Transcript

Hello! My name is Dani. I’m a student at the University of Southampton and I’m a facilitator on the course. My favourite shipwreck is the SS City of Medicine Hat. It was found in a city called Saskatoon, which is in central Canada – that makes it about three days’ drive from the nearest ocean. It was a paddle steamer used to ferry passengers up and down the river. It sank in 1909 when it hit some underwater telegraph cables. It was found a few years ago, and they found about a thousand artefacts with it. It’s my favourite shipwreck because three days from the ocean and we still find maritime archaeology and that’s pretty exciting!

Further reading about SS City of Medicine Hat:

• Wikipedia article
• Globe and Mail Article on discovery of the wreck

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Tom Sukanen and the Sontiainen

Tom Sukanen was born in Finland, where he trained as a shipwright before immigrating to Canada in 1911 to work as a farmer.  In the 1929, during the height of the great depression he travelled back to Finland for a brief visit.  It was after his return that he hatched a plan to sail back to Finland on vessel he built himself.   His plan was to build a hull that was 13.1 metres long and three metres high with a 2.7-metre beam. The keel was 9.1 metres long at the waterline and 2.7 metres deep.  He built the ship in several parts and intended to drag it to the South Saskatchewan River, there he intended not to sail the ship down the river but rather to put the deck cabins on a raft, mount his old car engine on the raft with a propeller, and pull the watertight keel and hull on their sides behind him.  Once he had reached Hudson Bay, he would bolt his ship together and sail away.

He began moving sections of the boat towards the river in 1938, but by 1939 his health had failed.  Regarded by many local people as mad, he had completely dismantled his home and barns for material to build his ship of dreams.  Sadly, he was removed from his ship and lived out the rest of his days in a mental institution in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan.  The ship itself was vandalised shortly after his departure from it, and his tool, equipment and bit of the vessel itself were strewn across local fields for decades.

The vessel was eventually salvaged and reassembled at the Sukanen Ship Pioneer Village and Museum just south of Moose Jaw.  The story  continues to resonate with Western Canadians and Sukanen’s ship has become symbolic  of the strength, resilience, and, sometimes, madness it took to live in this landscape during the Great Depression.

The SS City of Medicine Hat

On June 7th, 1908, The SS City of Medicine Hat, a 130ft river steamer,  hit telegraph wires that had been submerged by spring runoff on the South Saskatchewan River.  The ship’s steering was disabled and it drifted into the column of the Victoria Bride in Saskatoon.   Thankfully, the passengers had already disembarked and the captain and crew climbed onto the bridge to escape.  The ship’s engineer jumped overboard and swam ashore.

At the time, it was considered the “greatest nautical disaster in Prairie history.”  The SS City of Medicine Hat was the last steamship ever to sail on the waters of the South Saskatchewan River.

In 2010, archaeologists re-discovered the remains of the SS City of Medicine Hat during construction work on the bridge.  1,000 artifacts including ceramics, metal parts, tableware and clothing were discovered.  There is some evidence that remains of the hull may have survived, submerged in the sandy bottom of the river…work for future maritime archaeologists of the prairies!

Further Reading/Watching:

Dreams in the Dust: The Story of Tom Sukanen

National Film Board of Canada: Shipbuilder

Mysteries of Canada

Globe and Mail: Shipwreck from 1908 found in South Saskatchewan

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Built by the Fairfield Shipping Company of Scotland and launched in 1906, The Empress of Ireland and her sister ship, the Empress of Britain were steam liners built for the transatlantic trade. At 14,000 tonnes in weight and with a length of 550ft (167m), the liners would routinely make the trip from Liverpool to Quebec in six days at a speed of 20 knots. Each ship was designed with watertight doors so that it would float if any two compartments flooded. It was also divided into eleven sections sealed by bulkheads (walls). The Empress of Ireland was owned and operated by the Canadian Pacific Railway and used to connect people and goods from England to the national railway of Canada.

