TERMS USED IN VESSEL FACTS
In the Vessel Facts part of each shipwreck story, standard professional maritime history terms have been used wherever possible. However, when the usage of such terminology limits reader comprehension, we have opted for compromise language that makes the material presented more understandable. Following is an
explanation of the terminology used in Vessel Facts.
VESSEL NAME
Vessel names are derived from a variety of sources, but namesakes were most frequently people. The standard for alphabetizing these names comes from the U. S. Government publication List of Merchant Vessels of the United States first published in 1868 and commonly called Merchant Vessels. This system alphabetizes the vessel names, first by the first initial of the name, and then by the first letter of the first name. Thus, J. A. Smith comes before James R. Bentley. This is the convention that we have used in this book.
There were no restrictions on how many vessels could carry the same name.
explanation of the terminology used in Vessel Facts.
VESSEL NAME
Vessel names are derived from a variety of sources, but namesakes were most frequently people. The standard for alphabetizing these names comes from the U. S. Government publication List of Merchant Vessels of the United States first published in 1868 and commonly called Merchant Vessels. This system alphabetizes the vessel names, first by the first initial of the name, and then by the first letter of the first name. Thus, J. A. Smith comes before James R. Bentley. This is the convention that we have used in this book.
There were no restrictions on how many vessels could carry the same name.
![Picture](/uploads/1/0/6/2/106221155/published/ship-terms-official-record_2.png)
RIG
For sailing vessels, we have used the terminology employed by Merchant Vessels. These terms, e.g., schooner, brig, bark, etc., are defined in the Glossary. Vessels powered by steam-driven, sidemounted paddle wheels are simply called side-wheel steamers. Vessels driven by propellers, regardless of engine type, are called propellers. Although this convention violates the conventions used by Merchant Vessels, it is much simpler for the reader. Vessels that are not self-powered are called barges. The rig listed in Vessel Facts is the rig of the vessel at the time of its loss.
For sailing vessels, we have used the terminology employed by Merchant Vessels. These terms, e.g., schooner, brig, bark, etc., are defined in the Glossary. Vessels powered by steam-driven, sidemounted paddle wheels are simply called side-wheel steamers. Vessels driven by propellers, regardless of engine type, are called propellers. Although this convention violates the conventions used by Merchant Vessels, it is much simpler for the reader. Vessels that are not self-powered are called barges. The rig listed in Vessel Facts is the rig of the vessel at the time of its loss.
OFFICIAL NUMBER
After the Civil War, the U .S. Congress passed the Act of July 28, 1866, which prescribed the Official Number System for vessels. In this system, each vessel was assigned an Official Number that, along with its tonnage, had to be inscribed on the main deck beam of the vessel no later than July 1, 1868. In tracking vessel lineage, those that passed out before July 28, 1866, did not have an Official Number, while those in commission after July 1, 1868, had such a number.
These numbers were assigned in blocks to the Custom Houses and were then assigned alphabetically to vessels using the Merchant Vessels' convention. Official Numbers were introduced in Canada in 1855. For those vessels that had them, the Official Number serves as an unique identifier.
GROSS TONS
The gross tonnage of a vessel is a measure of its volumetric carrying capacity, not the vessel's weight. A brief history of the derivation of this term follows.
In ancient times, wine and olive oil were shipped in amphoras. However, by medieval times the standard shipping container had become the so-called Bordeaux cask, or tonneaux, which was a wooden barrel. The English term for the Bordeaux cask was the word ton, a derivation of the Anglo Saxon tunne or Celtic tun. By an Act of Parliament passed in 1423 in England, a tunne, or barrel, of wine was officially defined as measuring 252 gallons being equivalent to two butts or four hogsheads, which were smaller barrels. The tunne, with its contents of wine, closely approximated the long ton weight of 2,240 pounds and it occupied a space of approximately 40 cubic feet.
The English ton came into wide use as a container for shipment of a variety of commodities. Prior to the sixteenth century, when someone spoke of a vessel as measuring 500 tons, they simply meant it was capable of carrying 500 barrels in its hold. Although numerous formulae were introduced to calculate tonnage, the basic meaning has not changed. Thus, today the tonnage values given for modern vessels, such as the 1,000-foot Stewart J. Cort, are still essentially a measure of how many barrels, or tunnes, the vessel can carry in its hold.
During the nineteenth century, two different systems were in use for measuring the tonnage of American vessels. 6 The first of these was known as the builder's old measurement, or BOM, method of calculation. This was supplanted by the Moorsom System through the U.S. Congress Act of May 6, 1864. Under this Act, all vessels had to be remeasured using the new method prior to May 1867. Consequently, any vessel built before May 6, 1864, that remained in commission
after May 1867, would have carried two different tonnage designations in its lifetime.
