River Queen (steamboat)

Sidewheeler ferry River Queen
Career
Owner:	Fall River lines, Vineyard Company, Nantucket & Cape Cod Steamboat Company, and Mount Vernon & Marshall Hall Steamboat Company
Completed:	1864
Out of service:	1911
Fate:	burned down
Notes:	Civil War conference between Lincoln and Stephens held on boat.
General characteristics
Tonnage:	426
Length:	181 feet (55 m)

File:The Peacemakers 1868.jpg

The Peacemakers by George Peter Alexander Healy, 1868, depicts the historic 1865 meeting on the River Queen

File:Hsl-06-Birds eye view steamer-cu.jpg

Sidewheeler ferry River Queen at the wharf in Nantucket, probably during the late 1860s.

The River Queen was a sidewheel steamer operating as a ferry serving the islands of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket during the late 1800s.

Construction

River Queen was built at Keyport, NJ in 1864. It was one of four steamers operating for the New Bedford, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket Steamboat Co. when it was organized in March 1886 (The other three were Island Home, Martha's Vineyard and Monohansett.) However, it had sailed this route since 1871 by the company's predecessors.

Civil War Service

It was used by General Ulysses S. Grant as his private dispatch boat on the Potomac River in 1865. On February 3, 1865, the Hampton Roads Conference took place on the River Queen in an unsuccessful attempt to negotiate an end to the American Civil War. During this conference in the saloon of the ship, it was lashed to the Mary Martin, another ship. Abraham Lincoln met with General William T. Sherman and General Grant aboard the River Queen near the end of the Civil War. Both Lincoln and Grant liked this vessel; Lincoln rode it 48 hours before his assassination. Capt. Nathan B. Saunders of the Fall River steamer line was captain of the River Queen during its Civil War service.

Ferry career

After the war, River Queen was operated by the Newport Steamboat Company between Providence, RI and Newport, RI. The American Lloyd's Register of American and Foreign Shipping during 1865-1872 records the River Queen as a 500-ton vessel with a homeport in Providence. Its owner was listed as R. Buffon and its master as Capt. Williams.

River Queen was sold by the New Bedford, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket Steamboat Co. in 1893 to the Mount Vernon & Marshall Hall Steamboat Co. of Washington, D.C. During 1897-1900 the Record of American and Foreign Shipping lists the River Queen as a 181' long, 426-ton sidewheeler hailing out of New Bedford, owned by "Mt. Vernon & Marshall Hall S. B. Co." and under the command of a Capt. Wood.

River Queen was still operating in 1910 on the Potomac River, by that time among the oldest side-wheelers still in service. In July 1911, newspapers reported the burning of the River Queen "to the water's edge" following the explosion of a signal lantern on board. The press reported that "For the past year or two the River Queen has been used as an excursion boat for negroes."

References

Wikimedia Commons has media related to:

[[Commons: Category:River Queen (steamboat 1864)

| River Queen (steamboat 1864)

]]

• [7] - reprint of an 1906 article in the Vineyard Gazette
• [8] - reprint of a 1940 article in the Vineyard Gazette
• [9] - 1860s photographs of Nantucket
• [10] - Mystic Seaport - G. W. Blunt White Library - Ship & Yacht Register
• Turner, Harry B. The Story of the Island Steamers (The Inquirer and Mirror Press, 1910)[11]