|
1909 Hudson-Fulton Celebration | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| HRMM HOME | Quadricentennial | Robert Fulton | Henry Hudson | | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
From Saturday, September 25, to Monday, October 11, 1909, the State of New York commemorated the 300th anniversary of the discovery of the Hudson River by Henry Hudson in 1609 and the 100th anniversary of the first successful application of steam to navigation upon that River by Robert Fulton in 1807. The creation of a full scale replica of Robert Fulton's steamboat was one of the accomplishments of this celebration, and this chapter describes how the Clermont replica was designed and built. CHAPTER 8THE BUILDING OF THE CLERMONT REPLICA Research Concerning the ClermontIMMEDIATELY upon the merging of the Hudson ter-centenary and the Fulton centenary movements, as recorded in Chapter 1, the building of a facsimile of Fulton’s pioneer steamboat, the Clermont, became a part of the Commission s plans as naturally as had that of the Half Moon.This task fell to the Naval Parade Committee, of which Rear Admiral Joseph B. Coghlan, U. S. N., was Chairman until his death, December 5, 1908, and of which Capt. Jacob W. Miller has been Chairman since. After her construction, the new Clermont became the charge of the Clermont Committee, of which Mr. Eben E. Olcott is Chairman.
The researches in regard to the Clermont were conducted chiefly by Admiral Coghlan, Naval Constructor, Win. J. Baxter, U. S. N., Capt. Miller, Mr. Olcott, Mr. Frank E. Kirby and Mr. J. W. Millard. Messrs. Kirby and Millard, naval architects and engineers, drew the working plans, and Mr. Millard was the Commission’s Inspector of Construction. The vessel was built at Mariners Harbor, Staten Island, by the Staten Island Shipbuilding Company. It is a curious fact that the Naval Parade Committee had greater difficulty in determining the appearance of the Clermont, which was built in 1807, than in determining the appearance of Henry Hudson’s Half Moon, which entered the river in 1609. There is no contemporary picture or drawing to be found in Europe or America of either the Half Moon or the Clermont, but, as intimated in the preceding chapter, there are so many references to the masting, rigging and draught of the Half Moon in Juet’s Journal of Hudson’s voyage, that with the aid of contemporary pictures of the harbor of Amsterdam and its shipping, the Half Moon could be accurately reconstructed. But in making the facsimile of the Clermont not only did the Committee lack contemporaneous pictures of the vessel, but authentic descriptions of its details were also almost entirely lacking; and still further, the Clermont being a pioneer vessel, it was not one of a type and no aid could be drawn from the appearance of other vessels of that period. The anomaly was thus presented of a greater difficulty in reconstructing a vessel 100 years old than in reconstructing a vessel 300 years old. The plan adopted by the Commission, being the product of the most critical and painstaking technical and historical research, is, therefore, of great interest not only to persons interested in marine matters but also to historians and the public generally. In pursuing their researches, the Committee found a great many persons who offered information about what they believed to have been the original Clermont, but this information was generally found to apply to the boat after she was remodeled, and as the Celebration was designed to commemorate the beginning of steam navigation, the Committee determined to arrive as nearly as possible at the appearance of the pioneer vessel. A document bearing on the original size of the Clermont was a letter written by Fulton three months after her first trip, in which letter he suggested how she should be altered. This highly interesting document reads as follows:
Dimensions of the Original ClermontFrom the foregoing, it would appear that the original Clermont was 150 feet long and 12 feet wide, as with 16 feet beam she had “4 feet additional width;” but from Fulton’ s statement concerning his first boat in the specifications upon which he obtained his second patent October 2, 1810, which may be found in “A Sketch of the Origin and Progress of Steam Navigation” by Prof. Bennet Woodcroft, a distinguished authority on patents, printed in London in 1848, Fulton says that his first boat was 13 feet wide. His statement is as follows: “My first steamboat on the Hudson’s River was 150 ft. long, 13 ft. wide, drawing 2ft. of water, bow and stern 6o degrees; she displaced 36.40 cubic ft., equal 100 tons of water; her bow presented 26 ft. to the water, plus and minus resistence of 1 ft.; running 4 miles an hour. In the foregoing, Fulton says that his first boat was 150 feet long and 13 feet wide, drawing two feet of water, and all his calculations of displacement, immersed surface and resistance correspond with a boat of those dimensions. The Committee felt further assured that the calculation referred to the first boat because from it Fulton determined the size of his engine, and there was no doubt whatever about the engine. They also knew that the statement could not refer to the boat after she was enlarged because the official papers of her registry