Children of Sultana Survivors Honor Anniversary of Disaster




April 29, 2002--The greatest disaster in American maritime history was remembered Saturday on the anniversary of the explosion of the steamship Sultana, as a group gathered at the edge of the Mississippi River in Vicksburg, Mississippi.




Although the disaster is more commonly associated with Memphis, the last stop on the trip upriver before the explosion, it is often forgotten that the errors which led to the explosion actually started in Vicksburg.




The city recently began placing markers to recount the story after promptings from the Association of Sultana Descendants and Friends, who organized the gathering Saturday. More than 1,800 people — mostly Union soldiers just released from prison camps — died when the steamboat exploded on April 27, 1865.




Among those present at the ceremony was Glenna Green, 82, whose father, Samuel Washington Jenkins, survived the blast and told his family about the event.




Green and Robert Warner of San Angelo, Texas, the son of a Sultana survivor, placed a wreath on a historical marker on Levee Street in Vicksburg.




"I never learned about it in school," said Green, who traveled from Bakewell, Tenn., for the ceremony attended by more than 100 descendants of Sultana passengers. "I wondered about that myself — why they weren't teaching it."




When three of Sultana's four boilers exploded, Green said her father was blown off the ship into the water "and grabbed on to whatever he could find."




Green said her father was 19 when the Sultana blew up. He died in 1931. "Her father eventually became a doctor, they say because of the suffering he saw that night," said Gene Salecker of Chicago, who wrote a book, called Disaster on the Mississippi, about the Sultana in 1996.




Warner told a similar story recounted by his father, William Carter Warner of the 9th Indiana Cavalry.




"He and a good friend were both asleep when the ship blew up," Warner said. "He came to in the Mississippi River, cold as he could be. But that was probably very fortunate under the circumstances."




Warner told the Jackson (MS) Clarion-Ledger that the young soldier took off the bottom of his long johns, tied them around two boards, and kept afloat until his rescue. He also grabbed a hat that rushed by in the river.




"When he was rescued, he was wearing nothing but the top part of his long johns and a hat," said Warner, recalling a rare lighthearted account that hides the unspeakable horrors his father witnessed on the river 137 years ago.




"It was difficult for him to talk about it," said Warner, whose father died in 1933.




On April 24, 1865, more than 2,300 passengers, including 1,866 paroled Union soldiers, 80 crew members and 70 civilians, boarded the Sultana for their journeys home. The vessel, just under 260 feet long and designed to carry 370 passengers, was disastrously overcrowded when it left the port and steamed north up the Mississippi River.




The Sultana had departed from New Orleans on April 21, 1865, and by the time it reached Vicksburg, a crack in one of the boilers was found and patched. According to written accounts, workers strongly recommended that the boiler be replaced, but the boat's pilot, Capt. J. Cass Mason, was ready to resume the trip north.




Frederick Speed, a Union Army captain from New York, was the only person ever tried for the Sultana overcrowding, said Charles Dawkins of Hattiesburg, whose great-grandfather, Van Buren Jolley, survived the Sultana explosion.




Jolley joined the Union Army in Indiana and was captured and sent to Andersonville prison in Georgia. In researching the story, Dawkins discovered that he was also distantly related to Speed, who was court-martialed and dismissed from service. Later the conviction was overturned.




An estimated 1,500 people lost their lives in the disaster. Many passengers who survived the fiery explosion drowned in the waters of the flooded Mississippi River. Around 300 died later in the hospital.




The Association of Sultana Descendants and Friends holds annual reunions on April 27 in Knoxville, but this year they decided to meet in Vicksburg for the dedication ceremony. Organizers said their turnout of approximately 130 members has been the group's largest so far.

Home state TN

Wish I had known about this, I would have made the trip.

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Replying to:

Children of Sultana Survivors Honor Anniversary of Disaster




April 29, 2002--The greatest disaster in American maritime history was remembered Saturday on the anniversary of the explosion of the steamship Sultana, as a group gathered at the edge of the Mississippi River in Vicksburg, Mississippi.




Although the disaster is more commonly associated with Memphis, the last stop on the trip upriver before the explosion, it is often forgotten that the errors which led to the explosion actually started in Vicksburg.




The city recently began placing markers to recount the story after promptings from the Association of Sultana Descendants and Friends, who organized the gathering Saturday. More than 1,800 people — mostly Union soldiers just released from prison camps — died when the steamboat exploded on April 27, 1865.




Among those present at the ceremony was Glenna Green, 82, whose father, Samuel Washington Jenkins, survived the blast and told his family about the event.




Green and Robert Warner of San Angelo, Texas, the son of a Sultana survivor, placed a wreath on a historical marker on Levee Street in Vicksburg.




"I never learned about it in school," said Green, who traveled from Bakewell, Tenn., for the ceremony attended by more than 100 descendants of Sultana passengers. "I wondered about that myself — why they weren't teaching it."




When three of Sultana's four boilers exploded, Green said her father was blown off the ship into the water "and grabbed on to whatever he could find."




Green said her father was 19 when the Sultana blew up. He died in 1931. "Her father eventually became a doctor, they say because of the suffering he saw that night," said Gene Salecker of Chicago, who wrote a book, called Disaster on the Mississippi, about the Sultana in 1996.




Warner told a similar story recounted by his father, William Carter Warner of the 9th Indiana Cavalry.




"He and a good friend were both asleep when the ship blew up," Warner said. "He came to in the Mississippi River, cold as he could be. But that was probably very fortunate under the circumstances."




Warner told the Jackson (MS) Clarion-Ledger that the young soldier took off the bottom of his long johns, tied them around two boards, and kept afloat until his rescue. He also grabbed a hat that rushed by in the river.




"When he was rescued, he was wearing nothing but the top part of his long johns and a hat," said Warner, recalling a rare lighthearted account that hides the unspeakable horrors his father witnessed on the river 137 years ago.




"It was difficult for him to talk about it," said Warner, whose father died in 1933.




On April 24, 1865, more than 2,300 passengers, including 1,866 paroled Union soldiers, 80 crew members and 70 civilians, boarded the Sultana for their journeys home. The vessel, just under 260 feet long and designed to carry 370 passengers, was disastrously overcrowded when it left the port and steamed north up the Mississippi River.




The Sultana had departed from New Orleans on April 21, 1865, and by the time it reached Vicksburg, a crack in one of the boilers was found and patched. According to written accounts, workers strongly recommended that the boiler be replaced, but the boat's pilot, Capt. J. Cass Mason, was ready to resume the trip north.




Frederick Speed, a Union Army captain from New York, was the only person ever tried for the Sultana overcrowding, said Charles Dawkins of Hattiesburg, whose great-grandfather, Van Buren Jolley, survived the Sultana explosion.




Jolley joined the Union Army in Indiana and was captured and sent to Andersonville prison in Georgia. In researching the story, Dawkins discovered that he was also distantly related to Speed, who was court-martialed and dismissed from service. Later the conviction was overturned.




An estimated 1,500 people lost their lives in the disaster. Many passengers who survived the fiery explosion drowned in the waters of the flooded Mississippi River. Around 300 died later in the hospital.




The Association of Sultana Descendants and Friends holds annual reunions on April 27 in Knoxville, but this year they decided to meet in Vicksburg for the dedication ceremony. Organizers said their turnout of approximately 130 members has been the group's largest so far.