Checotah

MV Great Lakes Diver, Port Sanilac Marina, Michigan. 586 792 2040.

The silty substrate of the lake bed where the wreckage of the Checotah lies can get whipped up into a hazey, milky fog, making diving this wreck a fruitless effort. However, if the conditions are good and there is minimal current divers are rewarded with the remains of a large wooden schooner that sank over 100 years ago. It is always cold and dark on this wreck and the first diver down from our boat (the first of the 2008 season) came up and declared that there was nothing but "a lumber yard" to be seen. This is true of the bow and middle portions of the ship; she sank and struck bow first and happened to be carrying a cargo of a lumber at the time. However, had he persevered and made it to all the way along to the stern portion of the wreckage he would have found her still in reasonable condition and at least discernable from the enduring deck hardware as a ship.

The Checotah had a sad life after her initial enrollment as the George D Russell in Toledo, Ohio in 1870 and was surrendered as a total loss on two seperate occasions before sinking finally in 1906. Three lives were lost in 1882 when downbound in tow on the Saint Marys River from Marquette, Michigan she collided with the propellor driven Northener; her load of iron ore sent her down so fast that the crew had no time at all to react. Six years later Captain Jex of the tug Gladiator saw an opportunity in the valuable ore that insurance carriers had written off and employed two divers and some serious steam salvage tackle to bring her and her cargo back up. Rebuilt and renamed the Checotah she went back on the Lakes without reported incident for only ten more years. She became stranded on Thunder Bay Island in Lake Huron in 1899 and was then surrendered for a second time after being wrecked in Cleveland in 1905.

It was only a season after being once again refloated and repaired that she met with her demise. On October 30th 1906 in the midst of a storm, in tow of the steamer Tempest and behind two other barges, the Uranus and the M McVea, she sprang a leak. Once again she filled with water but on this occasion did not sink as swiftly, buoyed up by her cargo of timber. However, becoming at first a drag on the lead boat and ultimately a danger, the master of the lead vessel in the flotilla was left with little choice but to cut the tow line in order to preserve the safety of the other three vessels. As the Checotah eventually sank once more, Captain Somerville and his daughter, with first mate and three other, crew escaped in a life boat and were fortunate enough to be picked up and taken to Port Huron by the passing steamer William A Payne.

Valid HTML 4.01 Strict
Copyright Bruno's Dive Shop. Mangled by Tricky3