placing two ranges of joist upright, which at the bottom are set in the ground, or framed into sills, and at the top are framed into plates. These two ranges are ceiled [sic: sealed?] with boards, secured to that side of each range which is nearest the other. In the New-York houses, the space between the boardings is at least fourteen inches (enough to readily admit a man), and is generally filled with sawdust alone, but sometimes with saw-dust mixed with pulverized charcoal, &c. Occasionally rice chaff is used, but this is seldom obtainable in large quantities; in fact, it is out of sale now, as we are informed, and cannot be had at all. The saw-dust is procured from New-York, Albany, &c., at an average price of $4 per cord. This kind of filling never needs to be changed, as some others do. Filling with tan was formerly practiced near Boston, more than any other method, according to the following description. “The space between the two boardings is filled with refuse tan wet from the yards. This wet tan is frozen during the winter, and until it is thawed in the spring and summer, little waste occurs; afterward the waste is more rapid, but, as a large portion of the ice is taken out, for domestic consumption or shipment, before this takes place, the loss in quantity is small, and occurring before the expenses of transportation have been paid is of less pecuniary importance. So long as the mass of the tan remains frozen, it answers well enough; but since it will melt each summer there arises the necessity of re-freezing it every winter.

Very few of the large ice-houses in the Northern States are constructed of brick or stone. Such material is, of course, far more costly, but has the advantage of durability, a well as of safety from fire, to which these structures are much exposed, from the light, dry materials used in them to preserve the ice.  At Cambridge, one of this kind covers 36,000 square feet of ground; its vaults are forty feet deep, and its walls are four feet thick from outside to inside, inclosing [sic: enclosing] two sets of air-spaces.

These storehouses in southern countries, where ice is most valuable, are constructed at greater expense, usually of brick or stone; and the protection to the ice consists in air-spaces, or in dry, light vegetable substances enclosed between two walls. The ice-houses in New-Orleans, Mobile, etc., are among the most substantial buildings in those cities. We have an extract from a number of The Bengal Hurkarn in 1845, containing a notice of an ice-house erected at Calcutta, by Mr. Wyeth of Cambridge, Mass. It is capable of holding 30,000 tuns of ice, and incloses more than three-fourths of an acre. Its walls are 198 feet long, 178 wide and 40 high; these are of brick, and triple, with flues or air-spaces between; and the whole is covered by five roofs, also with air-spaces between.

The yearly crop of ice varies considerably, accounting to the character of the season, and is much influenced by many circumstances. In the winter of 1852-3, the first half of the season was extremely unfavorable, and in the latter part of January, Rockland Lake was but just frozen over in good condition, when it was completely buried by a heavy snow. Similar and other mishaps not unfrequently occur in every locality; and hence there is a great variation in the cost of securing ice, which thus produces a corresponding change in the price of the article in different years.

Editor's Note: This series of blog posts recounts the dramatic story of the Esopus Indian Nation’s Revolutionary War exodus. The original inhabitants of Ulster County, the Esopus Indians successfully maintained their sovereignty and traditional way of life in the face of overwhelming odds for over a century. These blog posts are summaries of a much fuller story that will be published in 2027.

Part 2: A Peaceable Disposition (1776-1777)
​
Spring, 1776. Over the New England border to the east, revolution was brewing. Within a few months, it had reached the isolated settlers living near to the Esopus Indians on the far side of the Catskill Mountains. In that year, Kingston resident Charles DeWitt, a member of the New York Provincial Congress, became colonel of the 2nd Ulster County Militia regiment. Like other colonial officials, he knew that the outcome of previous colonial wars greatly depended on the support of Native allies, especially the powerful Six Nations. In Ulster County, the Esopus Indians no longer resided in appreciable numbers around Kingston and the river towns. Over the preceding decades, nearly the entirety of the Esopus Indian Nation had moved over the Catskill Mountains to the headwaters of the Delaware and Suquehanna Rivers, where they were in regular communication with both the government of the Six Nations and with that of Ulster County. Individuals and families continued to visit their old Hudson Valley homeland, where many still counted friends among their Dutch colonial former neighbors. For DeWitt, maintaining friendly relations with the county’s former Native residents might ensure some measure of protection in case the war were to spread into the Colony of New York. And so, Col. Charles DeWitt and other Ulster County officials strove to strengthen the traditional bonds of friendship between Ulster County and its Esopus Indians.

Over the course of 1776, Kingston authorities sent letters and gifts to the Esopus Indians’ tribal government and elected chief, Philip Houghtaling. Notably, they sent quantities of gunflints, powder, and lead for ammunition over the mountains. These gifts of ammunition seem to indicate that DeWitt hoped for more than simply peaceful relations. Perhaps he hoped that, like the Stockbridge Mohicans in New England to the east, the Esopus Indians also sympathized with the Rebel cause. Indeed, quantities of ammunition were also sent over the mountains to those settlers who were known to be “hearty friends of the American cause.”[1] The Esopus Nation’s leadership, like that of their Nanticoke, Munsee, Mohican, and Tuscarora neighbors on the nearby upper Susquehanna, emphasized to colonial officials in both Pennsylvania and New York of their desire to stay out of conflict. They offered, instead, to shield Ulster County from the war while not otherwise offering support.[2]

That autumn, the thinly-scattered European settlers on the far side of the Catskills expressed alarm at a possible war afoot in adjacent Indian Country. The paranoia of Indian raids that spread among them was much like that which overtook Ulster County two decades earlier during the French and Indian War. What these settlers did not mention in their panicked letters was the fact that some of them had formed a gang and were actively persecuting Loyalist neighbors on the upper Susquehanna and Delaware Rivers. Many of the so-called Loyalists were simply peaceful farmers who had little interest in joining a rebellion. The persecutions – which included violent evictions and theft of property – got so out of hand that armed local Indian warriors felt the need to protect these settlers.[3] The harassment by the roving Rebel gangs pushed many on the frontier – Indian and white – towards Loyalism. In that September, leaders from the tribal governments on the western side of the Catskills pledged loyalty to the British at a large treaty held at Fort Niagara.[4] Upon returning from Fort Niagara, Esopus Indian chief sachem Philip Houghtaling sent a representative, the war captain John Runnupe, with a message to local Rebel settlers: they had one week to leave the Western Catskills, with no guarantee of safety for those who refused.[5]

In response, Ulster County resolved that a company of rangers be formed to patrol the western frontier of Ulster County to protect non-Loyalist settlers.[6] A few days later, more alarming news arrived from over the Catskills: an elderly Esopus Indian woman “…weeping much… desired the [settlers] to move this week to get out danger, and that she would not see them [again for] a long time… she expected that in case they did not move off they would be murdered by the Indians in a short time…”[7] Many settlers now abandoned their frontier farms and fled eastward to the safety of the river towns. And yet, even if they had warned off rebellious frontier settlers, the Esopus Indians still showed no inclination towards conflict with Ulster County as a whole. A number of their leaders arrived in Kingston in November of 1776 to renew the treaty of peace, just as they had done nearly annually since the Second Esopus War ended in 1664. This would be the last time in history that the Nicolls Treaty was renewed.
           
The winter of early 1777 passed by relatively uneventfully. When travel became easier with the melting of winter snow, messengers were once again sent from Kingston to the Esopus Indians on the other side of the Catskills to enquire as to their intentions.[8] By early April of 1777, the Esopus Indians’ response was received: they still wished to maintain peace with Ulster County. The Esopus Indian leadership even offered to send one of their most respected citizens, Nicholas, to Kingston with his family to remain for the duration of the war as a sign of their good will (and as a potential hostage). Chief Sachem Philip Houghtaling ended his message stating that “We assure you of a truth, that it is our determination that we will lay still in this distressing time, and that you shall not receive damage by us… The remote tribes of Indians are mostly joined at Niagara, and we expect they will be on your [i.e., the rebels’] backs some time this moon, at the northward [towards the Mohawk River]…”[9]
           
Pragmatically, the Esopus Indians wished to avoid conflict with their friends and former neighbors in the river towns of Ulster County, regardless of political orientation. They promised to protect Ulster County from raids by Loyalists and loyal Indian allies, so long as Ulster County protected Esopus Indian families and settlements on the upper Susquehanna and along the upper branches of the Delaware River. But by all indications, in following the lead of the Six Nations, the Esopus Indian Nation had allied itself with Great Britain the previous autumn two months before renewing the Nicholls Treaty in Kingston for the last time. And they had good reason to do so: should the Rebels win the war, they would prove to be an existential threat to all of those Native Nations dwelling near to the Fort Stanwix Treaty Line.[10] Moreover, it is likely that many young Esopus Indian warriors were inspired by charismatic Mohawk war chief and British officer Joseph Brant, who spent lengths of time in these years living amongst them. By early August of 1777, the Esopus Indians had participated as victors in one of the bloodiest ambushes of the American Revolution: the Battle of Oriskany in the western Mohawk Valley.

