Today’s Foundering Yet Truly Morbid Fact!
Apart from the many abandoned copper mines and ghost towns dotting the region, Michigan’s densely forested Upper Peninsula yields a rich harvest of second-growth pine and balsam trees. Beginning in early November, the local woodcutters and lumbermen commenced shipment of Christmas trees to the inhabitants of Milwaukee, Chicago, and the lesser cities and towns dotting the shorelines of the lower Great Lakes.
In the early years the task of delivering the fragrant spruce trees via Lake Michigan was the province of Captain Herman Schuenemann and his brother August, who in 1887 conceived the idea of hauling the bundled cargo, each bundle measuring six to eight feet, by lake schooner.
With his load of pines secure in the hold, Schuenemann sold Christmas trees and hand-fashioned wreaths from his mooring at the Clark Street Bridge in Chicago. The tallest trees drawn from the lot were presented to the grateful proprietors of the downtown theaters. In return, the brothers received complimentary season passes.
A 1909 photo of Captain Herman Schuenemann, center, Mr. Colberg, right, and W. L. Vanaman, left.
Herman Schuenemann, master of the Rouse Simmons, his wife, and three young daughters lived in a tiny flat at 1638 North Clark Street, a little more than a mile north of the river. The eldest daughter, Elsi, was devoted to her father and had recently taken an active interest in his seasonal business.
By 1912, Chicagoans had become accustomed to buying the well-shaped trees from the jovial Schuenemann for prices ranging from seventy-five cents to a dollar. It was as much a cherished holiday tradition as the Fourth of July fireworks celebration and the Taste of Chicago would become to future generations of city dwellers.
Herman affixed a hand-painted sign to the wharf, reminding his customers that he had ventured deep into the snow-covered woods of Manistique and Thompson, Michigan, and had personally selected and chopped down only the finest trees for his friends and business associates back in Chicago.
The shipment of Christmas trees via the Great Lakes was not without risk. The month of November was particularly treacherous for the Lake Michigan merchantmen. High winds and gale-like conditions had sent many a good craft to the bottom. The maritime sailors bitterly recalled the disappearance of the passenger ship Chicora in the heavy seas of January 1895. The only traces of the vessel were two bottle notes that washed ashore four months later, purportedly written by the doomed sailors moments before sinking. In 1898, Captain Schuenemann’s brother August went down with all hands while manning the fifty-five-ton schooner S. Thal in the churning waters off the north suburban Glencoe shoreline.
The threat of dangerous weather conditions failed to deter Herman Schuenemann, who purchased an eighth interest in the Rouse Simmons in 1910 with fellow navigator and Chicagoan Charles Nelson. The Rouse Simmons was fitted for duty in 1868 by McLelland and Company of Milwaukee. Measuring 123.5 feet in length, the wooden schooner carried three masts and was intended primarily for the lumber trade.
The Rouse Simmons
With a crew and passenger list of 16 and between 27,000 and 50,000 trees tied up and bundled below deck, Captain Schuenemann set sail from Manistique, Michigan, on November 22, 1912, bound for Chicago. Skies were overcast and high winds were predicted. The Rouse Simmons headed straight into the open waters of the lake, heedless of the ominous weather reports. When the storm broke, the ancient wooden craft found itself hopelessly trapped. The flag of distress was hoisted, but there was little the coastal rescue vessels at Sturgeon Bay and Kewaunee could do to assist the imperiled ship traveling in such bad weather. The ship foundered in the rough water before the ice-caked masts and the sails blew out. Shortly thereafter, the Rouse Simmons disappeared.
Eighteen days of anguish, fear, and worry passed. In a dingy little room at South Water and Clark Street overlooking the Chicago River, Elsie Schuenemann held out hope that her father’s schooner would eventually appear on the distant horizon. She was weaving Christmas garlands, said to have come from the splintered trees recovered by coastal residents of Wisconsin where the trees had washed ashore. Facing destitution, the daughter of Captain Schuenemann and her grief-stricken mother sold the garlands to the public. Every dollar the family possessed was tied up in the boat. The Chicago Inter-Ocean newspaper, with the cooperation of the Lake Seamans Union, organized an emergency relief fund for the family.
“I am going to make an attempt to carry on father’s Christmas tree business,” vowed the brave young woman. “I will get friends to help me and send my trees by rail to Chicago and sell them from the foot of Clark Street. Ever since I was a little girl Papa has sold them there, and lots and lots of people never think of going any other place for their trees.”
W.C. Holmes Shipping, for whom Schuenemann skippered a vessel in his younger days, placed the schooner Oneida at the family’s disposal. It was moored at the Clark Street Bridge where the Rouse Simmons had stood for years, and was laden with Christmas trees recovered from Sturgeon Bay and shipped to Chicago. A cherished Yuletide tradition would remain unbroken.
Mrs. Barbara Schuenemann, left, widow of Captain Herman Schuenemann, with her daughter Elsie, right.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Treasury Department dispatched the revenue cutter Tuscarora to search the small islands in Lake Michigan for survivors and clues as to the precise location of the doomed Rouse Simmons. The hopes and prayers of sixteen bereft families went with them but quickly faded.