after her alteration showed that she was then 18 feet wide. Registry of the First ClermontThe facts concerning the registry of the original Clermont are briefly these: The Clermont was not enrolled at the time of her initial trip on August 17, 1807, but on August 29, 1807, Fulton wrote to Chancellor Livingston a letter in which he said among other things, “I will have her registered and everything done which I can recollect.” Five days later, that is, on September 3, 1807, he had her registered. This original enrollment cannot be found, but on May 14, 1808, Fulton enrolled the enlarged boat, and in that enrollment reference is made to that of September 3, 1807. The enrollment of May 14, 1808, in the New York Custom House, reads as follows:“No 108. Enrollment in conformity to an Act of Congress of the United States of America entitled ‘An act for enrolling and licensing ships or vessels to be employed in the coasting trade and fisheries, and for regulating the same. “Robert R. Livingston, of Clermont, “Columbia County, State of New York. “having taken and subscribed to the oath required by the said Act and having sworn that he, together with Robert Fulton of the City of New York, are citizens of the United States, and sole owners of the ship or vessel called the North River Steamboat of Clermont, whereof Samuel Wiswall is at present master, and as he hath sworn he is a citizen of the United States, and that the said ship or vessel was built in the City of New York, in the year 1807, as per enrollment 173 issued at this port on the 3rd day of September 1807, now given up. And Peter A. Schenck, Surveyor of the Port, having certified that the vessel being enlarged, the said ship or vessel has one deck, and two masts, and that her length is 149 ft.; breadth 17 ft. 11 in. depth 7 ft. and that she measures 182 48—95 tons. That she is a square-sterned boat, has square tuck; no quarter galleries and no figurehead. Hands and Seals May 14, 1808.”The importance of the foregoing is that it shows that the boat was 149 feet long and 17 feet 11 inches wide after she was enlarged. Nothing is said about lengthening, but she was “enlarged,” from which statement and from previous evidence, of her length it was concluded that she was widened and had a poopdeck and other work added. The widening, as intimated in Fulton’s letter of Nov. 20, 1807, was necessary to give her greater stiffness, her original beam of 12 or 13 feet being too narrow for stability. As to the differences between 12 and 13 feet beam and 149 and 150 feet length in the statements concerning the original boat, they are accounted for by the fact that the measurements probably referred to different points on the hull. For instance, the Custom House measurement in those days was from the foreside of the stem to the afterside of the stern post at the upper deck; and as all of Fulton’s boats appear to have had a raking bow and stern, the lines of rake carried up to the rail would make the Clermont 150 feet long. Building the New ClermontThe Committee at length arrived at the conclusion that the original Clermont was 150 feet long and 13 feet wide, with 7 feet depth of hold; but owing to the dangers attending a boat of such narrow beam, it was determined to build the replica 16 feet wide on the bottom and about 18 feet wide at the deck. With that exception, the final plans were drawn exactly as the Clermont was ascertained to have appeared on her first trip. The actual dimensions of the replica, therefore, were as follows:
Launching the Clermont
The keel of the Clermont was laid May 14 and she was: launched on Saturday, July 10, 1909, the officers of the Commission, its guests, and the launching party embarking at Pier A, Manhattan, for the scene of the ceremony at Mariners Harbor, Staten Island. The U. S. S. Wasp officered and manned by the Naval Militia of New York preceded the flotilla and anchored in the Kill von Kull near the shipyard, while the gunboat Aileen followed with the officers of the Commission, the launching party and a detachment of the Naval Militia from the Second Battalion of Brooklyn. The latter, upon landing, acted as a guard of honor and patrolled the grounds around the ways. The navy tug Powhatan, the Supervisor of the Port’s tug Cerberus, the Dock Department tug Manhattan, the United States Revenue tender Guide, and Launch A of the Department of Docks and Ferries carried guests. Many private yachts and launches, all as gay with colors as the official boats, either accompanied the latter or assembled in the waters near the shipyard. Mr. W. J. Davidson, President of the Staten Island Shipbuilding Company, received the official party at the landing and escorted them to the small launching platform erected at the bow of the Clermont. The party upon the platform included several descendants of Robert Fulton and Chancellor Livingston. The sponsor for the new Clermont was Mrs. Arthur Taylor Sutcliffe (born Alice Crary), a great-granddaughter of the inventor of the first Clermont; and her maids of honor were Miss Dorothy Camp, Miss Evelyn Knox, and Miss Katherine L. Olcott. They carried mountain laurel brought from the Catskill Mountains. A conspicuous object of historic interest upon the rail of the platform was the bell of the original Clermont.