Several weeks later, on August 23rd, a rumor spread among the Esopus Indian communities that a large Rebel force from Kingston was on its way to destroy them. Although the rumor was unfounded, Esopus Indian families and non-combattants were sent eastward for safety up the West Branch to an isolated one of their settlements, as well as to Joseph Brant’s base of operations at the town of Onaquaga. It is possible that they imagined that this attack would be retribution for their involvement at Oriskany. They then sent a friendly overture to the authorities in Kingston; just as in previous overtures, they noted that they would continue to shield the river towns in Ulster County from any Loyalist raids, while hoping that Ulster County would cast a blind eye towards their warriors’ support of British military endeavors in the Mohawk Valley to the north.[11] New York Governor Clinton’s response to the Esopus Indians was indignant: that since “…the young Indians & warriors who had joined [the Loyalist officer] Butler went there designedly to fight and kill our People and to assist the English, that we cannot, therefore, consider the Fathers & Mothers of those young Indians as our Friends…”[12]
 
                                                               To Be Continued…
 
Citations:
[1] Journals of the Provincial Congress of the State of New-York: 1775-1776-1777, Vol. I. Albany: Thurlow Weed. 1842. 539-540.
[2] Harvey, Oscar Jewell & Ernest Gray Smith. A History of Wilkes-Barré, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, Vol. II. Wilkes-Barré: 1909. 888-889.
[3] McGinnis, Richard. "A Loyalist Journal, Part 1" in The New York Genealogical and Biographical Record, Vol. 105(4). New York: 1974. 193-202.
[4] Journals of the Provincial Congress of the State of New-York: 1775-1776-1777, Vol. II. Albany: Thurlow Weed. 1842. 216.
[5] John Runnupe was likely the son or grandson of his namesake, whose full name was recorded under variations of Noondawiharind and who was involved in land sales in Shawangunk and for the Hardenbergh Patent earlier in the century.
[6] Journals of the Provincial Congress of the State of New-York: 1775-1776-1777, Vol. I. Albany: Thurlow Weed. 1842. 656-657.
[7] Ibid, Vol. II: 340.
[8] Calendar of Historic Manuscripts Relating to the American Revolution in NYS, Vol II. Albany, NY: Weed, Parsons & Company. 1863. 93-94.
[9] Journals of the Provincial Congress of the State of New-York: 1775-1776-1777, Vol. II. Albany: Thurlow Weed. 1842. 423-424.
[10] The 1768 Fort Stanwix Treaty line was a boundary that more-or-less followed the Appalachian Mountains and which was meant to keep the peace by dividing the British colonies from the Indian Nations to the west.
[11] Calendar of Historic Manuscripts Relating to the American Revolution in NYS, Vol II. Albany, NY: Weed, Parsons & Company. 1863. 276-277.
[12] Public Papers of George Clinton, Vol. II. Albany: Wynkoop Hallenbeck Crawford Co. 1900. 272-274.

Breaking the Ice Gorges of the Hudson River
Captain Ulster Davis, Great Gorge Fighter in Command of All the Big Battles Against Ice Flood and Freshet in Recent Winters, Tells the Exciting Story of Perilous Attacks by Ice-Breaking Tugs.

ICE BREAKING in its simplest form is an art in which few men have been educated, in spite of the fact that the Hudson river in front of the city freezes tightly each winter and offers a fine opportunity for any man to serve his apprenticeship in conquering such a task. To be a successful man of ice-breaking knowledge one must know his boat, from bow to stern, and must know how she will behave in attacking with an ice floe or solid field.

In breaking gorges the task becomes a most difficult one. Gorges that have formed along the Hudson for years, especially in the vicinity of Coeymans and New Baltimore, have been often attacked, and sometimes such an attack has not brought forth results. Gorges usually extend for miles and are one concrete mass of ice, solid from the river's bottom to sometimes 10 feet above the surface of the frozen water at high tide. To fight such a gorge, which is in reality a Hudson river iceberg without a tide to move it playfully about in the water, calls for a man who knows the power of his boat or boats, and is acquainted with the details of attack, and to know just how and when to ram the gorge.

Albanians, especially those in the zone usually inundated by the spring freshets, greet the name “river gorge” with a shiver of fear, for the backing up of the waters over the docks and the flooding of the low-lying districts mean hardship, misery and want. The man responsible for the breaking of these gorges, which allows the turbulent spring waters of the Hudson to rush madly to the ocean, is known to every man, woman and child in the sections which suffer from freshets.

A Great Gorge Fighter.
Since 1902 Captain Ulster Davis, of Rensselaer, manager of the Albany Towing company and of the Cornell Steamboat line in this section, has been the man of the hour in ice-breaking attacks and gorge fighting. No man between New York and Albany knows the river better than Captain Davis, and no man is more capable of superintending gorge ‘busting’ than the Rensselaer captain. He has risen from the cabin wheel of a small tugboat to the responsibility of caring for everything that is done in the way of towing in this section, and to the topnotch in his profession.

Captain Davis has had charge of the ice breaking boats and the crews that manned them that attacked the gorges of 1902, 1903, 1907, 1909 and 1910. He has succeeded in accomplishing the task he set out to do each time, and has thus brought happiness to thousands along the Hudson.

Captain Davis reviews the work of his ice-breaking expeditions in a story, covering the work accomplished during the past eight years.

Ice Moved the Bridge.  
“The first work on gorge ice which served to demonstrate the practicability of plunging through the ice field and attacking gorges, was on December 22, 1902,” says Captain Davis.
“The ice moved in front of the city at 4 o'clock in the afternoon and gorged at the Livingston avenue bridge, piling up high, and each rush of the water jammed the crystal into a beach-to-beach gorge. The ice jam displaced the superstructure under the draw span of the Livingston avenue bridge. Edward McGiven, superintendent of the American Ice company, chartered the tug GEORGE C. VAN TUYL to break up the ice around the bridge. Before the tug was steamed up the ice began to move. We refused to leave the Albany basin until the heavy ice had passed down stream. After it had passed we proceeded to the bridge and found the ice jammed to the bottom of the river and piled up 10 feet high. The frame work under the draw span had been pushed south five feet.

“Putting the powerful little tug to a test, we cut the ice from above the draw on the west side and bucked the frame work back under the draw bridge. Dynamite was tried on this work, without success. Six days were taken up in this work, for which the tug was paid $405.

Saved Thousands of Dollars.
“This first successful ice breaking saved the American Bridge company thousands of dollars, as it was under contract to replace the old bridge and guaranteed not to stop traffic on the New York Central.

“The ice moved down the river from in front of the city and Troy to Mull's Bar, and gorged to the bottom of the river, causing the water to rise to an unprecedented height and creating alarm in the southern section of this city and in districts which suffer from a freshet. A cold snap followed and the waters receded although there was not a raise and fall of tide at Albany until March.

"It was, however, not until March, 1903, that the services of the powerful Cornell river tugs were enlisted in fighting and finally breaking up the ice gorges.

Cities Inundated.
“About the first of March, 1903, heavy rain and melting snow, due to the mild weather, caused the river to overflow its bounds and the ice broke up for a second time and passed to the Mull’s Bar gorge formed in December and jammed into a solid mass. The pressure of the water north of the gorge became so great that it lifted the Mull’s Bar gorge that formed in December, and it passed down the river two miles, lodging at Roah’s Hook, causing the water to rise so that the lower part of the city and Rensselaer were inundated.

“The Chamber of Commerce alarmed with the existing conditions took hold of the matter and a fund was raised by subscription, starting in Rensselaer, and $800 was raised from the merchants and manufacturers in the affected districts. In all $1,450 was the amount of the fund and the old side-wheeler NORWICH, in charge of Captain Jake Du Bois, and the W. N. BAVIER, commanded by Captain Herbert Du Mont, of Rensselaer, were engaged to come from Rondout to buck the gorge on the south.

Attacking the Gorge.
“The steamers started from Rondout on Thursday, March 5, and ploughed through the ice from Rondout to Coeymans. I was engaged by the Chamber of Commerce to look after their interests at Coeymans and joined the boats at New Baltimore.

“The ice was cut up in the reach at Stuyvesant and Coxsackie Lights, and the tugs proceeded to Roah Hook and attacked the gorge. The tide was normal on the lower side, but water flooded in the docks in this city. There was no current below the gorge and as the BAVIER—a new steel-hull steamer—would back up 500 feet and ran into the gorge at full speed the ice came up from the bottom in great chunks.

“It remained stationary there being no tide to float it away. After working into the gorge about 500 feet or more and in the deep water off Corwin & McCulloch's brickyard, at Coeymans, we began to get some current from beneath the gorge. The ice floated away faster than it has at any time since he began operations.

“When the BAVIER backed up and rammed the gorge the ice rolled up as solid and blue as it was in December when the original gorge knitted together. The ice was cemented with deposits of mud, logs and timber. Even though the engines of the BAVIER worked at full speed, the craft would not go over 25 to 30 feet into the gorge, with a start of 500 feet. The NORWICH could not accomplish much in fighting the gorge as the ice was so deep that it cut her below the copper sheathing and stove in some of the planking.

Like a Field of Ice.
“The gorge, when we started to cut it out, looked like a smooth field of newly frozen ice, with the exception that here and there a stick of timber would sprout up. The snows and storms had leveled it off smooth.

“Captain Jake Du Bois, of the NORWICH, asked me at this time where the ice gorge was, and I told him it was on Mull's, and that it would not take long to go through this smooth field — which was in reality the December gorge — he then let me know that he had encountered a stiffer gorge than was the first, as we had not made 200 feet in an hour.
“The ice was above the guard of the Norwich as she lay in the cut made through the gorge and the plane of the river bottom showed on the surface as the ice receded from the shores towards the centre of the river in concave shape.

Price to Break the Gorge.
“The steamers were sent from Rondout to attack the gorge by Fred Coykendall, on an agreement that the Chamber of Commerce would pay a minimum price off $2,500. People on the trains seeing the boats coming through made it known at Albany, and the subscriptions were halted with the result that but $1,450 was raised. William B. Van Rensselaer, at that time president of the chamber, phoned me to stop the boats as there was not enough money to pay them. The work was stopped at dusk Friday night after we had gotten to the new or March gorge where the boats jammed through with apparent ease.