In light of the 1912 tragedy of the sinking of the Titanic, many safety measures were in effect.  The number of passengers that could travel on The Empress was not determined by the number of berths (beds) on board but rather the number of lifeboats.  On its final voyage, the ship carried 40 lifeboats, 2200 life jackets and 1447 passengers and crew.

The Tragedy of The Empress of Ireland

On May 28th, 1914 The Empress began her 96th trip to England from Quebec City, travelling down the St. Lawrence River. The Empress had just dropped off her pilot (an expert on navigation on tricky parts of the river) at Point-au-Pere and was close to the south shore. The Storstad, a heavily loaded Norwegian coal ship, was heading the opposite direction to collect her pilot for travel to Montreal. The ships spotted each other at 1:40 am, on May 29th, 1914.  Captain Henry Kendell of The Empress noted that The Storstad was approximately 8 miles (12km) ahead and ordered a course that would allow both ships to pass starboard of each other before The Empress moved towards open water.

Shortly after noticing The Storstad, a heavy fog particular to the area rolled in from the south shore obscuring both ships. Concerned, Captain Kendall ordered The Empress to come to a full stop and signalled with two long blasts that the Empress was no longer moving. Within minutes The Storstad came out of the fog, 100 ft. (30m) away from The Empress, and hit her at a 45 degree angle at the centre of the ship. Despite attempts by both captains to keep the ships connected, and thus more stable, the currents ripped the ships apart.

Water poured through the starboard hole in The Empress so quickly that only five or six of the lifeboats could be launched. Within 10 minutes the ship was on her starboard side, with hundreds of survivors sitting on the port side of the hull.  Within 14 minutes the ship had completely sunk.

Out of 1447 passengers and crew, 1012 lost their lives.

A wireless SOS had been sent out and the Eureka and Lady Evelyn joined the still floating Storstad to search for survivors. By the time they had arrived, all survivors in the water were dead. Those who had been saved were transferred to the Lady Evelyn and brought to the nearby town of Rimouski.

The Aftermath

A Canadian Court of Enquiry was established to review the incident, chaired by Lord Mersey who had also chaired the Titanic tribunal. Fortunately, Captain Kendall survived the wreck, having been pulled from the water into a lifeboat. Captain Anderson of The Storstad had not been at the helm of the ship during the incident. His first officer (who was found negligent of not informing his captain of the incoming fog) swore that before the fog had appeared he had seen red lights, signifying that The Empress was showing her port side. Despite the conflicting testimony, the Storstad was ultimately found responsible for the accident.

In the summer of 1914, Canadian Pacific Railway hired a salvage company to retrieve the safe, first class mail and nearly $150,000 in silver bullion.

For fifty years it mostly remembered by the Salvation Army, who lost 170 members including their band during the event. It was only rediscovered by divers in in the mid-1980s. Despite only lying at 130ft (40m), the current and conditions at this site make it difficult to dive at. The sharp angle of the wreck means that much of the starboard side has silted in. Many of the loose artefacts and some of the human remains on the site had been pillaged before the wreck was classified as a “historical and archaeological property” in 1999.

Importance

Despite being one of the worst maritime disasters in Canadian history, the sinking of the Empress of Ireland remained largely forgotten. It was quickly overshadowed by the beginning of WWI and also by the more high class Titanic. Nevertheless, on the 100th anniversary of the wrecking, Canadians recognise the historic importance of the ship that brought over 120,000 European immigrants to Canada. The federal government believes that over 1 in 35 Canadians can trace an ancestor to this ship, many of whom settled in the Prairie Provinces.

By Dani Newman.

Links of Interest

National Post: Canada’s Titanic

Canadian Museum of History

PBS: Lost Liners- Empress of Ireland

CBC Radio: New Image Revealed of Empress of Ireland Wreck-02/06/2014

Sea View Diving: Empress of Ireland Wreck

Disaster Songs: Empress of Ireland

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