The ceremonies attending the launching were very brief. Capt. Jacob W. Miller, Chairman of the Naval Parade Committee, presided, and spoke upon the subject “Time and Tide, Wind and Wave;” the Rev. Charles A. Cassidy offered prayer; and Mr. Davidson of the shipbuilding company, and Gen. Stewart L. Woodford, President of the Commission, made brief remarks. The following original ode was then read by Mr. Robert Underwood Johnson, editor of the Century Magazine: Mr. Eben E. Olcott, Chairman of the Clermont Committee, then said: “GEN. WOODFORD, LADIES AND GENTLEMEN.— It is interesting that, on this auspicious day, we have one part of the old original Clermont, the bell, which was used before the days of the steam whistle to call tardy passengers to the landings. It is my great pleasure to present this bell for the occasion. May it ring out a message as clear and true, both for this and future generations, as the inventor’s own words, when, in speaking of the Mississippi and the great North West, he said, ‘Although the prospect of personal emolument has been some inducement to me, Yet I feel infinitely more pleasure in reflecting on the numerous advantages that my country will derive from the invention.’”While Capt. Miller’s daughter, Mrs. R. B. Bowler, rang the old bell, the final strokes of the operation of “sawing-off” the king-planks of the cradle were executed and the Clermont began to slide down the ways into the water amid strains of music by the band, the blowing of steam whistles, the firing of salutes from the gunboats, and the cheers of the multitude. At the first movement of the vessel, Mrs. Sutcliffe broke upon the bow a bottle beautifully ornamented with silver filigree work and filled with water from the old Livingston well at Clermont-on-the-Hudson, at the same time naming the vessel in these words: “I name thee Clermont, and again auspiciously proclaim to the American people the sentiments of Robert Fulton as expressed in an essay to the Friends of Mankind, ‘Industry will give abundance to a virtuous world and call mankind to unbounded feats of harmony and friendship. The liberty of the seas will be the happiness of the earth.’” A picturesque incident of the launching, after a Japanese custom, was the release of a dozen carrier pigeons from a basket on the bow of the boat as she glided down the ways. Each of these aerial messengers bore a ribbon upon which were printed the dedicatory words of Mrs. Sutcliffe. One of the pigeons, released at 2.38 P. M., reached No. 342 West Eleventh street, New York, in fifteen minutes, having traversed a distance of ten miles at the rate of a mile in 90 seconds. Appearance of the Clermont
The new Clermont, as she took her place in the great naval parade of September 25, to begin her voyage over the route first traversed by steam by her namesake 102 years before, was a quaint looking craft in the midst of a fleet of gigantic modern steamships. She was an almost wall-sided craft with parallel sides, and painted a quaker drab color. Her bow and the under body of her transom stern were wedge-shaped. Her bottom was flat. She had two masts, the foremast carrying a square sail and the aftermast a fore-and-aft sail. She had no bowsprit or figurehead. There were two cabins, one forward and one aft. A plain open railing surrounded the deck. Inboard over the stern projected the tiller of the big rudder. The boiler, smokestack and the green-colored upper works of her single-cylinder engine, the latter an exact facsimile of the original engine made by Bolton and Watts, were in plain view amidships, while the fly-wheels were outside of the hull and in front of the uncovered bright vermilion paddle-wheels. Upon her stern were painted the words “Clermont, New York.”
