A BUFFALONIAN'S ACCOUNT OF THE ACCIDENT TO THE "NEW WORLD" - 1859

Editor's Note: This account is from the November 1, 1859 issue of the  "Buffalo (NY) Weekly Express". Thank you to Contributing Scholar Carl Mayer for finding, cataloging and transcribing  the article. The language, spelling and grammar of the article reflects the time period when it was written.​

Built in New York, wood, 1418 tons, by William H. Brown for Peoples Line as day boat between New York and Albany. Later rebuilt as night boat. Sank in 1859 when gallows frame and working beam collapsed. Raised and returned to service only to sink again in 1861. Raised, but saw little service afterwardds. Engine put into "St. John" in 1863, hull used as hospital barge on James River during Civil War. Image from "The Flyers of the Hudson, Hudson River Steamboats" Drawings by Samuel Ward Stanton.

A BUFFALONIAN'S ACCOUNT OF THE ACCIDENT TO THE NEW WORLD. 
Mr. John J. Weber, of this city, who was a passenger on board the steamer "New World", at the time of the accident which occasioned her sinking, furnished the following account of the disaster to the reporter of the New York Evening Poet: "I started for Albany last night, on board the steamer "New World". When near Fort Lee I heard a crash, and on reaching the deck learned that the steamer was sinking fast, caused by the water rushing into a large hole in the bottom of the steamer, caused by the machinery breaking and falling through it. I never saw such a terrible sight before. Many of the passengers were perfectly wild from fright, and rushed over the steamer from one end to the other. I saw two or three persons jump overboard; saw two of them sink, but cannot say positively whether any were drowned or not. Two or three were in one of the cabins drinking when the accident occurred, and as they were known to be intoxicated, it is feared that they were drowned by the water rushing in at the cabin windows. 

"When the sloop "Jack Downing" came alongside of us I was one of the first to get on board, and assisted several others to do the same, among them a number of ladies. When there were from sixty to seventy-five persons on board, the Captain gave orders that the ropes which fastened the vessels together should be unloosed, as he was afraid, if any more got aboard, the sloop would be capsized, and the whole party drowned. Two of the ropes I could not unfasten, so I cut them with my knife, and we started for Yonkers. I am returning to New York to see after my baggage. 
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Mr. Weber was of the party taken on board the sloop "Jack Downing" and landed at Yonkers. The names of this company, which numbered about sixty, are the only ones published as yet. In the list we find no others from Buffalo, but we notice the name of Mr. W. L. Canfield, of Springville.

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