“On the following Sunday the ice, weakened through the attacks of the BAVIER and NORWICH, passed out and the water fell, clearing the river for the season. This was the first work on the heavier type of Cornell boats on ice-gorge attacking.

Big Damage to Property.
“This gorge caused thousands and thousands of dollars worth of damage to property along the river banks. Traffic was delayed on the New York Central, ice having pushed the south-bound track on top of the north-bound main, and into the swamp at Poolsburg. No attempt was made to attack the gorge at this time.

“In 1907 the first day of the new year marked the moving out of the ice in front of the city. This ice gorged at Castleton, causing high water here. On Thursday, January 3, the gorge let go and part went down over the dyke into Schodack creek and jammed to the bottom of the channel, completely destroying the prospects of ice harvesting at the two mammoth houses of Ransom, Gardinier & Sons, and the 60,000-ton house of the American Ice company. The ice also jammed in Baker's Creek.

Clearing the Ice Pack of 1907.
“On Saturday, Supt. Thomas Clifford, of the ice company, and I conferred at Castleton and the tug GEORGE C. VAN TUYL was engaged at the rate of $15 per hour to clear the ice pack out of Baker's creek. This work was accomplished on Sunday, January 6, by Captain Edward McCabe and Bert Houghtaling, who were in charge of the tug.

“I went to Castleton with a livery rig on the same morning and the VAN TUYL tied up at the village dock after finishing its work. The Gardiniers and the American Ice company officials desired Schodack creek cleared of its obstruction as it was jammed from Burns’ dock to a short distance above Schodack Landing. The VAN TUYL was sent down the river accompanied by D. J. Driscoll. How the rig got back to Rensselaer can best be told by “Denny’’ — I drove to Schodack.

“Arriving at Burns’ dock I found the ice jammed to a depth of nine or ten feet, two or three feet out of water in the channel and piled high on the flats, mixed with timber, trees and debris from a haystack to a chicken coop.

Prying Logs From Propellor.
“We contracted with Gardinier and the ice company to clean out the channel and complete the work in 22 1-2 running hours. Considerable time was spent in getting a timber out of the propeller, which very often necessitated taking out the coupling bolts and prying the engine on the quarter, then replacing the bolts and turning on steam in the reverse motion from which the engine was turning at the time the log was picked up. It was very necessary at times to use pry bar and steam together to move the obstruction.

“Finally we attacked the gorge and it passed out and lodged at Pine Grove, in the narrow channel. Some damage was done to the boat in doing this work. Two planks were stove in on each side of the stern, and as there was no drydock to haul on at this time of the year, we kept up steam on her night and day to keep her afloat. We later proceeded to New York and had her hauled on the Leitjen & Lang drydock at Hoboken, N. J. It cost $500 to repair the hull and double plank it back from the stern to the widest part of the hull, such damage having been inflicted in a few days.

Tug Hercules Caught in the Ice.
“In the same month Welsh Brothers, ice dealers, of Coxsackie, chartered the giant tug HERCULES to go from Rondout to Grape Vine dock to cut the ice loose that had come down from above and gorged in front of their house. The tug was sent out alone to do this work and passed up through the narrow channel. Coxsackie was made with apparent ease by the powerful boat, but in turning around the ice jammed around her so that she could not be moved in either direction.

“On Thursday, January 10, 1907, Fred Coykendall, manager of the Cornell line, requested me to go to Coxsackie and see what could be done with the HERCULES. I went to Newton Hook by train and crossed the river in a small scow by being pulled through floating ice a half foot thick. I drove from Coxsackie to Pine Grove and found the powerful HERCULES, which was in charge of Captain John Silliman, of Rensselaer, hard and fast on top of an ice pack, and the tide rose and fell on her as though she was on a beach instead of in a channel with 14 feet of water.

The tender ROB, Captain George Gage, and Captain Charles Conklin for cook (and a mighty poor one, at that!) and also the big steamer POCAHONTAS, Captain Irving Hayes, were sent to rescue the HERCULES and to cut her from the pack.

“The POCAHONTAS stove a plank in her bow and had to be beached at Catskill to make repairs. The tender ROB made the distance, however, arriving on Friday at 3 o'clock in the afternoon. Captain Gage skirted the ROB alongside the bow of the HERCULES, so that both were fast.

“With both tugs helpless, hooks and bars were secured from an icehouse in order to pry the boats apart. After many hours’ work the ROB was pried loose and she settled down in the river with a splash. The ROB was then forced to cut the powerful HERCULES out of the floe, ploughing the ice below the boat and pulling her away with a stout hawser.

“The POCAHONTAS, after repairs had been made to her on the beach, with the HERCULES and ROB, kept at work fighting the ice and finally worked it past Athens and Catskill and down below Saugerties.

“At this time the diminutive harbor tug, VAN TUYL, was struggling with an ice floe at Four Mile Point and it was necessary to dIspatch the ROB to the assistance of the Albany tug. All four boats made Rondout safely on January 15.

“On Sunday, February 16, the ice broke up again in front of this city and gorged at New Baltimore. This obstruction was allowed to melt away.

Most Powerful Tug on River.
“One of the most recent gorge attacks was made during the winter of 1919, when we were forced to use the most powerful tug on the river, the CORNELL, which was, in fact, the biggest boat ever used in breaking the ice.

“The ice broke up unexpectedly in front of this city at 1:30 in the afternoon, February 27, and gorged at Van Wie’s Point. The water at 9 o'clock that night was over 12 foot above mean low water mark. It continued to rise rapidly and at 9:39 the next morning it was 15.1; 8 o'clock in the evening, 16.1, and two hours later, over 17 feet.

“At 10 o’clock on the night of February 29 the gorge at Van Wie’s Point let go and passed Cedar Hill. This water dropped two feet then.

Emergency Bill in Legislature.
“Continued warm weather and rain brought about alarming conditions on March 2.  At the morning session of the Legislature, Assemblyman B. R. Lansing, who was forced to wade through the water in front of his store in hip boots, made his way to the clerk’s desk and introduced an emergency bill, directing that boats be engaged to attack and break the gorge. The bill was rushed through both houses and was signed by Governor Hughes in the afternoon.

“Deputy Superintendent of Public Works Winslow M. Mead chartered a special train to go to Hudson so that the river could be inspected at that point. Mr. Mead was accompanied by Assistant Superintendent David Lewis and myself. We found the ice solid and teams were crossing the river when we reached Hudson.

“Boats were ordered from Hudson by telephone and we were advised that the CORNELL and ROB would be ready Thursday, March 3, at 10 o'clock in the morning.

Perilous Trip.
“The powerful CORNELL and tender, ROB, left Rondout creek at 11 o'clock on that morning. On board, besides the crew, was H. M. Hulsapple, representing the State. Later in the day the ROB was sent to Rhinecliff to meet a train. Mr. Mead and William B. Elmendorf came aboard the boat.

“We were forced at some points to push through over two feet of solid ice, the river being the same as when it first tightened up. He made about one mile an hour until 7 o'clock at night, when the boats crossed over to Red Hook island, on the east shore of the river. In the next four hours the ice was so thick that but two miles was made.

“While I was at the wheel of the CORNELL at this point, Captain Tim Donovan, the boat's regular commander, told me to save enough of the boat so we could get ashore in safety. The big boat was rocking and plunging and the thick and stubborn ice gave us a fight that he will long remember. It was the same as pushing the boat a brick wall. The ice was over two feet thick, and at 11 o'clock we stopped the fight and laid up for the night.

Ice Bent Steel Plates.
“Promptly at 6:30 the next morning, Friday, the two tugs were sent after the enemy again. After getting in midstream it was discovered that the plates on the steel hull of the CORNELL were bent and the frames twisted. Mr. Hulsapple  and myself were forced to walk to Tivoli and phone New York of the condition of the boat. We were told to break the gorge and relieve the suffering in the valley and to proceed to Albany.

“The boats renewed their attack and for a short distance below Saugerties creek there was open water, but from Saugerties Light to Malden, about two miles, it took four hours to make the distance, the ice being from 22 to 24 inches thick.

“Above Malden the boats were shifted close inshore and the snow water off the hills had weakened the ice in this stretch, so that he went along merrily without a stop until Germantown was in sight. We arrived at Germantown Landing at 7:30 in the evening, having covered but 10 miles in 13 hours, three hours of which was consumed in crossing the river from Alsen to Germantown.

“Assemblyman B. R. Lansing joined us at Germantown, Saturday, March 5, and leaving Germantown at 6 o'clock in the morning, we found hard ice to Linlithgo and open water on the west side of the river to Catskill creek. From Catskill to Athens the ice was 12 inches thick, and in Perry's Reach at Athens 18 inches thick. He reached Athens at 1:30 in the afternoon.

In the Path of the Ice Breaker.
“Here men and boys were out on the ice and it was at this point that the ice planks from Athens to Hudson were cut through. As the CORNELL approached a man with a large hand sled, with a passenger having two suit cases, started from the shore to cross the ice in the path of the ice breaker. He did, but he cleared the bow of the CORNELL only about six feet and was out of sight of the man at the steering wheel in the pilot house. The passenger stuck to the sled as he declared he had paid 50 cents to drive over. No whistles were sounded from the CORNELL as the boat had the right of way and the man with the sled was not going to stand on the cracking ice and dispute this fact.

“We proceeded to oil dock and turned around and came back below Hudson light to cut the heavy ice up in the reach. Then we headed for Newton Hook, reaching there at 7 o'clock at night.

“Sunday, although a day of rest with almost everybody, was one of hustle on the Cornell as the boat left Newton Hook at 6 in the morning. We found unusually heavy ice to Schodack Creek, and from there to Barren Island the ice was but eight inches thick.

