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 Panama
Route
With the discovery of gold at Sutter’s Mill in 1848,
the California Gold Rush was launched. This event would mark
the single largest migration of people from around the world
to California, seeking their chance to strike it rich. The
great “Gold Rush” made rise in the development
of ships required to carry people and goods to California.
Many easterners from the New England states chose not to take
the overland route but looked to transportation that would
provide a means to make the 14,000-mile journey by sea, around
Cape Horn to this isolated frontier called California. This
was also true for European and Asian emigrants who had no
choice but to travel by sea. Eventually, the shorter overland
routes through Panama and Nicaragua offered argonauts
with an opportunity to avoid rounding Cape Horn, with scheduled
steamer service between Panama and San Francisco.
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 Winfield
Scott Construction
Contemporary
accounts filled east-coast newspapers reporting on the building
of ships, both sail and steam. On 20 October 1850 the New
York Herald announced, “Another New Steamer, of
about two thousand tons will be launched from the shipyard
of Westervelt & Makay [sic] on Tuesday morning, 22d, at
10 o’clock. She is intended for the trade between Panama
and San Francisco, and is constructed under the supervision
of Capt. William Skiddy, for Davis, Brooks & Co. Her engines
are from the Morgan Works. We understand that no expense has
been spared to secure strength, safety and speed, and she
will bear the name of the gallant General in chief of the
army, Winfield Scott.” |
 Two
months later The New York Journal of Commerce reported
on 14 December 1850, “Ship-Building and Steam Engines.
– Business at the various yards and iron-works is still
active. No new contracts for vessels, however, have been made
recently, though there are some “nibbles,” as
the ship-builders say. At the Morgan Iron Works, three large
steamships are moored, for the purpose of receiving machinery,
viz.:-- the Brother Jonathan, North America, and
Winfield Scott.”
Winfield Scott was launched on 22 October 1850, built
of wood with double iron bracing, that included White Oak,
Live Oak, Locust, Cedar and Georgia Yellow Pine. Mounted to
her round stern was an American eagle with a coat of arms
and she had a bust carved in the likeness of General Winfield
Scott. |
|  The
steamer had accommodations for 165 cabin and 150 steerage
passengers, although she would ultimately carry numbers
exceeding 400. From her round stern to the straight stem,
she had a registered length of 225 feet and a 45 foot beam.
In 1851, Gleason’s Pictorial provided a detail description
“her lines partakes somewhat of the “hollow”
kind, beautifully swelling to her extreme width, and as
beautifully tapering off again as they approached her stern.
On deck are the captain and clerk’s offices, and also
the kitchen – all very commodious. Between decks,
aft, is the general drawing room, with sofas along the entire
length, and staterooms on each side, each furnished with
two berths. The forward saloon is similarly arranged. Beneath
the drawing room is the dinning saloon, in which more than
100 persons can be comfortably seated; it also has staterooms
at each side, all thoroughly ventilated and well lighted.
Forward are the pantries, main semi circular staircase.
Beneath the dining saloon is the steerage, also very airy
and light. The ventilating and lighting of the vessel reflect
great credit on Captain Skiddy, but few vessels being able
to boast of such excellence in these important necessaries
to the comfort and health of her passengers.”
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 Winfield
Scott was not immediately dispatched to the Pacific
Coast but was engaged in servicing the New York –
New Orleans route, under the flag of Davis, Brooks and Company.
In 1852, ownership transferred to the New York and San Francisco
Steamship Company Line and the side-wheel passenger steamer
arrived in San Francisco, via Cape Horn, on 28 April 1852.
She was advertised as “doubled engined” connecting
with the steamer United States for New York. The
line changed its name on 18 May 1853 to New York and California
Steamship Company and retained ownership of the Winfield
Scott until the company came to an end, and she was
sold on 8 July 1853 to the Pacific Mail Steamship Company.
The steamer had become quite popular on the Panama
- San Francisco route and provided not only passenger service
but carried important intelligence, mail, newspapers, express
freight which included gold mined from the mother-load returning
east.
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 Winfield
Scott Machinery
Winfield Scott’s power
plant consisted of two Morgan Iron Works side-lever
steam engines driving two paddle-wheels, assisted
by square sails on the foremast. This propulsion
system was widely used from 1820 to 1860, in
both the Atlantic and Pacific regions. There
were many versions of the side-lever design
with the piston moving levers that were directly
positioned on each side of the engine. As the
pistons moved in an upward and downward motion
the levers were connected at the opposite ends
by crosstails fastened to a connecting rods
that turned the cranks. The cranks were connected
to the port and starboard paddle-wheel shafts,
which rotated the large paddle-wheels.
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 The
early steam propulsion system was not without
it’s problems as passenger Asa
Cyrus Call noted in his diary on 1 December
1853.“I embarked on the Steamer Winfield
Scott last Thursday, and at 12 o’clock
we left Vally’s [sic] St. Wharf for Panama.