Passengers on the Clermont
To add to the picturesqueness of her appearance, she carried as passengers several descendants of Robert Fulton and Chancellor Livingston, and many of these were dressed in the quaint and variegated costumes of a century ago. Upon the day when she entered Newburgh Bay there were on board all the then living grandchildren of the Inventor, the Rev. Robert Fulton Crary, D.D.(1), Mr. C. Franklin Crary (1), Mrs. Hermann H. Cammann, nee Ella C. Crary (1); and Mr. Robert Fulton Ludlow (1); also the great-grandson of Chancellor Livingston Mr. John Henry Livingston (2), the owner by inheritance of the Chancellor’s famous country seat, “Clermont.” Robert Fulton was impersonated by the Rev. C. Seymour Bullock; and Fulton’s fiancee at the time of the trip of the original Clermont, Miss Harriet Livingston, was impersonated by Mr. Bullock’s daughter, Miss Evelyn Livingston Bullock. The character of Chancellor Livingston was taken by Mr. Robert Reginald Livingston (2). Others in the party either throughout the whole trip of the Clermont or for a part of the time were: Governor Charles E. Hughes and staff; General Stewart L. Woodford, President of the Commission; Mr. Eben E. Olcott, Chairman of the Clermont Committee; Prof. Granville Barnum, Capt. A. Bedell Benjamin, Rev. and Mrs. Chas. E. Berg, Capt. John Birmingham, Dr. J. N. Bishop, Mrs. Robert Fulton Blight (3), Miss Florence Brownne (4), Miss Bull, Mrs. C. Seymour Bullock, Mrs. Edward L. Bullock and children, Mr. (1) and Mrs. (2) Edward Crary Cammann, Mr. and Mrs. (1) Hermann H. Cammann, Mr. H. Schuyler Cammann (1), Miss Dorothy H. Camp, Mr. Robert S. Clarkson (2), Mr. Charles Franklin Crary (1), Miss Amy Crary (1), Miss Cornelia Fulton Crary (1), Rev. (1) and Mrs. Robert Fulton Crary, Mr. Robert Fulton Crary, Jr. (1), Miss Mary Livingston Delafield (2), Mr. Jospeh Devlin (4), Mr. Francis Lewis Gould, Capt. Ira Harris, Rev. Sanford Culver Hearn, Mrs. Charles E. Hughes and party, Mr. Richard Hunt (2), Mr. Frank E. Kirby, Mr. Russell Kirby, Mr. (2) and Mrs. John Henry Livingston, Mr. and Mrs. (2) Frederick W. Longfellow, Mr. and Mrs. James B. Ludlow, Master Richard Morris Ludlow, Mr. (1) and Mrs. Robert Fulton Ludlow, Mr. Alfred R. Mandeville (5), Mr. Harry Marvel, Miss Merrit, Mr. J. W. Millard, Prof. Otis Montrose, Miss Katherine L. Olcott, Rev. Angelo Ostrander, Mrs. Henry Parish (2), Mr. Henry G. Pickering, Mrs. Herbert Pinkham and daughter, Rev. George Ramsay, Mr. and Mrs. (5) Charles Mandeville Reynolds, Miss Katherine North Sague, Miss Georgiana Schuyler, Miss Louisa Lee Schuyler, Miss Anita Merle Smith, Hon. William Smith, Rev. Wilton Merle Smith, Mr. and Mrs. (1) Arthur Taylor Sutcliffe, Miss Almira Livingston Troy, Miss Maine Troy, Miss Anna T. Van Santvoord, Supervising Inspector General George H. Uhler, Mrs. Weaver, Miss Beatrice Weaver, Mr. Joseph F. Webber, Mr. James F. Winans (5), Mrs. Joseph E. Winters, Miss Mary Ray Winters. (1) Descendants of Robert Fulton. (2) Descendants of Chancellor Livingston. (3) Widow of a grandson of Robert Fulton. (4) Descendants of Charles Brownne, who built the original Clermont. (5) Descendant of pilots of the original Clermont. Final Disposition of the 1909 Clermont Replica 1The centerpieces of the Hudson-Fulton Celebration and cynosure of all eyes were the replicas of Henry Hudson’s ship, the Half Moon, a gift of the people of Holland, and of Robert Fulton's first Hudson River steamer, the North River Steam Boat. This latter replica had been built at Staten Island for the celebration and was christened the Clermont for this had become the name of Fulton’s famous craft for all time.During the course of the festivities these replicas made a lengthy passage up the Hudson to the head of river navigation at Troy, greeted with a succession of elaborate civic ceremonies en route. The working plans for the Clermont had been drawn by Frank E. Kirby and J. W. Millard after extensive research. She was launched on July 10, 1909, at the yard of the Staten Island Shipbuilding Co., Mariners Harbor, New