The convention we have used in this book is to list the tonnage of the vessel at the time it was lost. Tonnages for vessels lost before the introduction of the Moorsom System are listed with the abbreviation BOM following the tonnage value.
LENGTH
The exact conditions for the measurement of the length of vessels were prescribed by the tonnage measurement systems discussed in the previous section. Basically, the length was the distance along the main deck from the stem post to the stern post of the vessel. The vessel lengths reported in this book were obtained from the Custom House records and have been rounded off to the next lowest whole number of feet.
Many vessels were rebuilt one or more times during their life and often were lengthened or shortened. The vessel lengths listed are the length of the vessel at the time of its loss.
HULL MATERIAL
Most vessels built on the Lakes before 1900 had wooden hulls. The first American iron-hulled commercial vessel was the propeller Merchant built in Buffalo in 1862.7 The propeller Spokane, built by the Globe Iron Works of Cleveland in 1886, was the first steel-hulled Lakes vessel. In the transition from wood to steel, some vessels had composite hulls made of iron and wood.
WHEN, WHERE, AND BY WHOM BUILT
The date built is the year in which the vessel was actually launched. The place built is self-explanatory. Builder's names have usually been obtained from Custom House records or from insurance records. Shipbuilding on the Lakes was a major business in the nineteenth century. Today it has all but disappeared. One of the best histories of shipbuilding on the Great Lakes is the book Freshwater Whales by Richard J. Wright.
DATE LOST
The date of loss of a vessel is the day of the original wreck incident. Often a stranded vessel might not become a total loss for several weeks after the original stranding.
CAUSE OF LOSS
Some terms used to describe the loss of a vessel are largely self-explanatory. Stranding, the largest cause of loss, means the vessel ran aground either on a reef or on shore. When a vessel takes on excessive water and sinks due to the weight, it is said to founder. Cut by ice means that the hull of the vessel was ripped open by the ice causing it to take on water and sink. Wooden-hull vessels were most
susceptible to being cut by ice and often had the forward section of the hull sheathed in metal to protect it.
Collision means colliding with another vessel that opened the hull causing either or both vessels to take on water and sink. Very few vessels capsized, but when they did it was usually fatal. Boiler explosions could tear apart a vessel's hull causing it to sink. Sometimes fire would burn a vessel to the waterline and the remains would sink. Occasionally vessels were abandoned due to old age and left to rot at a dock. These derelicts were often towed to remote locations and scuttled.
WRECK LOCATION/WHERE LOST
In the case of wrecks that have been discovered, their location is given in terms of distance and bearing from some known position or landmark such as a lighthouse. All bearings are true headings. Distances are in statute miles. The location of wrecks that have not been discovered are similarly described but with approximate or best-guess data.
The exact location (within 100 feet) of the discovered wrecks is also given in Loran C coordinates (8970 Chain) and latitude and longitude. The last two digits of each latitude and longitude listed is in hundredths of minutes and not whole seconds.
LIVES LOST
If a person lost his/her life in any way connected with the sinking of the vessel, he/she was counted as a life lost.
CARGO
Cargos of grain, coal, iron ore and lumber were the most common. In many cases we have not been able to determine the cargo carried by some wrecks.
BOUND FROM/TO
It is common on the Lakes to describe the direction of travel of a vessel by the direction that the water flows in its journey to the sea. Water in Lake Michigan flows generally northward to the sea, while that on Lake Huron flows southward. This direction is said to be downbound. The opposite direction is upbound.
These directions also determine on which side of a channel red or green channel marker buoys are placed. Rules of navigation on the Lakes call for the red buoy to be placed on the right side of an upbound channel and green on the left.
In this book, if the departure port and the arrival port are known, they are listed. Often the only thing known about a vessel's course is whether it is upbound or downbound.
LAST ENROLLMENT
The U.S. Custom Service, formed in 1789, opened its first Custom Houses on the Great Lakes shortly after the War of 1812.10 All vessels had to be documented by a Custom House and carry a valid Certificate of Enrollment.11 The Certificate of Enrollment contained information on the type of vessel, the dimensions and tonnage, the owners, the captain, the home port, the official number, the date of enrollment, the date of surrender, and the cause of surrender. When the home port, owners, dimensions, etc., of a vessel changed, the Certificate was urrendered and a new Certificate issued. When a vessel was lost, the Certificate had to be surrendered and the date and cause of the loss reported.
