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| Steamboat 'Magnolia' at Claiborne landing in 1855. |
(The following story was originally published in The
Monroe Journal’s Centennial Edition on Dec. 22, 1966. Written by Riley Kelly,
the story appeared on Page 15C of that issue under the headline, “’Spirits’ Are
Still Unfound.")
Skin divers in the area who have a big summertime thirst
might find more than muddy water at the bottom of the Alabama River near
Claiborne.
Currents of over 100 years might have covered with mud a
steamboat-load of ‘aged in the water’ spirits, part of the cargo of The
Henderson, sunk about a mile from Claiborne.
The Nov. 13, 1883 file copy of The Monroe Journal,
Monroeville, reprinted a story from the Wilcox Home Ruler, Camden, relating the
sinking in a story, ‘Buried Whiskey.’
Site Not Specified
The river boat, a 123-tonner, sank April 27, 1825, after
colliding with another vessel, the Balize. The history of Merchant Steam
Vessels of the United States, which lists this information, does not specify
the exact location of the accident.
The Henderson is recognized by many Alabama historians as
the boat on which French Gen. LaFayette made his voyage down the Alabama River.
He landed at Claiborne on April 6, 1825 and was honored at a reception at the
old Masonic Hall, which still stands at Perdue Hill.
The Henderson, at the time of her submersion, was declared
to have held a load of ‘barrels of fine whiskey, brandy and wines.’
The Camden paper’s description of the watery resting place
of the Henderson specifies no location other than ‘she sank in tolerable deep
water and has never been opened.’
Attempts were made to release the entombed spirits as early
as 1829 when the ‘low stage of the river exposed the boat and she could be seen
with her bow sticking up in the water.’
The newspaper account of 1883 recalls:
Mr. Thomas Gaillard, the father of Drs. Sam and Edmond
Gaillard and Col. Richbourg Gaillard, impelled by the spirit of laudable
enterprise, attempted to open her hatches and get into the hold. He procured
two flatboats and various appliances in the way of pulleys, ropes, etc. He also
employed an old sailor to assist in the work. Her timbers were so strong,
however, and the force of the water so great that he never succeeded in getting
into her hold, and the attempt was finally abandoned.
New Call To Action
The 1883 drought was apparently a call to action again,
since the water at the location was again low and the Henderson was exposed.
The Wilcox Home Ruler surmised that time had weakened her fastenings and that
she could be easily penetrated.
Further encouragement to adventurers before the days of
snorkels and aqua lungs declared: ‘It is also not at all impossible that the
cask may have withstood the action of the water during the half century that
has passed over them, as they have not been exposed to air, and are in all
likelihood encased in mud and sand.’
Today, some 141 years after the sinking, who is to say the
cargo of the old Henderson is not still as the Home Ruler conjectured: ‘Those
spirits are still emphatically good.’
Any divers interested in a dip for a nip would just have to
confine their operations to one mile or so near the Claiborne landing, or maybe
one mile south of the present landing… that’s just about as closely as the site
of the boat’s remains can be pinpointed.
Such is the case – unless you run into some tipsy fish.
Around Thanksgiving in 2007, I saw a structure when kayaking just above the grain elevator..May not be a ship but there were exposed timbers on river left downstream in the location named...the Alabama was extremely low...as low as I have ever paddled it.
ReplyDeleteMy grandfather used to tell a story about how there was a spot on the river, if it got low enough, you could once see the smoke stack from an old boat. He said he'd always heard it held a cargo of old whiskey.
ReplyDelete