The R.G. Coburn is Lake Huron’s Treasure Ship
By Janis Stein

Built in 1870 in Marine City for E.B. Ward’s Lake Superior Line, advertisements of the day touted the steamer R.G. Coburn as possessing “all the late improvements for the better safety and security of passengers.” Before her launch the Toledo Blade reported, the Coburn “has water-tight compartments, and when completed will be one of the most perfect steamers afloat on our inland seas.”

Another advertisement announced the R.G. Coburn as ready “this season for pleasure and health-seeking travelers and tourists, with special regard to safety and comfort. Her cabins and staterooms are spacious and well ventilated, while her cuisine is equal to that of any first class hotel in the country.”

In little over a year’s time, passengers aboard the Coburn felt anything but safe.

Along with passengers, this 193-foot wooden propeller ship carried freight, stopping at ports from Detroit to Superior. With the 1870 season completed, the Coburn plied her way through Lake Huron for a second term.

Trouble began for the Coburn in June 1871 when she hit a rock while traveling through fog off the Keweenaw Point in Lake Superior. Before she sank, the crew ran her aground in shallow water. The Casualty Report indicated the R.G. Coburn ran aground at the entrance to the Portage Ship Canal on or about June 6, 1871. Her bow was on a rock in six feet of water while her stern sat in mud and deeper water, an incident that might have consequently led to potential rudder damage. For six days, the Coburn sat until she was released.

In September, her crank pin broke; the Coburn gratefully accepted a tow to Duluth. A hearty lot, captains of the inland seas handled setbacks efficiently, plying their way across the Great Lakes.

Those on land faced their own challenges when, in October 1871, mountainous walls of fire raged through parts of the virgin forests of Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Ohio, and Illinois. The city of Chicago, too, was ablaze, with Mrs. O’Leary’s cow taking the blame.

Covering a vast area and with so much timber ablaze, voluminous plumes of black smoke created havoc on the Great Lakes in the form of reduced visibility.

Meanwhile, on October 15, 1871, the Coburn’s crew, captained by Gilbert Demont, prepared to leave Duluth, Minnesota, bound for Buffalo, New York. With about 75 people including crew and passengers, the Coburn, carried in her holds 3,500 barrels of flour, 15,000 bushels of wheat and 30 barrels of silver ore—though varying accounts of the number of silver barrels were later reported.

When the Coburn reached the tip of the Thumb, visibility had decreased so much that a great many ships, rather than continuing their trek southward, hunkered down, seeking shelter in the waters of the Saginaw Bay.

Though the Coburn’s engine had been checked down, she nevertheless crept forward. To add to the mayhem, the wind suddenly veered from the southwest, blowing up a strong gale. Recently built, and large and powerful for its day, perhaps the captain thought the Coburn invincible. Surely, the Coburn could weather the storm.

While the Coburn rolled in the ever-increasing waves, passengers sought the safety of their cabins, too sick to think beyond the moment. Disaster seemed inevitable when, about 4 a.m., the Coburn lost her rudder.

Now powerless, the Coburn rolled into the troughs of the sea. Waves broke over her deck. Barrels of silver ore broke loose and smashed holes in her bulwarks, allowing the hull to fill with water. More cargo shifted. Crewmembers began to throw cargo overboard. A relentless Lake Huron then pounded the Coburn with a wave so mighty it knocked off her smokestack, smashing her cabin.

Because the smokestack did not break off at the top of the deck but rather down inside the cabin, the escaping steam created a deafening noise that rivaled the storm. Smoke filled the cabins. The risk of fire, great. Many of these passengers, no strangers to hardship but too sick from the rolling sea to move, remained in their rooms and resigned themselves to their fate. For those who had already lost all hope, death would be but a five-hour wait—the time it took the Coburn to sink.

Rare for the times, the Coburn carried two lifeboats and two yawl boats, but nobody on board believed a small boat could survive. Still, some tried. Those with a bit of fight left in them clambered on deck and clustered around the boats, all the while trying to hold on to something—anything—all the while fighting the cold spray Huron continuously hurled.

When the Coburn started to sink about 20 - 25 miles north of Pointe aux Barques, the hurricane deck blew off; those passengers clinging to the deck washed away with the storm.

About 9 a.m. and in haste, two of the four boats successfully launched and, now, these smaller crafts faced a ferocious Huron. Eight people filled one yawl boat while 10 men occupied the other. Crewmember Captain Gordon commanded one of the boats. According to an October 24, 1871, edition of the Toronto Globe, the other two boats washed ashore in Kincardine, Ontario. “While one of the boats was empty, the other contained two dead bodies. One of these was a mulatto man, and the other, a young man, white, who was dressed in a suit of gray. It was also reported that considerable quantities of flour were coming ashore.”

Those in the yawl boats fared much better. The southbound bark Zack Chandler picked up Coburn survivors about four o’clock Sunday afternoon, while the Canadian schooner Robert Gaskin, rescued the others. It’s been assumed more Coburn passengers were plucked from the water. Frozen, exhausted, penniless—but alive.

Battered pieces of the Coburn were found along the Canadian shoreline, and bodies, too, continued to wash ashore. Those surviving crewmembers unanimously stated the Coburn would have weathered the storm, but for the incident with her rudder. Others sitting in judgment stated what a shame it was the Coburn sank, for there were ways to steer a ship without a rudder, though it would have been a tremendous undertaking.

Of the estimated 75 passengers and crew, Lake Huron claimed at least 32, including Captain Demont, who, according to the Toronto Globe, stood aft of the texas deck with his hand on the rail when the Coburn sank. The passenger list included eight women and four children. In addition to the lives lost, the year-old Coburn was valued at $80,000, and her cargo, $40,000.

Well over a century after the Coburn disaster, divers still search for the wreck and most especially her buried treasure: potentially 30 barrels of elusive silver. Rather than dumped on a pile, it’s likely her silver is scattered the length of the distance it took her to sink. The Coburn’s staunch hull, built with huge timbers making it almost indestructible, might still be intact, and wreck hunters should be aware of another distinctive detail: Instead of a wooden mast—the norm for the day—the Coburn’s mast appears to have been iron—a perfect sonar target.

Good luck hunters—Lake Huron keeps her secrets well.

Research information regarding the wreck of the R.G. Coburn courtesy of marine artist Robert McGreevy. First printed in Huron Shore magazine.