Copies of the surrendered Certificates were kept on file along with a log book of Certificates issued and surrendered. These log books, kept at each Custom House, were called Master Abstracts.12 The majority of these records are now held by the U.S. National Archives in Washington D.C. They are a treasure trove of primary historical data about vessels that operated on the Great Lakes and provide a wealth of information when tracing the lineage of a vessel. The last Certificate of Enrollment includes a complete set of information on a vessel at the time it was lost.
LAST ENROLLMENT SURRENDERED
The information on the surrender of the last Certificate of Enrollment serves as prima facie evidence of the loss of a vessel. Actual data usually includes the date and cause of loss, and the date and place of surrender. If the section on the original Certificate of Enrollment calling for an explanation is blank, then the term "no endorsement" has been used.
CONFIGURATION
Information on the number of decks and masts, the shape of the stern, such as square or round, and whether the vessel had any type of figurehead, was listed on the Custom House Certificate of Enrollment. The data listed in this book is always taken from the last Certificate of Enrollment.
DEPTH
The depth of discovered wrecks is given in feet and is measured from the 1985 mean water datum for Lakes Michigan and Huron published by the U.S. Army, Corps of Engineers13. In many cases, a wreck may lie on a sloping bottom and its depth will vary several feet over the length of the wreck. The value of depth listed in Vessel Facts is the average value from the deepest to most shallow portion of the
wreck.
After the Civil War, the U .S. Congress passed the Act of July 28, 1866, which prescribed the Official Number System for vessels. In this system, each vessel was assigned an Official Number that, along with its tonnage, had to be inscribed on the main deck beam of the vessel no later than July 1, 1868. In tracking vessel lineage, those that passed out before July 28, 1866, did not have an Official Number, while those in commission after July 1, 1868, had such a number.
These numbers were assigned in blocks to the Custom Houses and were then assigned alphabetically to vessels using the Merchant Vessels' convention. Official Numbers were introduced in Canada in 1855. For those vessels that had them, the Official Number serves as an unique identifier.
GROSS TONS
The gross tonnage of a vessel is a measure of its volumetric carrying capacity, not the vessel's weight. A brief history of the derivation of this term follows.
In ancient times, wine and olive oil were shipped in amphoras. However, by medieval times the standard shipping container had become the so-called Bordeaux cask, or tonneaux, which was a wooden barrel. The English term for the Bordeaux cask was the word ton, a derivation of the Anglo Saxon tunne or Celtic tun. By an Act of Parliament passed in 1423 in England, a tunne, or barrel, of wine was officially defined as measuring 252 gallons being equivalent to two butts or four hogsheads, which were smaller barrels. The tunne, with its contents of wine, closely approximated the long ton weight of 2,240 pounds and it occupied a space of approximately 40 cubic feet.
The English ton came into wide use as a container for shipment of a variety of commodities. Prior to the sixteenth century, when someone spoke of a vessel as measuring 500 tons, they simply meant it was capable of carrying 500 barrels in its hold. Although numerous formulae were introduced to calculate tonnage, the basic meaning has not changed. Thus, today the tonnage values given for modern vessels, such as the 1,000-foot Stewart J. Cort, are still essentially a measure of how many barrels, or tunnes, the vessel can carry in its hold.
During the nineteenth century, two different systems were in use for measuring the tonnage of American vessels. 6 The first of these was known as the builder's old measurement, or BOM, method of calculation. This was supplanted by the Moorsom System through the U.S. Congress Act of May 6, 1864. Under this Act, all vessels had to be remeasured using the new method prior to May 1867. Consequently, any vessel built before May 6, 1864, that remained in commission
after May 1867, would have carried two different tonnage designations in its lifetime.
The convention we have used in this book is to list the tonnage of the vessel at the time it was lost. Tonnages for vessels lost before the introduction of the Moorsom System are listed with the abbreviation BOM following the tonnage value.
LENGTH
The exact conditions for the measurement of the length of vessels were prescribed by the tonnage measurement systems discussed in the previous section. Basically, the length was the distance along the main deck from the stem post to the stern post of the vessel. The vessel lengths reported in this book were obtained from the Custom House records and have been rounded off to the next lowest whole number of feet.
Many vessels were rebuilt one or more times during their life and often were lengthened or shortened. The vessel lengths listed are the length of the vessel at the time of its loss.
HULL MATERIAL
Most vessels built on the Lakes before 1900 had wooden hulls. The first American iron-hulled commercial vessel was the propeller Merchant built in Buffalo in 1862.7 The propeller Spokane, built by the Globe Iron Works of Cleveland in 1886, was the first steel-hulled Lakes vessel. In the transition from wood to steel, some vessels had composite hulls made of iron and wood.