Imprisoned in Ice Fields.
“We did not attempt to attack the gorge at this time, skirting back to New Baltimore. We here learned that the ROB was wedged in between two fields of ice at Lamp Island dyke. She was unable to help herself against the field of heavy floating ice and we had to cut her out and give her liberty. Both boats then shifted to Catskill, cutting the field ice as we went, so that it would pass out, and both boats tied up at Athens at 8 o'clock at night after fighting for 14 hours.

“Everybody was anxious to get to the gorge on Monday, March 7, and both boats started on the last lap of their journey. While making from Athens to Stuyvesant light, a government pile-driver was floating down through the field of broken ice. The driver was being pushed and abused by the ice floe, and we picked her up and towed her to a beach. No salvage can he collected from the government so that our hustle to get the driver availed nothing financially.

Ran on a Sand Bar.
“The real hard fight started when we made our first flying attack on the mountainous gorge at 10 o'clock in the morning, opposite the upper Briggs Ice House. The CORNELL here ran on a sand bar. Every effort was made to push the boat over the bar, but without success.

“The boat was turned in its tracks and sent to Barren Island and up through Coeymans channel. At the Coeymans dock Superintendent Kunze, of the Western section of the canal, and a corps of dynamite experts, with Deputy Superintendent Mead was picked up. The water was so high on the decks here that the passengers were forced to walk to the boat in hip booths [sic, boots].

“The ROB was left alone in her struggle against the gorge, but, as she was of light draft, cut up over the bar and found 30 feet of water. The CORNELL cut in the river above the bar, and both tugs worked at the gorge until 1:30 in the afternoon, when a hurrah went up from all on board. The ice was moving down stream.

Pushed by the Moving Gorge.
“The CORNELL was forced to drop back to Roah Hook light, where there is an angle in the dyke, and the giant tug kept her engines working to prevent her from being pushed down the river over the bar, so heavy was the moving gorge.

“The ice moved without a balk for half an hour, when it became unruly again and gorged, stopping the flow of the current. A second attack was made, and it started moving seaward at 3:05 o'clock and an hour later the ice was all passed below Roah Hook and to the ocean.
“The both boats headed towards Albany and we were forced to plough through thousands and thousands of tons of jammed ice. It was suggested to Kunze, the dynamite expert, that he try dynamite to dislodge the   remnants of the gorge, and be replied that the Big CORNELL could cut out more ice in one plunge than he could remove in a day with the explosive. He added that there was enough ice here to put Hades in cold storage for years!

Ovation All the Way Home.
“The announcement that the ice-breaking boats would proceed to Albany was evidently sent all along the river, as we were greeted from every dock, a cannon announcing our arrival here. The heroic boats passed through the Greenbush bridge draw span, and we tied up at the foot of Hamilton street in a snow storm.

“Many amusing and pitiful sights greeted the men in charge of the ice-breaking tugs. In the gorge at Coeymans in one of our attacks there was a chicken coop frozen in the top of the field. We found in the coop a hen setting on eggs and she greeted us with a cackle.

“In March, 1902, with the tug VAN TUYL, I went to Montgomery's Island, just below Albany, on the east side of the river, and found in the house a widow with six barefooted children, The home, in which lay her dead husband, was surrounded by water, and it was impossible to reach it in a row boat because of the floating ice. The woman was almost overcome with joy when the VAN TUYL stuck her nose against the home.

“The day when ice gorges along the Hudson will cause the water to back up and cause hardship and misery to these who have the misfortune to live in the affected district is gone, however, as the superintendent of public works is now authorized in an emergency to employ means at the State's expense to break such obstructions.
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“The only effective means towards breaking ice gorges is the employment of the giant tug boats. Ice breaking is not profitable to the owners of the boats. The damage done to the craft while thus engaged is almost equal to the compensation.”

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. ​

Built originally for a local concern, Romer & Tremper, with offices in Rondout, the steamboat “Jacob H. Tremper” was a familiar sight sailing in and out of the Rondout creek a few years ago. Today, the “Jacob H. Tremper” is no more as she was broken up in 1928, but memories of this graceful steamboat are not very dim in the minds of local residents, and the tone of her whistle still haunts the hillsides along the banks of the Rondout creek.
               
The wooden hull of the “Jacob H. Tremper” was built by Herbert Lawrence at Greenpoint, New York, in 1885, and her engine was constructed by W.A. Fletcher & Company of New York. She was 180 feet long, breadth of beam 30 feet, two inches. Her tonnage was listed as gross 572 and net 432, and her vertical beam engine had a cylinder diameter of 44 inches with a 10 foot stroke.
               
The “Jacob H. Tremper” was built for the firm of Romer & Tremper of Rondout to be used as a freight and passenger vessel on a daytime run between Newburgh and Albany. She ran in line with the steamboat “M. Martin.” In August of 1884 the steamboat “Eagle,” which had been running on the Newburgh route since 1856 and for several years before 1884 in line with the “M. Martin,” was destroyed by fire, and the “Jacob H. Tremper” was built to replace the “Eagle.”
               
The new steamboat proved to be an exceptionally fine vessel for the purpose for which she was built. She had a large freight capacity and fine accommodations for passengers, and these advantages soon made themselves evident by the appearance of the “Jacob H. Tremper” as one of the first vessels placed in service in the spring of the year and the last steamboat to be laid up in the fall.
               
In the winter of 1899 the Romer & Tremper fleet of river steamboats was purchased by the Central Hudson Steamboat Company of Newburgh. This transaction included the steamboats “Jacob H. Tremper, “M. Martin,” “James W. Baldwin,” and “William F. Romer.”
               
Another distinction which places the “Jacob H. Tremper” apart from many of the other Hudson river steamboats was her exceptionally clear record. In fact, only one accident to the “Jacob H. Tremper” was demed worthy of note in her history. This accident occurred on Monday morning, July 21, 1913. On this morning, the “Jacob H. Tremper” left Newburgh at her usual time for Albany. On her way up the river she struck an uncharted rock off Esopus Island. The captain immediately ordered her course set for the mud flats off Staatsburgh on the east side of the river, and at this place she sunk rapidly.
               
Following this experience, the “Jacob H. Tremper” was raised and repaired and again placed in service, and in 1916 she was plying her regular route under the command of Captain John Dearstyne.
               
The “Jacob H. Tremper” was also one of the last of the sidewheel steamboats of her class to continue in service on the waters of the Hudson river as a freight and passenger vessel. In the fall of 1928 the “Jacob H. Tremper” was deemed unfit for further service and was laid up at Newburgh, and in July of the following year she was sold to a junk dealer and broken up at Newburgh

I​f 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!​

Human nature being what It is, we all have an odd quirk or two.  Boatmen were no exception. 

The foibles of two boatmen that come to mind were those of Staats Winnie and Ira Cooper, two of the better old time boatmen on the Hudson.  Staats Winnie's Whim was that he wore red flannel underwear the year round — Ira Cooper’s was a dislike for uniforms. 

Staats Winnie was an old time pilot for the Hudson River Day line and at the turn of the century was second pilot of the “Albany.”  When the “Hendrick Hudson” came out in 1906 he was to become her first pilot and served as her head helmsman during that steamboat’s early years on the Hudson.  Like many old time boatmen, he had previously been a pilot on towboats and tugboats of the Cornell Steamboat Company. 

With an impressive mustache and a stern gaze, Staats Winnie was a formidable looking man.  As my good friend Donald C. Ringwald observed in his book “Hudson River Day Line,” Pilot Winnie looked as if he could steer anything afloat. 

Like a number of old boatmen in his era, Staats Winnie wore red flannel underwear.  Only he wore his year round, summer and winter.  During the hot days in July and August, Pilot Winnie would frequently doff his uniform jacket and roll up his shirt jacket [sleeves?], exposing a pair of bright red shod forearms.

Steamboatmen were always known as great arm wavers.  Whenever two steamers passed each other, it was rare indeed if several crew members were not observed vigorously waving in the direction of the passing steamboat.  One would have thought the crew members of the two steamers hadn’t seen each other in months. 

As a matter of fact, in some instances this situation would have been true — as when a line had two steamers running between New York and Albany in daily service.  The two steamboats would leave New York and Albany on alternate days and the only time crew members would see each other for months on end would be on their daily passing in the middle part of the river.  Many crew members of a particular steamboat line came from the same community and were neighbors.  During the season they would get but a fleeting glance of each other as their steamboats passed in mid-Hudson and this, perhaps, was the probable reason for the vigorous arm waving. 

Staats Winnie was well known as one of the arm wavers.  During July and August in his years of piloting the Day Liners, boatmen on passing steamers became accustomed to seeing a red shod arm waving a greeting from his pilot house window.  It was said that passengers, however were frequently startled by the sight. 

Ira Cooper was captain of the steamer “Onteora” of the Catskill Evening Line.  During the early years of steamboating, officers of the steamers wore their usual civilian clothes in carrying out their jobs afloat.  During the 1880’s and 1890’s, the larger steamboat companies began to introduce the use of uniforms for their steamer's personnel, particularly the officers. 

The practice of wearing uniforms soon spread to all steamboat lines.  First, it was just a uniform cap.  Then it became a full fledged uniform with brass buttons and gold braid.  On some lines, the uniforms were provided by the companies outright, others granted a uniform allowance and the officers purchased their own uniforms, while on others a partial reimbursement for uniforms was given to officer personnel. 