York. Here again water from the well of the old Livingston estate at Clermont was used for the christening as “. . . a delicate tribute to Fulton’s well-known temperance principles . . ." After her construction was completed, she was entrusted to the Clermont Committee, of which Eben E. Olcott was chairman and which was empowered to make recommendations as to the final disposition of the replica. What to do with the Clermont and the Half Moon when the celebration was over presented a problem. Although the Hudson-Fulton Celebration Commission had presented one of the great events in Hudson Valley history, it ended with a deficit of over $50,000 and little in the way of assets to meet its unpaid bills. Meanwhile, the Clermont was laid up at the shipyard where she had been built. With no money available to keep her in repair, her condition apparently deteriorated rapidly. Mr. Olcott offered to buy her for the Hudson River Day Line and on September 13, 1910, the Executive Committee voted to sell her “. . . in consideration of a cash payment and repairs to the vessel equivalent to $2,361.85, and in further consideration of that company’s [the Day Line’s] agreement to maintain, care for, exhibit, and, when practicable, operate the Clermont as an object lesson in the science of steam navigation.” It was fitting that she should become the property of the Day Line, which had always evinced a strong interest in the early history of steam navigation. Actually, there is no indication that she would ever have been disposed of otherwise. She probably would have been left to rot away on the Staten Island shore. The Day Line immediately had the Clermont overhauled and on October 10, 1910, she was towed from Staten Island to the 129th Street pier at New York to commence a career as a floating museum, with appropriate exhibits on board. Later in the month she was placed at the Day Line’s Desbrosses Street pier and remained open to the public, with an admission fee of twenty-five cents. Early on the afternoon of May 24, 1911, the Hendrick Hudson took the Clermont in tow for Poughkeepsie, where she was to remain for some time. Captain George A. White, Samuel Ward Stanton and the Reverend C. Seymour Bullock, along with a number of newspaper reporters, were aboard the Clermont. The towing hawser broke early in the trip, perhaps because the Hendrick Hudson was going too fast, but aside from that the passage seems to have been uneventful — except that here was one of the most unusual tows ever to go up the Hudson. Now that it owned the Clermont, the Day Line went back further with its own historical antecedents. Its Souvenir Magazine in 1911 said, “Through officials whose fathers and grandfathers were connected with steam transportation on the Hudson since the time of the first company, the Day Line is the logical successor to the Fulton-Livingston Line of early days. . . . During the present season, the Clermont will be stationed at Poughkeepsie, and excursionists to that city on the Day Line . . . will have an opportunity of boarding and thoroughly inspecting this most interesting vessel for a moderate fee.” In September of that year the Clermont had a narrow escape from destruction when the Day Line’s pier and buildings at Poughkeepsie burned. Although the little steamer caught fire she was towed out in the river and the flames extinguished. Eventually interest in such a floating museum paled. It was inevitable that the Clermont could not continue indefinitely as an attraction, and hence the Day Line lost interest in maintaining her as one. In the fall of 1914, she was placed in a tidal lagoon on the inner side of the Day Line landing at Kingston Point and was sufficiently offshore so that she could not be boarded. For many years the company kept her in a presentable condition, but eventually considerable deterioration set in. During the depressed business conditions of the 1930s it was decided to break her up rather than leave her to rot away, and this was done in 1936.
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
