Boatnerd Discussion Forum

WOW--Never heard of any salvage attempts on the Price. Learn something new every day. Still don't understand why they would want to salvage a ship in such bad shape but then again as mentioned, she was only a couple years old at the time of her loss. Thanks to all who posted information.

here's some information from the Marine Review and other sources:

1915 in June Price’s hulk was examined. The bow was only 24’ under water, and a possible menace to shipping.

1916 it was reported that wrecking operations on the wreck would likely be abandoned. A survey indicated that the machinery was destroyed, the boilers were out of the hull, the aft cargo bulkheads were carried away and the stern was badly battered. The wreck’s salvage value was doubtful. The Great Lakes Towing company had taken the contract to float her for $98,000 or a percentage of its value on a no-cure-no-pay basis.

1917 Canadian interests purchased the wreck for $30,000, but it was never salvaged.

I have read in a couple different places about salvage efforts related to the Price. One account was related to salvaging the coal she was carrying, but it wasn't taken into account that by capsizing, the full weight of the cargo and trapped air would have blown the hatches off, allowing the coal to fall to the lake bottom as discovered by the divers mentioned in the previous post. The ship reportedly capsized and drifted a distance until the mast(s) snagged the bottom, so the point where she capsized and lost her cargo and her final resting place were two separate locations.

Then there was apparently interest in salvaging the ship herself as she was relatively new when lost and she went down in comparatively shallow water. Some of those efforts are recounted in these newspaper transcriptions: http://images.maritimehistoryofthegreatlakes.ca/55997/data

Ultimately, the ship was apparently given up as a total loss because of the extensive damage she suffered as a result of the sinking and subsequent salvage attempts.

Fred Duffty and Bill Paterson located huge piles of coal and masts where she tipped roughly 5 miles north of her current resting place. I believe the salvage attempts made in later years was an attempt to remove her as a hazard to navigation. Why she was not just dynamited I do not know.

I could see trying to raise her in 1914, buy why 1920 and 1935 ? The only use I could think of would be a barge, as I assume the deck houses and machinery are long gone. Would be interesting to find her engine, as that would indicate pretty much where she rolled over.

In 1914,20, and 1935 there were salvage attempts to bring her back to the surface. Each one of these major salavage attempts brought more and more damage to the hull breaking her into very large sections. After 100 years on the bottom, major storms and sometimes a strong current tore the wreck apart. She lies in 70' of water at the sand and 40' at the top of the hull. As far as I remember only 60-70' of the bow still lies intact. The bottom is hard sand and clay so there is not much buried. As far as I know there is no modern pictures, but there are videos on YouTube that are recent.

Jared--Why do you think the hull is collapsing? There are wrecks a lot older then the Price that are still in good shape. Is it the fact that she is up side down, or is it that the way she is sitting and not well supported though I would assume tat she has sunk in to the bottom? Does anyone have any pictures of her sitting on the bottom?

Bill Paterson and another diver rediscovered the price back in the late 50'-early 60's. He pulled of many of the things on the Price and turned it into a museum. Now we never had clubhouse made out of the hull. Every time a storm comes up, that hull collapses more and more, and it is a very noisy wreck.

I guess it really doesn't matter how the Price got where she is today. Does anyone have some underwater pictures of the Price in her present condition? My late father had a rivet from the Price that someone gave him years ago. The guy he got it from was a member of the Port Huron scuba diving club. He said that the club had made a club house from the hulk of the Price.

"The Savager" is not a reliable source, and some noted Great Lakes historians have researched it and came to this conclusion. I have it as well, and it is not a trust worthy book compared to other sources I have used.

I Googled the Price and it says that the hulk was sighted 10 miles NE of Ft Gratiot Light which I believe is about where it is now. Another sire says that the price was in the shipping channel which is what I had read.

The Price was initially sighted about where Lake Huron buoys 3 and 4 are now. They even stationed a tug there so that no one would hit it while entering or leaving the St Clair River. She isn't there now, so she must have been moved. I think it talks about it the book "The Salvager". Reid Wrecking of Sarnia was hired to take a diver out to the hulk to see the name. Once that was done they were hired again to move the hulk out of the shipping channel. Just going by what I read as it happened a couple years before I started sailing.

Lake Superior shipwrecks will be one of the last surveyed area, we are surveying in lake Huron and got a good portion of it done. I would say that we have found 75% of the wrecks on the American Side.
The Price was never towed out, she sank on spot and had been a host of number of unsuccessful salvage attempts which now has damaged her into almost unidentifiable wreckage.

1. I think you may have some, but there are probably a couple hundred wrecks in Lake Huron alone that have never been found. Mostly because no one has ever looked for them and until recently the technology just wasn't there or available to the sport diver. Most wrecks are found by accident, blind luck, or while looking for another wreck. Another reason is money, wreck hunting isn't cheap and it takes deep pockets and a lot of time.

2. You are thinking of the Charles S. Price. it was later towed out northwest of Lake Huron Cut n scuttled.

3. There are any books out there, some better then others. Those by Dana Thomas Bowen are good. White Hurricane is good about the 1913 storm. Lake Superior Shipwrecks by Julius Wolff Jr. is a very good book

There are many "major" wrecks left in lake Superior. The William F Sauber, Henry Steinbrenner, Adella Shores, Hudson, Leafield, and S.R Kirby as examples. The Bannockburn also foundered somewhere in the lake.
The Charles Price was the vessel in 1913 that floated for a period of time before succumbing to the lake.
Go to the Canadian run site called Maritime History of the Great Lakes. The site has thousands of articles of ships and shipwrecks.
Jared

the charles s price was found floating turtle.there was a big mystery about name until a diver went down to get the name.

I have a few questions in regards to shipwrecks.

1. As far as boats that are still missing on Lake Superior: There are the two minesweepers, The Lambton, Iosco, DM Clemson, Western Reserve.
Are there any major ones that I am missing? Did the Banockburn sink on Superior?

2. There was a wreck on I believe Lake Huron and I believe it was during the storm of 1913. The hull was found turtled but floating on the lake several days after the storm. Which boat was this?

3. Are there any good research journals that focus on great lakes shipwrecks?

Thanks!