Captain Cooper was an individualist of the old school.  He would have no truck [sic] with the new fangled idea of uniforms.  For him, what was good enough to wear ashore was good enough to wear afloat.  To the very end, he steadfastly refused to don either a uniform or even the traditional steamboatman's cap.  He undoubtedly was the last captain of one of the larger Hudson River passenger steamboats to command his steamer dressed in civilian garb. 
​
It was said Captain Cooper's ideas as to dress did not particularly please the owners and operators of the Catskill Evening Line.  It is my understanding, as a matter of fact, that a clash of wills ensued — and, since the owners held the trump cards, Captain Cooper left the “Onteora.”  He was later captain for many years of the big tugboat “J. C. Hartt” of the Cornell Steamboat Company — where he had no trouble dressing as he pleased.  The Catskill Evening Line’s loss, however, was the Cornell Steamboat Company's gain — for Captain Cooper was one of the best boatmen on the river.  

Editor's Note: This series of monthly blog posts by Justin Wexler recounts the dramatic story of the Esopus Indian Nation’s Revolutionary War exodus. The original inhabitants of Ulster County, the Esopus Indians successfully maintained their sovereignty and traditional way of life in the face of overwhelming odds for over a century.. These blog posts are summaries of a much fuller story that will be published in 2027.

Post 1: Setting the Scene (1770)
Five centuries ago, the hazy-blue peaks of the Catskill Mountains towered over a vast expanse of fertile, grassy flats and cornfields that stretched in swathes from Saugerties to Kingston and far to the westward. On these flats lay a mosaic of cornfields, lush bottoms of tall bluestem grass, and dense thickets of hazelnuts, blackberries and wild plums. Clusters of dome-shaped, bark-shingled houses were found here and there on the edges of the floodplains. The shimmering rivers that wound through these flats – the Esopus, the Rondout and others – were periodically crisscrossed with fence-like weirs and fish traps. The surrounding rocky uplands were cloaked in a forests of oaks and pitch pines and, in many cases, were barren at their tops due to frequent fires. This idyllic, park-like landscape was the result of centuries of careful management by the region’s human inhabitants: the Esopus Indians.

The Esopus Indians appear in the earliest colonial records under variations of the name Waranawankong, perhaps meaning ‘The Cove People.’ They spoke a dialect of what linguists today call the Munsee language.[1] The Esopus dialect survives today in the dozens of place names that still grace their ancestral homeland, including Ponckhockie, Ashokan, Shandaken, Wawarsing and, of course, Esopus. The Esopus Nation’s territory was divided among four matrilineal clans, and included the valleys of the Esopus, the Rondout, the Shawangunk, and the lower Wallkill Rivers as well as the headwaters of the Delaware River and lands across the Hudson River in the current towns of Red Hook and Rhinebeck. A chief sachem was elected to represent the four clans.

In the decades before and after the arrival of Dutch colonists in the early 17th century, the Esopus Indians lived in dispersed settlements that stretched along the terraces of land that border the fertile floodplain bottomlands. There, they grew their crops of maize, pole beans, squash, sunflowers and tobacco. They built stockaded strongholds in select elevated locations to retreat to during times of war. Theirs was a life built around the seasons: in the springtime, when the women were busy preparing their maize fields, most of the men could be found downstream in fishing camps where they took advantage of successive visits of spawning fish including alewives, shad, striped bass, sea lampreys, sturgeon, and eels. Summers were spent close to their cornfields. After the autumn crop harvest, younger and more mobile families visited hunting cabins in the uplands of the Shawangunk Ridge and in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains. There, they hunted numbers of white-tailed deer, Eastern elk, black bears and beavers in massive collective hunts. By early springtime, everyone returned to their villages in the bottomlands.

The 1660s were a time of major upheaval in the region. The Esopus Indians controlled the largest stretch of contiguous cleared arable farmland in the entire Hudson Valley. This was extremely attractive to settlers, creating friction that eventually led to the devastating First and Second Esopus Wars with the Dutch settlers. Concurrently, the Esopus Indians were involved in a massive intertribal war with the Five Nations or Haudenosaunee Confederacy. Between 1664 and 1669, the Esopus Indians had little other recourse than to make peace with the Haudenosaunee, with the Dutch and with the British. They would renew these treaties of peace regularly over the entire following century.

Over the 17th and 18th centuries, the Esopus Indians and other regional Native Peoples faced catastrophic population declines, largely due to Old World viruses to which they had little immunity. They soon found themselves to be a minority in their own land. And yet, the New York colonial government continued to treat with them as the sovereign indigenous nation that they were. As a strategy of survival, between the mid-17th century and the mid-18th century the Esopus Indians sold the vast majority of their territory in dozens of land sales, many preserved in deeds to this day. The deeds occasionally reserved their right to reside in or to use select areas. They soon held legal title to very little of their traditional territory.

Land sales, the growing colonial population, and environmental degradation made a traditional life difficult. By the 1750s, the majority of the Esopus Indian People had moved to the other side of the Catskill Mountains. There, they dwelled in communities along Delaware River’s East Branch, where they preserved the traditional spring fish camps for American shad and striped bass and the tradition of winter hunting camps. Over the preceding century, many had gained some level of fluency in the Dutch language. They had also adopted many customs from their colonial neighbors, including keeping of dairy cows, horses, hogs and chickens and growing of new crops including apples, peaches, cucumbers and turnips. Records from this period reveal Esopus Indian individuals who had adopted colonial skills including cider production, violin making, and blacksmithing. And yet, they tenaciously maintained their traditional religion: the Esopus Indians are the only Native group in the Hudson Valley who refused to join the Christian mission at Stockbridge, and only a handful of members joined the Moravian Missions.

By the early 1770s, it became clear that an influx of settlers was coming to the isolated valleys of the western Catskills and upper Susquehanna River, where they had a village called Ahlapeeng. Between the sales of the Hardenbergh Patent and the 1768 Fort Stanwix Treaty, land speculators and settlers were ready to pour over the mountains. Early in 1770, the Esopus Indians even met with British Indian Superintendent Sir William Johnson to try to find a solution. Ultimately, their destiny lay with that of the Haudenosaunee, now the Six Nations, whose lead they had followed since 1669. With the coming of the American Revolution, the consequences would be disastrous.
 
[1] The Munsee language, which belongs to the Eastern Algonquian language subfamily, is still spoken by a handful of descendants on the Moraviantown Reserve in Ontario, Canada.

TERRIBLE DISASTER!!
Steamer BERKSHIRE Burned. Many Lives Lost. Intrepidity of of the Pilot. Incidents of the Conflagration. Full Particulars. (BY OUR OWN REPORTER.)
​
The conflagration which was seen by our citizens illumining the horizon to northward, on Wednesday evening, proves to have been another of those awful steamboat disasters which now and then startle the community and plunge multitudes of men, woman and children unprepared into eternity. Our reporter went to the spot Thursday morning and he has furnished us thus far the following communication:
​
SCENE OF THE WRECK, TWO MILES ABOVE HYDE PARK, JUNE 9, 1864.
The steamer BERKSHIRE caught fire at a quarter before ten o'clock, P. M. on Wednesday, off Esopus Island, and was burned to the waters edge in a very few minutes, the flames spreading with such rapidity that many lives, and every article of property on board were lost.

The fire is supposed to have started in the lamp room, caused by the bursting of a kerosene lamp.

One of the owners, who was on board, when he discovered the fire ordered the pilot to run her ashore immediately, which was done. The BALDWIN passed, bound up a few minutes after, and rescued about 60 people, who were floating on chairs, life preservers, &c. A number who had escaped were distributed among the houses along shore.

The following are known to be lost thus far:
Wife and two children of Capt. Bullet, of a Harlem boat.
Three children of a lady named Mrs. Hanford, of Delaware county.
The manifest of the passengers was unfortunately lost, the clerk not being able to save his papers on account of the rapidity of the flames.

This morning Joel Beam of Hyde Park, had his leg and thigh broken by the falling of a smoke-stack. Also, a man named Andrew Soper was probably fatally injured by the same cause.  They were digging about the boat, endeavoring to find bodies.

The body of a female, name unknown, apparently about 30 years of age lies upon the shore.

The shore in front of the wreck is lined with people, and the water in the vicinity of the ill-fated steamer is filled with boats and men fishing for bodies. 

It is thought that between 25 and 30 lives were lost, although the facts cannot yet be ascertained. 

Coroner Norris, of Rhinebeck, is on the ground, attending to his duties. It is raining very hard and the work of finding bodies is slightly retarded thereby.

The appearance of the remains of the vessel from the shore is sad. Nothing is left of her but a small part of one wheel house, one smoke stack and the skeleton of her machinery. At this time (low water) her hull lies out of the water, five or six feet. Her guards are entirely destroyed and the smoke of the ruins still continues to ascend. 

The wind at present, not blowing very hard, the search for bodies will be continued with, probably, better success.

A passenger thinks that hardly one escaped from the ladies cabin. The statement of course needs confirmation.

Although the exact number of passengers on board at the time is unknown, yet Capt. Frederick Power, her commander, states that as near as he can estimate, there were about 130 all told.

The conduct of the pilot of the boat is spoken of in the highest terms. It is said that be did not leave his post until the vessel was run ashore, and nearly everything about him was consumed by the flames.

SECOND DISPATCH.   12 o'clock.
The body of a little boy, apparently about eight years of age, supposed to be the son of Mrs. Hanford, has just been picked up. His face and head are badly burned. The mother of this little boy jumped overboard with her two other children in her arms, leaving him standing on the stern of the boat awaiting her return. Her two children were drowned, and she was rescued by a gentleman, who in turn lost his own child while rescuing her.

