The 150th anniversary of the Civil War is upon us.  In the Civil War 150 programs I have viewed, there are, not surprisingly, few references to steamboats or the men who owned and operated them.  So today I want to take a moment to pay tribute to the men of Georgetown, PA  specifically and all of the men who commanded and operated those transports 150 years ago.

“Thousands of men, women and children lined the river bank to give the men a sendoff…The 78^th PA Infantry was boarded on Captain Thomas Poe’s steamboat Clara Poe and the Moderator while the remainder of the men. horses and canon boarded on the four other steam boats.”  ”At 6:00 PM ropes were released, whistles sounded, anchors weighed, and the Clara Poe… sailed quickly from the Monongahela River into the Ohio River enroute to their jump-off point of Louisville, Kentucky, some three days away.  Some of the soldiers standing at the ship’s railing, watching the city quickly disappearing into the darkening sky, would never live to see Pittsburgh again” [1]

 

This sendoff was vividly recorded on Oct 18, 1861 – 150 years ago tomorrow.  The Clara Poe was one of six steamboats chartered by Commodore WJ Kountz, who had charge of the transportation by river of troops and Government supplies. [2]  The other five steamers at the Monongahela Wharf that Oct day were the Moderator, Sir William Wallace, JW Hallman, Argonaut, and the Silver Wave. 

On Apr 17, 1865, the str Clara Poe was burned by the Confederates at Eddyville on the Cumberland River while transporting supplies and barges of hay to Nashville.  [3] The Moderator on 1 May 1863 collided at night with the str Horizon a vessel owned at that time by Capt Thomas S Calhoon of Georgetown, PA.  The collision, a Civil War tragedy where many soldier lives were lost, occurred near Vicksburg. [4] 

The shining example of these steamboat men is a gift to those with a sense of history.  

  

References. 

 

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[1] Arthur B Fox, Pittsburgh during the Civil War, 1860-1865, p. 31-32.
[2] Arthur B Fox, Pittsburgh during the Civil War, 1860-1865, p. 31-32.
[3] Frederick Way, Jr.,Way’s Packet Directory, 1848-1994, (Ohio University Press, Athens 1994), p. 99.
[4] Frederick Way, Jr.,Way’s Packet Directory, 1848-1994, (Ohio University Press, Athens 1994), p. 217.

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