WHEN, WHERE, AND BY WHOM BUILT
The date built is the year in which the vessel was actually launched. The place built is self-explanatory. Builder's names have usually been obtained from Custom House records or from insurance records. Shipbuilding on the Lakes was a major business in the nineteenth century. Today it has all but disappeared. One of the best histories of shipbuilding on the Great Lakes is the book Freshwater Whales by Richard J. Wright.
DATE LOST
The date of loss of a vessel is the day of the original wreck incident. Often a stranded vessel might not become a total loss for several weeks after the original stranding.
CAUSE OF LOSS
Some terms used to describe the loss of a vessel are largely self-explanatory. Stranding, the largest cause of loss, means the vessel ran aground either on a reef or on shore. When a vessel takes on excessive water and sinks due to the weight, it is said to founder. Cut by ice means that the hull of the vessel was ripped open by the ice causing it to take on water and sink. Wooden-hull vessels were most
susceptible to being cut by ice and often had the forward section of the hull sheathed in metal to protect it.
Collision means colliding with another vessel that opened the hull causing either or both vessels to take on water and sink. Very few vessels capsized, but when they did it was usually fatal. Boiler explosions could tear apart a vessel's hull causing it to sink. Sometimes fire would burn a vessel to the waterline and the remains would sink. Occasionally vessels were abandoned due to old age and left to rot at a dock. These derelicts were often towed to remote locations and scuttled.
WRECK LOCATION/WHERE LOST
In the case of wrecks that have been discovered, their location is given in terms of distance and bearing from some known position or landmark such as a lighthouse. All bearings are true headings. Distances are in statute miles. The location of wrecks that have not been discovered are similarly described but with approximate or best-guess data.
The exact location (within 100 feet) of the discovered wrecks is also given in Loran C coordinates (8970 Chain) and latitude and longitude. The last two digits of each latitude and longitude listed is in hundredths of minutes and not whole seconds.
LIVES LOST
If a person lost his/her life in any way connected with the sinking of the vessel, he/she was counted as a life lost.
CARGO
Cargos of grain, coal, iron ore and lumber were the most common. In many cases we have not been able to determine the cargo carried by some wrecks.
BOUND FROM/TO
It is common on the Lakes to describe the direction of travel of a vessel by the direction that the water flows in its journey to the sea. Water in Lake Michigan flows generally northward to the sea, while that on Lake Huron flows southward. This direction is said to be downbound. The opposite direction is upbound.
These directions also determine on which side of a channel red or green channel marker buoys are placed. Rules of navigation on the Lakes call for the red buoy to be placed on the right side of an upbound channel and green on the left.
In this book, if the departure port and the arrival port are known, they are listed. Often the only thing known about a vessel's course is whether it is upbound or downbound.
LAST ENROLLMENT
The U.S. Custom Service, formed in 1789, opened its first Custom Houses on the Great Lakes shortly after the War of 1812.10 All vessels had to be documented by a Custom House and carry a valid Certificate of Enrollment.11 The Certificate of Enrollment contained information on the type of vessel, the dimensions and tonnage, the owners, the captain, the home port, the official number, the date of enrollment, the date of surrender, and the cause of surrender. When the home port, owners, dimensions, etc., of a vessel changed, the Certificate was urrendered and a new Certificate issued. When a vessel was lost, the Certificate had to be surrendered and the date and cause of the loss reported.
Copies of the surrendered Certificates were kept on file along with a log book of Certificates issued and surrendered. These log books, kept at each Custom House, were called Master Abstracts.12 The majority of these records are now held by the U.S. National Archives in Washington D.C. They are a treasure trove of primary historical data about vessels that operated on the Great Lakes and provide a wealth of information when tracing the lineage of a vessel. The last Certificate of Enrollment includes a complete set of information on a vessel at the time it was lost.
LAST ENROLLMENT SURRENDERED
The information on the surrender of the last Certificate of Enrollment serves as prima facie evidence of the loss of a vessel. Actual data usually includes the date and cause of loss, and the date and place of surrender. If the section on the original Certificate of Enrollment calling for an explanation is blank, then the term "no endorsement" has been used.
CONFIGURATION
Information on the number of decks and masts, the shape of the stern, such as square or round, and whether the vessel had any type of figurehead, was listed on the Custom House Certificate of Enrollment. The data listed in this book is always taken from the last Certificate of Enrollment.
DEPTH
The depth of discovered wrecks is given in feet and is measured from the 1985 mean water datum for Lakes Michigan and Huron published by the U.S. Army, Corps of Engineers13. In many cases, a wreck may lie on a sloping bottom and its depth will vary several feet over the length of the wreck. The value of depth listed in Vessel Facts is the average value from the deepest to most shallow portion of the
wreck.