The steamer W. CRANE, from Rondout, having on board Capt. Tremper, of the BALDWIN, and Capt. Cornell, of the THOMAS CORNELL, arrived here early this morning, and they are doing everything in their power. It is utterly impossible, as yet, to give a detained account of the loss of life.  All sorts of rumors are afloat.

Four bodies have been found thus far.

FURTHER PARTICULARS.
The BERKSHIRE was a new steamer, this being her first season, commanded by Capt. Frederick Power. She plied between Hudson and New York and was on her down trip when the fire broke out. The flames spread with inconceivable rapidity and in half an hour nothing was left but the smoking hull and the skeleton of her machinery.

We were unable to find either of the officers of the boat, or anyone who was on board of her at the time, as the former had gone to Hudson when we arrived at the scene of the disaster, and the passengers who were saved had all departed for their homes. We, however, conversed with the captain and other officers of the BALDWIN which reached the wreck just after she ran ashore, and from them obtained such of the particulars as they could give.

STATEMENT OF J. B. VAN ERTEN.
I am pilot of the steamboat JAMES W. BALDWIN. On the night in question Mr. Mosher, the other pilot, and myself, were in the pilot house of the BALDWIN we being bound up. When opposite the stone quarry two miles above New Paltz on the west side of the river saw a bright light and supposed it to be the reflection of the head light of a locomotive. It growing brighter and larger, supposed it to be the railroad depot at Hyde Park, knew the BERKSHIRE was behind time. On rounding Crum Elbow saw that the flames came from the burning of the BERKSHIRE as we could distinctly see the vessel from that point. Put on all steam and hurried to the spot, arriving there after the BERKSHIRE was ashore. At the same time the river was filled with human beings. We succeeded in rescuing a large number. The whole vessel was completely enveloped in flames. We laid by her about two hours doing all in our power to aid the passengers. We landed 60 or 70 at Rhinebeck, together with the body of a boy.

STATEMENT OF CHARLES D. JOHNSON, 1st mate of the Baldwin.
On arriving at the scene lowered a boat and shoved out towards the fire. Hadn't gone but a short distance before I picked up two men. Went on little further towards shore and took a woman off an island. —  (This was afterwards ascertained to be Mrs. Hanford, spoken of above.) Her little boy, when she jumped off stood on the stern of the burning steamer crying out “mother! save me!” The last seen of the little fellow, he was enveloped in flames. We rescued three from the river and proceeding to the shore took there from a large number who had reached the beach in safety. While looking for persons in the river, one man whom I picked up stated that just before I got him the river about him was filled with human beings, hanging to chairs, &c., but before I got to them they all disappeared. Everything that laid in our power was done to rescue the unfortunates.

THE DEAD BODIES.
The little steamer WALTER B. CRANE, of Rondout, having a number of steamboat men on board, including Capt. Tremper of the BALDWIN, and Capt. Cornell of the steamer CORNELL, left the wreck just before noon for Rondout, having on board six bodies, which, with the one left by the BALDWIN at Rhinebeck the night previous, made seven found up to that time.

The following is a list:
Miss Catharine Niles, Spencertown, Columbia County, drowned.
Three children belonging to Mrs. Hanford, of Davenport, Delaware County. One of them a little girl five years of age, and a baby about seven months old were found on the beach between Kelly's dock and the wreck. The other child, a beautiful little boy about eight years old, was found at the stern of the wreck, lying in the water with his head burned slightly.
A colored man, name unknown, supposed to be one of the waiters of the BERKSHIRE, was found on the beach about five hundred feet south of Kelly's dock. He had on a life preserver, but it was adjusted on his back, which was probably the cause of his losing his life.

SCENES AND INCIDENTS.
An eye witness describes the scene in the vicinity of the burning vessel as awful. As soon as it was ascertained that she was on fire, the pilot immediately headed her for shore, the engine at the time working at full speed, but before she struck the mud, all-the wood work was one vast sheet of flame. The scene that followed beggars [sic] description. Men frantic with fear, children crying, (and it in said that there were quite a number of little ones on board,) men shouting, the flames crackling, and the passengers jumping overboard, formed a sight terrible to behold. Furniture of every description was floating in the water, some of the pieces upholding a few of the unfortunate beings.

One little boy with his grandmother was in a state room, and when he heard the alarm he endeavored to open the door of his room, but could not. He then managed to get out of the window and tried to save his relative, but so close were the flames that he had to jump overboard to save his own life. The lady was probably suffocated.

One of the most heart-rending scenes in this terrible disaster was the case of Mrs. Hanford. On ascertaining her danger she seized her babe and her daughter, spoken of above, and jumped overboard, leaving her little son standing on the stern of the vessel. After she got in the water she was compelled to relinquish her hold on her little ones and they both went down. A man with his child-in his arms who was in the water close by her, seeing that the mother was in the act of sinking, seized hold of her and buoyed her up; but alas! in doing so he lost his own child.

The pilot of the BERKSHIRE, (we are sorry we could not learn his name. [Capt. Frederick Power]) receives the highest praise for his heroic bravery and endurance. With the prospect of almost certain death before him he remained at his post until nearly everything about him was consumed by fire and the boat was brought to land. The officers of the BERKSHIRE and her crew are said to have conducted themselves in the best possible manner.

Too much praise cannot be awarded to Capt. Tremper and all the attachees of the JAMES W. BALDWIN, for their untiring exertions in behalf of the sufferers. It will be impossible to ascertain full particulars of the loss short of three or four day, or  perhaps a week's time.
Whether anyone was to blame  at the commencement of  the conflagration we could not learn, nor can we, in view of the terrible result, hint at such a thing.

STILL LATER.
We learn that a Mr. French, of Saugerties, together with his two children, a boy and a girl, jumped from the promenade deck of the steamer into the river, and reached the shore in safety.

After the vessel ran on the mud, and in consequence of no one being able to reach the engine room to stop the engine, the wheels of the burning steamer continued to revolve, thereby washing those who had jumped overboard from the stern out into the river. Many persons undoubtedly lost their lives in this way.

It is supposed that were about 130 or 140 passengers on board the boat at the time. Probably about 30 or 40 of these were lost. The vessel had on board at the time a large quantity of butter, hay, stock and country produce generally. Her original cost was about $100,000. A vessel like her could not be built now short of $200,000.

Mrs. Hanford, who is at present stopping at the house of Capt. Tremper in Rondout, yesterday proceeded to the steamer WALTER B. CRANE in Rondout Creek, and identified the bodies of her three children. Her feelings can better be imagined than described.

We left the wreck at twelve o'clock yesterday morning and proceeded to Rondout by railroad and ferryboat. The excitement there was great. Returning for Poughkeepsie we left Rondout at 8 o'clock on board the steamer EAGLE, which vessel on her way down passed close to the wreck of the BERKSHIRE. Persons were yet engaged in dredging for bodies, but the distance from us to them was so great that we were unable to find out whether any more had been found.

Most of the passengers on the BERKSHIRE had retired or were about retiring for the night when the fire broke out, consequently those that were saved were shoeless, coatless and some of them almost entirely naked. Their wants were partially supplied by the country people in the vicinity of the disaster and by the proprietor of the Rhinecliff House at Rhinebeck. The calamity has cast a gloom over every community hearing of it.

Early yesterday morning one of the passengers, an elderly lady, was found roaming in the woods near where the calamity happened, in a state of mind  bordering on insanity.

The only possible way to get anything like a true statement of the number lost is to take the number already accounted for, and subtract it from what was thought to be the number on board at the time of the accident, which, as is stated above, was in the neighborhood of one hundred and thirty. The JAMES W. BALDWIN landed about seventy at Rhinebeck, who took the cars from thence to their respective homes up the river. The pilot of the boat left Hyde Park at 10 A. M. yesterday having two ladies in charge. It is also stated that a number walked to Staatsburgh and Hyde Park and took conveyance from there. The loss in drowned and burned will probably reach forty. A large number of the passengers were from Catskill and vicinity, and Hudson.

During the forenoon of yesterday a great ma[n]y country people visited the spot and remained nearly all day watching with in tense interest every movement made by parties engaged in dredging the river.

Both smoke pipes attached to the hulk of the vessel are now down, the last one having fallen yesterday afternoon.

The WALTER B. CRANE sailed some distance up and down the river yesterday close to the shore, each side of the wreck, in search of more dead bodies, arriving at Rondout about 3 P. M., without finding any.

STATEMENTS OF PASSENGERS.
Since writing the above we have been furnished by Mr. Shurter, our collector, with the statement of two passengers who were on board the BERKSHIRE at the time of the conflagration. One of them, Mr. Niles, who lost his wife and daughter, says when he first was made aware of the true state of things, he in company with his wife and daughter started to save themselves. By some means or other his wife got away, leaving his daughter with him, and with whom he jumped overboard. After reaching the water a woman seized his daughter, breaking his hold of her and both sank together. He was picked up by the BALDWIN's boat and landed on a ledge of rocks. He believes his wife was burned to death.

Another passenger, whose name we could not learn, states that he left Catskill in company with a friend and took passage on the BERKSHIRE for New York; after retiring to their berths in the cabin, he suddenly heard a cry of fire. Jumping from his berth he ran to the companion way and ascended the the steps, intending to go out on deck, but on opening the door, the smoke rushed through the aperture with such density and fury as to drive him back. Concluding in an instant that he had to get out of the cabin or be suffocated, he made another attempt to reach the deck and succeeded this time in getting one foot out, when he observed a huge wall of flame directly in his pathway, utterly doing away with all possibility of escape. He again retreated to the cabin, which by this time was so filled with smoke as to make it an imperative necessity for him to make another attempt to get out or die. Groping his way along he entered an ante room in which was a window through which he could see a dim sky light. Rushing to it he broke the sash, when he jostled against a boy who was also endeavoring to escape. Seizing him, the two crawled through the window and dropped into the water. His friend, he believes, was burned to death or suffocated in the cabin. He further more says that he was the first one that made any attempt to escape from the cabin; and he is positive that after he retreated from the companion way the second time nothing could get out of the cabin alive. There being quite a number in their berths in the cabin, it is feared that this gentleman’s statement is too true. 

