CLEVELAND, Ohio – The recent discovery of the Lac La Belle, which sank to the bottom of Lake Michigan in 1872, does more than scratch it from the list of long-sought shipwrecks.
It takes one back – if only for a moment – to when traveling around the Great Lakes didn’t mean climbing in a car or boarding a train but buying a ticket on a steamer.
The waterways back then were the equivalent of today’s freeway system, said maritime historian Brendon Baillod, and dual-purpose steamships – many of them built in Cleveland – hauled both people and freight.
With luxurious staterooms on the upper decks, “they might have 50 head of cattle down below,” Baillod said.
One such ship was the Lac La Belle. For decades its location was a mystery until shipwreck hunter Paul Ehorn located its remnants in 2022. Just this month, he revealed his discovery but is keeping the exact location secret until he can create a 3D photogrammetry model.
Commissioned by Cleveland’s Robert Hanna & Co. in 1864, the Lac La Belle was built in Cleveland by Ira Lafrinier & Co., with its engines and boilers supplied by another local outfit, Cuyahoga Steam Furnace Co., according to greatlakeships.org.
The ship had two engines, two boilers and two smokestacks. With a top speed of 16 miles per hour, it was much faster than comparable boats on the lakes, Baillod said.
It also had giant structural arches on each side of the boat to provide support to both ends of the hull when its midsection topped a wave, a position called hogging.
Originally, the Lac La Belle was assigned to make regular runs from Cleveland to Lake Superior, with stops in Marquette and the Keweenaw Peninsula in Michigan, and Duluth, Minnesota.
And yet for all its regalness, the Lac La Belle would have a rough run during its brief lifespan. It ran aground more than once and in 1866, it was left for dead after sinking in the St. Clair River.
Newspaper accounts from the day recount the harrowing collision between the Lac La Belle and the steamship Milwaukee. As the Lac La Belle headed south, hugging the American shoreline, and the Milwaukee steamed the other way, signals got crossed.
The Milwaukee sliced into the Lac La Belle’s port side, nearly cutting it in two.
“When the Milwaukee struck the Lac La Belle she penetrated her side so far that for a time she was unable to extricate herself,” reads an account from the Cleveland Leader at the time.
James Evans, who had a wife and family in Cleveland, was in the engine room and became trapped by the rushing water. He did not survive nor did the ship’s head waiter, Henry Rudd, who fell into the water while leaping from the Lac La Belle onto the Milwaukee. It was unclear according to the newspaper account whether Rudd was from Cleveland or Buffalo.
A chambermaid also was severely burned at supper after being struck by a falling kerosene lamp.
“Providentially, there were plenty of articles at hand to quench the flames, and the woman was spared a terrible death,” according to the Cleveland Leader.
There were six passengers and 35 crew members on board. Survivors made their way onto the Milwaukee, which tied itself to the Lac La Belle to facilitate the rescue.
Raising the Lac La Belle seemed improbable at the time, and it was thought it might get cut to pieces by ice in the river. Instead, it was raised and reconditioned three years later and sold at auction to the Engelmann Transportation Co., which put it on a route from Milwaukee to Grand Haven.
It was during an Oct. 13 run in 1872 – with winter approaching – that it would meet its eventual demise in heavy seas. The steamer had departed Milwaukee with 53 passengers and crew, along with 19,000 bushels of barley, 1,200 barrels of flour, 50 barrels of pork and 25 barrels of whiskey.
An account from the ship’s second engineer, published in the Plain Dealer, said the Lac La Belle “sprung a leak” around midnight, about three hours after leaving Milwaukee.
“The crew worked hard all night to try and prevent the vessel from sinking and threw considerable of the cargo overboard, but all to no purpose,” the newspaper reported.
Five lifeboats were deployed, but only four would make it to shore. One landed six miles south of Racine, Wisconsin, after 12 hours on the water, according an account from the ship‘s clerk. During that time, a passing ship did not respond to signals from the lifeboat, “although I am confident she saw us,” he reported.
Eight members of the crew died.
While the location of the shipwreck is listed as 20 miles off Racine, according to greatlakeships.org, the actual location of the Lac La Belle is still a closely guarded secret.
Ehorn, who has been searching for shipwrecks since 1965, and his partner Bruce Bittner used sidescan sonar to find the ship. They knew it was the Lac La Belle because the hogging arches were clearly visible, and because the only other ship so constructed that also sank in the region had side paddlewheels, which the Lac La Belle lacked.
Baillod said the Lac La Belle was high on the list of ships waiting to be discovered in Lake Michigan.
“It’s a Victorian area passenger steamer and a really ornate one too,” he said.
