Death by Fire and Ice: The Steamboat Lexington Calamity

by Brian E. O'Connor

Overview

Death by Fire and Ice tells the little—known story of the sinking of the steamboat Lexington on Long Island Sound in January 1840. Built in 1835 by Cornelius Vanderbilt, the Lexington left Manhattan bound for Stonington, Connecticut, at four o'clock in the afternoon on a bitterly cold day carrying an estimated one hundred forty—seven passengers and crew and a cargo of, among other things, baled cotton. After making her way up an ice—encrusted East River and into Long Island Sound, she caught fire off Eaton's Neck on Long Island's north shore at approximately seven o'clock. The fire quickly ignited the cotton stowed on board. With the crew unable to extinguish the fire, the blaze burned through the ship's wheel and tiller ropes, rendering the ship unmanageable. Soon after, the engine died, and the blazing ship drifted aimlessly in the Sound away from shore with the prevailing wind and current. As the night wore on, the temperature plummeted, reaching nineteen degrees below zero. With no hope of rescue on the dark horizon, the forlorn passengers and crew faced a dreadful decision: remain on board and perish in the searing flames or jump overboard and succumb within minutes to the Sound's icy waters. By three o'clock in the morning the grisly ordeal was over for all but one passenger and three members of the crew—the only ones who survived. The tragedy remains the worst maritime disaster in the history of Long Island Sound. Within days, the New York City Coroner convened an inquest to determine the cause of the disaster. After two weeks of testimony, reported daily in the New York City press, the inquest jury concluded that the Lexington had been permitted to operate on the Sound “at the imminent risk of the lives and property“ of its passengers, and that, had the crew acted appropriately, the fire could have been extinguished and a large portion, if not all, of the passengers saved. The public's reaction to the verdict was scathing: the press charged that the members of the board of directors of the Transportation Company, which had purchased the Lexington from Commodore Vanderbilt in 1839, were guilty of murder and should be indicted. Calls were immediately made for Congress to enact legislation to improve passenger safety on steamboats. This book explores the ongoing debate in Congress during the nineteenth century over its power to regulate steamboat safety; and it examines the balance Congress struck between the need to insulate the nation's shipping industry from ruinous liability for lost cargo, while at the same time greatly enhancing passenger safety on the nation's steamboats.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781682478042
Publisher:	Naval Institute Press
Publication date:	10/15/2022
Pages:	232
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Brian E. O’Connor was born in Brooklyn, New York. He received a BA, magna cum laude, in government and politics from St. John’s Universityand a JD from St. John’s UniversitySchool of Law, where he served as the publications editor of the Law Review. After beginning his legal career with a clerkship on the New York Court of Appeals, he became a partner in a prominent Wall Street law firm, where he specialized in complex commercial litigation for thirty—eight years before retiring as the firm’s General Counsel in 2017. He lives on Eaton’s Neck in Northport, New York, with his wife Helen and his two Portuguese water dogs, Maya and Nelson.

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Harnessing the Power of Steam

1 A "Fire Engine to Raise Water" 7

2 "Fulton's Folly" and the New York Monopoly 13

3 The Competition Emerges 18

4 Gibbons v. Ogden 22

The Demise of the New York Monopoly

5 High-Pressure Engines and Anthracite 28

6 Steam-Propelled Navigation on the Sound 32

Vanderbilt Launches the Lexington

7 Fires and Exploding Boilers 37

8 Congressional Power to Regulate Steamboat Safety 43

9 The Steamboat Act of 1838 47

10 Vanderbilt Sells the Lexington to the Boston and New York Transportation Company 54

11 All Aboard the Lexington for Stonington 59

12 The Fire Alarm Sounds 68

13 Rescue Efforts Prove Too Little, Too Late 75

14 The Coroner's Inquest 83

The Owner's Testimony

15 The Coroner's Inquest 88

The Lexington's Safety Record

18 The Coroner's Inquest 95

The Survivors' Testimony

17 The Inquest Jury's Verdict 102

18 The Public Demands Retribution and Improved Safety 110

19 The Lexington's Owner's Liability for Property Lost on Board 116

20 The Shipowners' Limitation of Liability Act of 1851 120

21 The Call to Overhaul the Steamboat Act of 1838 127

22 Congress versus the States 133

23 The Steamboat Act of 1852 139

24 The Steamboat Act of 1871 146

25 Salvaging the Lexington 152

Epilogue 157

Requiescat in Pace

Notes 163

Selected Bibliography 197

Index 201

Editorial Reviews

This extraordinarily well—written history provides the ‘who, what, when, why, where and how’ of the disaster of the Lexington. Remarkably, John Q. Adams, Aaron Burr, Currier & Ives, Clive Cussler, Andrew Jackson, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Mark Twain and Daniel Webster are among many whose actions contribute to the story.” —Skip Finley, author of Whaling Captains of Color: America's First Meritocracy

“Brian E. O’Connor has woven together a captivating story detailing the rise of steam navigation in the United States, the legislation needed, and enacted, to regulate this new industry, and the explosion, burning, and sinking of the steamboat Lexington in Long Island Sound on January 13, 1840. The author tells the gripping story of the forgotten disaster that left only four survivors out of 147 people on board, and then fleshes out the consequences by delving into the resulting court proceedings and legislative acts meant to curtail such an accident from ever happening again, which, unfortunately, was never realized.” —Gene Eric Salecker, author of Destruction of the Steamboat Sultana: The Worst Maritime Disaster in American History

While others have written about Lexington, O’Connor’s work stands apart. Not only does he relate, in finely crafted prose, the details of the disaster, but employing his skills as a distinguished lawyer, he takes the reader into the intricacies of the law and the conduct of the investigations. It was a time when the nation’s ability to build powerful machines surpassed its capacity, or willingness, to regulate these new devices. In this case, a devil’s brew of failure resulted in the worst maritime disaster in the history of Long Island Sound. — Sea History

From the Publisher