We will probably get further reports today. 

Looks as If It Would Make an Exception This Year, However — Last Season’s Record Recalls the Great Flood of 1857, When Much Damage Was Caused in Albany.
If the Hudson river should skip a year in its record of spring freshets, Albanians would be agreeably surprised, for the years in which it has not overflowed its banks at this point when the ice went out or soon after have been few and far between. Forecaster Todd has compiled a record from many sources of the floods that have occurred at Albany extending back to 1645. Many early years since then are omitted, of course, no records
being available, but it makes a telling argument for the deepening of the upper Hudson and the clearing out of sandbars that facilitate the formation of ice gorges that serve as dams and back up the water until it overflows the docks and inundates a considerable section of the city.

Highest on Record.
The flood of last year is still fresh in the minds of Albanians. The water at this point reached the highest mark on record, 23 feet above mean low water level, even exceeding that of the great flood of 1857, which was until last year the greatest flood in the history of the Hudson. In 1867 the highest point reached was 21.25 feet above mean low water. There is no absolute surety that a freshet will not occur after the ice has passed out of the river. Last year the river began to rise rapidly on March 26, after the steamers of the Hudson River
Navigation company had resumed navigation and had been running some time. The flood was caused by heavy rains, helped by ice that came down from the Mohawk. The water continued to rise on the 27th and on the 30th reached its maximum height of 23 feet above mean low water. At midnight the river began slowly to recede and by March 31 had reached nearly normal conditions. In this flood bridges were washed away, barns, lumber and all sorts of debris floated past Albany and nearly every industry in this city. Rensselaer and Troy was suspended, about 100,000 in the three cities being temporarily thrown out of employment. There was great suffering in the South End, but perhaps the worst effect of this flood was the putting out of commission of the filtration plant and the pollution of the drinking water, which caused a good many cases of typhoid fever.

In these days, however, we are better able to cope with flood conditions and bring relief to those who are marooned in their houses than Albanians were in 1857. Although the water last spring rose to a higher point than it did in 1857, the flood of the latter year caused greater suffering and greater destruction of property. We have had floods as late as the first part of May, but this of 1857 occurred early in February and was succeeded by a smaller one in May, when the river was swollen by heavy rains and melting snow in the north and west, and the pier and docks were inundated.

Flood of 1857.
The flood of 1857 started on Monday, February 9, early in the morning. The mild weather which had prevailed all the previous week caused the great quantities of snow which had accumulated in the streets and upon the adjacent hills to melt with surprising rapidity. This was the case in the Mohawk as well as in the Hudson valley, the result being to pour down into the rivers an immense volume of water, the effect of which was first seen on the Hudson about noon on Saturday, February 7. Then it was first noticed that the heavy, solid mass of ice which had bridged the Hudson for upwards of two months was being gradually pressed upward by the swelling stream. In the course of the next 24 hours the river had raised six feet. Throughout the afternoon the pier, the docks and portions of the streets leading from the latter presented a scene of activity that was suggestive of a very busy day during the fall season. By sunset most of the merchants who had in previous years been visited by floods had removed all their goods from the first to the second floors, and retired feeling perfectly satisfied that they had saved their property and that it was beyond the reach of the rising water. Early Sunday morning, February 8, the ice in the Mohawk river broke up and came down, forcing its way into the Hudson, carrying away everything within its reach on the banks and producing a very disastrous flood at East and West Troy. It was this ice, together with a change of wind from southeast to northwest, which caused the fluctuations of the Hudson noticeable during Sunday afternoon and evening, the water at times advancing to the thresholds of some of the stores, and then receding suddenly off the docks. This fluctuation continued until about 11 p. m., when the heavy ice in front of the city was raised up in a moment, as quickly broke into millions of pieces and then went crashing along in the wildest and most terrific confusion, impelled by a torrent hitherto unknown to the ‘‘placid Hudson.”

Ice Gorge Formed.
The course of the ice was checked this side of Van Wie's Point, not more than three miles below the city, and to the fact that it blocked up there suddenly was due the rapid rise of the water that followed. The rapidity with which the water came up may be judged from the fact, that shortly after the ice broke up the rise was four feet in 10 minutes. Between 10:30 p. m. Sunday and 3:30 a. m. Monday, a period of six hours, the rise was about 11 feet. The rise continued until 8 o’clock, when it reached its highest point, being three feet higher than at any other period of which there then existed a record. A little after 10 o'clock Monday night, February 9, the water commenced falling and continued going down at the rate of an inch and a half an hour during the night and throughout Tuesday. The weather turned extremely cold and the river froze over so firmly that on Wednesday several teams crossed on the ice from Albany to Greenbush.

Great Damage.
The damage to property caused by this flood was estimated at not less than $1,500,000. The merchants on the docks and piers supposed that their property, having been removed from the first to the second floors, was entirely out of danger. Such, however, was not the case. The icy and muddy water entered on the second floors to the depth of from one to three feet. On these floors merchants had stored flour, grain and groceries and most of it was rendered useless. A man who had 278 head of cattle at East Albany (now Rensselaer)
awaiting shipment lost all but 28 of them in the flood. He visited them at 10 o’clock and found water in the yard, but was assured that it would not rise higher. He went again at 1 o’clock in the morning and found the animals in immediate danger of drowning. He begged the use of a boat from a person he saw near by and offered $50 for the favor, explaining that he wanted to go to the yard and open the gate, so as to let the animals out to swim ashore. He was refused, and the pent up creatures were nearly all drowned. Snowden & Charles, butchers, had upwards of 250 head of cattle at the distillery of Edson & Co., and 100 of them were drowned by daylight and some of the few that were saved died from cold and exhaustion shortly after being driven out of the water.

The greater part of the fleet wintering in the upper basin was sunk when the heavy ice crossed the pier into the basin, cutting the boats from their moorings. Columbia street bridge was carried away Sunday night upon the first moving of the ice, and upon the pier were stranded eight or 10 canal boats. The steam tug H. N. Dowd was sunk in the basin, and the R. J. Grant was turned keel up and lay with a lumber office on it. A sloop passed down the river soon after the ice started, was capsized and sank by the weight of the ice. The propeller Western World was on fire several times and was extinguished through the exertions of Assistant Engineer Coburn and some citizens with water thrown from buckets, but finally got beyond control and the boat was scuttled. Two Boston vessels loaded with merchandise were caught in the ice below the city in the fall. One was the packet Victor, which for 20 years had plied between Boston and this city, and the other was the John C. Calhoun. Both were lost. State street bridge was raised several feet above the iron columns and the east end of it broken off from the supports.

Fire Adds to Terror.
While this dreadful destruction was going on, the citizens were thrown into great excitement by repeated fire alarms. Some one was so frightened that he sent word to East and West Troy that what was left of Albany after the flood was being destroyed by fire, and towards noon of Monday fire engine companies from those places came to Albany to render assistance, which was not needed. There were five fires which started within a short
time of one another, the first one starting long before daylight in the lime kiln and plaster works of E. C. Warner & Son on South Broadway. The water reached the lime, slacking it, which set fire to whatever was combustible about the premises, and as all the streets for blocks around were inundated to a depth of two or or three feet, the fire engines could not reach the fire. Soon after a second alarm called the firemen to Gibson & Dalton’s plaster and planing mill in the north part of the city. This fire originated in the same way as that at Warner & Son’s, and as the premises were surrounded by water to a depth of six or seven feet, the engine companies were helpless until boats could be procured in which to extend their hose, and by that time nothing was left of the main building but its walls. All the costly machinery and finished material were destroyed, entailing a loss of about $100,000. The warehouse of W. R. Barrett, on the pier, also caught fire from the igniting of lime in the
second story, and the building and its contents were partially destroyed, among the latter being 4,000 bushels of corn. Two other fires followed, but were put out before much damage was done.

Relief Measures.
Both the the city officials and a committee of citizens took immediate steps to relieve the poor who were sufferers from the flood. The city hall was thrown open to those who had been driven from their homes and had no places to sleep. Food was distributed to those in the South End who were prisoners in their houses, and Very Rev. J. J. Conroy, pastor of St. Joseph’s church, opened the house at 798 Broadway for the distribution of soup and provisions for the poor of his parish, under the charge of Sisters of Charity. The poor of the northern part of the city of all creeds and sects were invited to apply for relief here.

Great Suffering.
The greatest suffering was in the First and Second wards. There more than 150 families were driven out of homes so suddenly that they had only time to dress and run for their lives. Most of these families were poor, but had managed to lay in their winter’s supply of provisions, which were ruined by the water. Officials and police went to their assistance. Some of those in the South End were still in their half submerged houses. Officers Clinton and Keefe, for instance, discovered a family in the second story of a dwelling unable to reach dry land and suffering severely from the cold. Near at hand was a man in a rowboat who refused to go to their succor unless paid an exorbitant price. The family had not as much as he asked and he was about to desert them when the officers seized the boat, ejected him and relieved the unfortunates.