We had fine weather till Friday evening when
it became foggy. One of the boilers had been
leaking through the day which had retarded our
progress, and the Sierra Nevada had
passed us, but it was repaired on Friday afternoon,
and we were running about twelve miles an hour,
when I went to bed on Friday night.”
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Shipwreck Event
Passenger Edward Bosqui recalls what happened
later that night. “At midnight I was suddenly
awakened from a sound sleep by a terrible jar
and crashing of timbers. Tumbling out of my
berth, I was confronted by the horror stricken
visage of my toothless and baldheaded stateroom
companion, who had not time to secure his wig
and false teeth and was groping about to find
them. Leaving him paralyzed with fear, I hurried
out on deck, where my attention was fixed on
a wall of towering cliffs, the tops of which
were hidden by the fog and darkness and appeared
about to fall and crush us. All round was the
loud booming of angry breakers surging about
invisible rocks.”
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Winfield Scott became a total loss
at Anacapa Island, with over 400 passengers
becoming stranded on the small island. On the
following day the side-wheel steamer California,
on her north bound run to San Francisco from
Panama with a full complement
of passengers, arrived at the island and took
on some of the women and children and the cargo
of gold bullion. After eight long days on the
island, the California returned well
provisioned and rescued the remaining passengers
and continued onto Panama. The
crewman stayed behind to recover what they could
of the remaining mail and passenger baggage
still submerged in the hull.
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Winfield Scott Shipwreck Site
Today the submerged remains of the Winfield
Scott lie within NOAA - Channel Islands
National Marine Sanctuary and Channel Islands
National Park. The site has been recorded and
continues to be studied by archaeologists representing
both agencies, assisted by the Coastal Maritime
Archaeology Resources (CMAR) organization. Although
the site has seen commercial salvage over the
years, including as late as World War II, portions
of her side-lever machinery still remain to
be studied in 30 feet of water. Since extensive
literature research has not yielded historic
records on her machinery, these artifacts provide
substantial evidence of mid 19th century engineering.
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Winfield
Scott Shipwreck Site Today
The most apparent artifacts are the paddle-wheel
shaft and hub,
and the paddle-wheel shaft support.
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 Two
Crossheads that once connected to the upper
position of the piston rods are visible at the
site.
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 Little
remains of her wooden hull after 150 years on
the sea floor surface, but a portion of her
outer hull with copper sheathing and yellow
metal drifts is still visible
Pacific
Mail Steamship Company
Nearly twenty years after the Winfield Scott
was launched the Pacific Mail Steamship Company’s
Report of the President To the Stockholders
in 1868, continued to advocate the construction
of side-wheel steamers over the propeller driven
system. In Part “The statistics of the
Company’s steam-ships demonstrate that
they can accomplished more work in a satisfactory
manner, at less cost, than any screw steamer
yet built, of which I have any knowledge. On
the Panama route, this fact
has been notorious, to the wonder of all experienced
ship-masters and other experts, who have had
the opportunity for comparison.”
Cuba
and Winfield Scott Comparison Of Two
Vessels Working the Panama Route
In 1897, just forty-seven years since the Winfield
Scott was launched, great advancements
in the evolution of steam propulsion systems
were evident as in the Pacific Mail Steamship
Company’s passenger cargo steamer Cuba,
later shipwrecked at San Miguel Island in 1923.
The shipwrecks Winfield Scott and Cuba
have provided researchers with an opportunity
to view the evolution of steam propulsion, paralleling
two vessels operating under the same steamship
company and employed on the same trade route
to Panama. In just forty-seven years a streamline
steel hull has replaced Winfield Scott’s
extreme sheer wooden hull. The large side-wheel
paddles that once buffeted the ocean surface
have been replaced by totally submerged twin
13-foot bronze propellers. Winfield Scott’s
Morgan Iron Works side-lever engines gave
way to the Cuba’s twin Blohm
and Voss triple-expansion engines.
Santa Barbara Maritime Museum
The underwater archaeology exhibit at
the Santa
Barbara Maritime Museum features a
diorama of the shipwreck site. A simulated
diver working from a model of the sanctuary
research vessel Shearwater, tours
the site stopping at various 19th century
artifacts. A monitor exhibiting actual
underwater videotape footage runs consecutively,
providing an overview of the history and
work being performed by underwater archaeologists.
Also included with the exhibit are historic
artifacts from the Winfield Scott
and examples of tools underwater archaeologists
use to record shipwrecks.
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Schwemmer,
Robert, Paddle-Wheels To Propellers Forty-Seven
Years In The Evolution Of Steam Propulsion
(1850-1897), Presented At the Society
For Historical Archaeology Conference,
2000 [In-Part]
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