Back in Chicago, a seaman who had signed on with the Rouse Simmons related a strange story. Hogan Hoganson, a superstitious Swede who lived at 413 North Milwaukee Avenue, had relied on his instincts and lived another day. He said that he refused to make the homeward voyage to Chicago after he observed several rodents leave the ship and scurry for cover in the shelter of the docks. It is a tradition of the sea that when a rodent abandons ship, disaster is lurking.
“The boys laughed at me,” said Hoganson. “They laughed at me for they mostly were not old sailors. to them the rats leaving meant nothing—but to me, who have heard of this strange thing for years—well I’m glad I got the hunch and came back by rail.”
Two bottle messages were reportedly retrieved. The first one was pulled from the beach at Sheboygan, Wisconsin, on December 13, 1912. “Friday. Everybody goodbye. I guess we are all through. Sea washed over our deck load Tuesday. During the night, the small boat was washed over. Ingvald and Steve fell overboard on Thursday. God help us. Herman Schuenemann.”
Ingvald Newhouse was a deck hand taken on board just before the sailing. Stephen Nelson was the first mate and the son of Captain Charles Nelson, also lost.
A second bottle note from Captain Nelson was reportedly found in 1927. “These lines were written at 10:30 p.m. Schooner R.S. ready to go down about twenty miles southeast of Two Rivers Point, between fifteen to twenty miles off shore. All hands lashed to one line. Goodbye.”
From time to time other curious artifacts, including a human skull believed to have come from the lost Christmas tree ship, would be caught in fishermen’s nets. On April 23, 1924, Captain Schuenemann’s wallet containing business cards and newspaper clippings was recovered at Two Rivers Point. But the precise location of the Rouse Simmons remained a Great Lakes mystery until October 1971, when diver G. Kent Bellrichard of Milwaukee found the remarkably well-preserved wreck lying under 180 feet of water off the coast of Two Rivers. The anchor was raised and placed on display at the Milwaukee Yacht Club. A signboard and porthole are on public view at the Milwaukee Public Library marine room.
Wreckage of the Rouse Simmons with a Christmas Tree placed on the bow
As to the fate of the surviving Schuenemanns, Elsie and her mother made good on their promise to continue with Papa’s business. A Christmas tree ship was moored at the Clark Street Bridge every holiday season thereafter until 1933.
The tragedy of the Rouse Simmons was forever immortalized in verse by Chicago Daily News reporter and book author Vincent Starrett.
The Ballad of the Christmas Tree Ship
This is the tale of the Christmas ship
that sailed o’er the sullen lake;
And of sixteen souls that made the trip,
And of death in the foaming wake.
Culled from: Return Again to the Scene of the Crime
Garretdom: Sparring Death Edition!
A SPARRING BOUT HOMICIDE.
How Young Charles Archibald Got Out of a Very Serious Affair.
Charles Archibald, a young weaver, yesterday pleaded guilty before Judge Peirce [sic] to manslaughter in causing the death of John Cameron on the 15th of May, and Robert Hamilton, indicted for complicity in the offence, was acquitted. It was in evidence that Archibald and Cameron, while in an intoxicated condition, engaged in a sparring bout for fun on a hill near Hartwell street and Indiana avenue, and that Hamilton, who had been drinking with them, was a witness to the encounter. The contestants, it was said, were so drunk “that they fell all over each other,” and in the last round Cameron received an injury in the head which caused death a few hours later. District Attorney Graham said that it was but fair to say that Archibald was a hard-working young man, who had borne a previous good character, and that in view of all the circumstances of the case he would recommend him to his Honor’s clemency.
“Sparring in fun in this case proved to death in earnest,” said Judge Peirce to the prisoner. “I am sure you regret it. The root of the whole matter lies in the drinking custom of this city [Philadelphia]. It is a pity that you and other hard-working young men like you should spend all your wages for that which is not bread or strength, but which leads to so much misery. I have taken into consideration your previous good character and the recommendation of the District Attorney, and the sentence of the Court is, that you undergo an imprisonment of four months and two weeks, from the 14th day of May last.” This had the effect of discharging the prisoner yesterday.
From the collection of The Comtesse Despair
1886 Morbid Scrapbook
More grim olde news can be found at Garretdom!
Andersonville Prisoner Diary Entry Du Jour!
This is the continuation of the 1864 diary of Andersonville prisoner Private George A. Hitchcock (see the archived version for all entries up until now).
Here’s today’s entry:
June 28th. Hot. Heavy shower in the evening. Six hundred prisoners from Grant’s army, taken near Petersburg, came in. Among them we found the familiar faces of [Thomas] Winn, [Thomas Stephens] Stevens, and [William H.] Tyler from the 21st. Thirty Indian sharp-shooters from Northern Michigan, also. I learn that my brother Henry is with the regiment, and is acting adjutant.
Culled from: Andersonville: Giving Up the Ghost