In portions of the Sixth and Seventh wards the premises of many poor families were flooded and they lost nearly everything. An interesting anomaly was that in the inundated district in the North End, where many families were imprisoned in the second stories of their homes, one of their pressing wants was water. They had too much of it of a certain kind all around them, but none fit to drink, the water in the pipes being frozen.

Thrilling Escapes.
There were many thrilling escapes. A man named Moore who lived on the island just below the city (then called the & Vegetable Garden”) became aware that it was threatened with speedy inundation and removed his family and horses Sunday night, returning to the island to watch his property. In the morning he found, his house completely hemmed in, nearly up to the roof, and no possible chance of his escape at that time. He suffered much from exposure, but managed to survive until the waters receded and he could be rescued. A
man was carried down from somewhere up the river on a pile of lumber about noon on Monday. As it was nearing Greenbush the current carried it toward the ferry slip, when some persons on the dock threw a line, which he caught and tied around his body and he was drawn safely ashore. The bookkeeper of Gibson & Dalton, a Mr. Wetmore, also had a narrow escape. He, with two other men, remained in the building over night.

About 3 a. m. the water was rising so rapidly that he sent his companions to apprise his employers of that fact. While alone he thought it best to remove the books of the firm from the first to the second floor. After doing so he attempted to go down stairs again, when he discovered that the building was on fire and his course impeded by the smoke. He had no means of egree [sic, egress], and, wet to the skin, he was compelled to remain in the building. He was finally rescued by firemen, who found him completely exhausted. Three men went in a boat from near the house of Archibald Dunlop on the Troy road to bring off a family occupying a house on the island at that point, when the boat was capsized by a cake of ice and the three men were thrown into the water. Two of them managed to clamber into a tree, but the third was so cold that he could not raise himself from the water and was taken out in a dying state. The men on the island were rescued in a cart which was backed up to their relief.

Lola Montez’s Adventure.
An adventure in which Lola Montez, the famous (or infamous) dancer who later captivated the King of Belgium, figured at this time was chronicled by the Atlas and Argus of Feb. 11, 1857, as follows: "LOLA MONTEZ PLAYING THE DEUCE AGAIN. — Yesterday afternoon this notorious woman, who has had rooms at the Stanwix Hall during her engagement at the Green Street theatre, came to the conclusion that she could not remain in the city another day. She must go. The nearest, and the most perilous way for her to reach the other side of the river and take the cars was to cross over in a small skiff. No one had yet ventured to cross since the breaking up of the ice. Here was an adventure just suited to her daring spirit, and of course she was on nettles to embark.

“Ferrymen were procured and off they started, Lola accompanied by her sister, her agent (who was so unfortunate as to fall upon the ice and become damaged by water, thereby exciting the loud laughter of the danseuse) and another gentleman. They were ferried over in safety. The ferrymen then came back for Lola’s baggage, two heavy trunks. With that precious load they again shoved off for the opposite shore. The wind from the northwest was very strong and piercing cold. The men were somewhat exhausted by their previous
exertions and when in the centre of the stream the wind and rapid current drove their little boat into some drifting ice, and before they could extricate themselves their craft was firmly frozen to the moving mass.

“In this situation they were discovered by many of our citizens. Their peril was soon communicated throughout the city and much excitement ensued. All who could procured positions on the roofs of the higher buildings to obtain a view of the poor fellows. Away they floated, and when opposite Westerlo street the bell of the South Dutch church rang out an alarm. But it was impossible for anyone on this side to go to their assistance. Happily
the current tended to the Greenbush shore, and when they had nearly reached the ferry slip on that side they were floated against the solid ice.

"A dozen or more men out of Greenbush started for their relief and reached them by means of planks. Just then the ice gave way and the rescuers were compelled to retreat. They again essayed, and this time with more success, saving not only the men, but the trunks. The ferrymen have undoubtedly been severely frost bitten in return for indulging their adventurous spirit."

Breaking Ice Gorges.
Bars in the river have frequently afforded lodgment for the great cakes of ice piled one on top of the other as they floated down the stream and ice gorges have formed which rendered navigation impossible while other parts of the river were open. This was the case in 1857. On February 21 a committee of the Albany Board of Trade visited the ice barrier below the city and found it extend from Van Wie’s Point to Castleton, and so thick and solid as to defy any attempt to open a channel. As at this time river traffic was of large proportions, the ice embargo was severely felt by the commercial interests of this city. A man named Smith proposed to fill a box from four to six feet long with powder, to place this at an advantageous point in the ice gorge and to set off the powder by means of electricity. This plan, however, was rejected. The powder would probably have had about as much effect on the gorge as the kick of a grasshopper. However, late in the evening of the 21st the lower end of the barrier broke away and went down the river, and on the 25th the rest of the ice dam disappeared and the entire channel was found to be unobstructed except by floating masses of ice. The retiring water disclosed the unshapen mass which remained of the State street bridge. Navigation was at once resumed.

It was not until December, 1902, that the idea of smashing ice gorges on the Hudson by means of ramming them with powerful tugs was adopted. On the 22d of that month Captain Ulster Davis took the tug GEORGE C. VAN TUYL and attacked a gorge at the Livingston avenue bridge. The ice was jammed to the bottom of the river and piled up 10 feet high. The attempt was successful, after six days of “bucking.” Early in March, 1903, the
lower part of this city and Rensselaer was flooded by backwater from a gorge at Roah Hook. The old side- wheeler NORWICH and the tug BARIER [sic, BAVIER] were brought up from Rondout and attacked the gorge. The BARIER was a new steel hull steamer, and as it backed up 500 feet and then went at full speed into the gorge, it penetrated 25 or 30 feet. After several days the obstructions were cleared. Since then steamers have been employed with more or less success to break up the ice gorges in the river. In 1907 the powerful tug HERCULES got stuck hard and fast in an ice pack near Coxsackie and the big steamer POCAHONTAS and the tender HERCULES were sent to her rescue. The POCAHONTAS stove a plank in her bow and had to be beached at Catskill. 

The ROB got stuck in the ice alongside the Hercules, but after many hours, was pried loose. Then the ROB cut the HERCULES out of the floe and pulled her away with a stout hawser.

One of the greatest achievements of Captain Davis in breaking an ice gorge on the Hudson was in March, 1907. when he brought up the powerful tug CORNELL and the tender ROB from Rondout, a good part of the way cutting through ice two feet thick, and smashed upon the great barrier near Coeymans. It took four hours to make the trip of about two miles from Saugerties Light to Malden. Even after the gorge had been broken the immense cakes of floating ice jammed and formed other barriers, but were in turn rammed and dislodged, and after four days of strenuous work Captain Davis and his crews had the satisfaction of seeing the ice flowing freely and knew that the river was open to the ocean. The State now makes preparations for attacking ice gorges in the Hudson with steamers whenever necessary.

First Flood Record.
From the records compiled by Forecaster Todd we learn that in 1645 “a very high freshet, unequalled since 1639,” occurred, "which destroyed a number of horses in their stables, nearly carried away the fort and inflicted considerable other damage in the colonie.’’ In 1648 freshets nearly destroyed Fort Orange and in 1661 the country around Fort Orange for miles was under water and a few days later the heaviest flood the colonists had experienced up to that time forced them to quit their dwellings and flee with their cattle for safety to the woods on the adjoining hills. The “woods” at that time were where some of the finest residences of Albany are located now.

In 1818 the greatest freshet known in Albany in 40 years occurred. The river froze over that winter on December 7, 1817, and remained frozen until March 3, 1818, when the ice moved out in a body for some distance south and then remained stationary. On the night of March 3 the water rose to a great height in the river, so that several families in Church street would have perished if they had not been rescued. The water was two feet deep in the barroom of the Eagle tavern, at the southwest corner of South Market and Hamilton streets. Sloops were thrown upon the wharf and the horse ferry boat was driven about half way up to Pearl
street. A family that occupied a house on the island opposite the city were rescued by the people of Bath. The river was not clear this year until March 25.

Open Three Times.
The river was open to navigation three times between December, 1823, and February 11, 1824. On the latter date the breaking up was so sudden that sloops and other vessels moored for the season were carried away.

The worst freshet recorded before 1857 was on January 26, 1839, when the water at Albany rose to 17.28 feet above mean low water mark. Many citizens were driven from their houses and a soup house was opened at the city hall for their benefit. A late spring freshet was that of 1833, when the river began to rise on May 14 and two days later had reached its greatest height, causing much damage. South Market street was impassable below Hamilton street. Another was on May 2, 1841. The ice had gone out without making any trouble on March 24, but later heavy rains swelled the stream and when a great snow storm set in on May 2 the water overflowed the docks.

Freshets Not Only in Spring.
Occasionally the Hudson river goes on the rampage in the fall. In 1823, it even cut up on Christmas day, when the rain and mild weather conspired to break up the ice and considerable damage was done. The pier, which was nearly completed, was exposed for the first time to such a freshet. There was such a heavy rain during the first four days of September, 1828, when nearly as much fell as in the months of July and August, that the river rose and submerged the docks and pier. Heavy rain sent the water over the docks on September 3, 1849, and on October 28 of the same year heavy rain that had fallen for 36 hours caused the island at the lower end of the city to be inundated for the eighth time that season, entailing great damage to crops. On November 14, 1853, heavy rain of the previous two days caused a rise in the river, which overflowed the docks. A great freshet caused by rain of the previous 36 hours on August 21, 1856, carried away the bridge over the Normanskill on the Bethlehem turnpike and damaged several mills. On October 8, 1903, the river began to rise rapidly and by the 10th reached 16.3 feet above mean low water mark at Albany. The greatest rainfall ever recorded for 24 hours at Albany was on the 9th, when 4.75 inches fell.