From the Philadelphia Inquirer, December 11, 1839:

The schr Louisiana, Capt. Edward Auld, from Matagorda, for New Orleans, went ashore on the evening of the 14th Oct. near the east end of Last Island, (La. Coast) during a severe SSE gale, and was high and dry on the beach, a total loss. She had no cargo, excepting a few boxes [of] tobacco, (return cargo) which will probably be lost. Capt. Auld, his three passengers and two of his crew, arrived in New Orleans on Saturday evening, 23rd ult. [i.e., 23 November] by way of the bayou La Fourche, swamps & c. having been exposed eight days in an open boat, during which time they have traveled nearly three hundred miles – a large portion of the time tugging at the oar.

Louisiana was a 67-ton, two-masted schooner launched at Waterford, Connecticut in 1831. She was initially registered at New London, but was re-registered at New Orleans in May 1833. On April 4, 1837, under the command of J. C. Pierce,  she was captured by the Mexican brig-of-war General Urrea on suspicion of aiding the rebellion in Texas and taken as a prize to the mouth of the Rio Grande. Fortunately, the Mexican warship was seized in her turn by an American vessel, the sloop-of-war U.S.S. Natchez, which subsequently forced the release of Louisiana and her crew. Edward Auld purchased the schooner and re-registered her at the end of that year.

Edward Auld (c. 1802-1856) seems to have been a mariner of the first order, commanding merchant brigs sailing from Baltimore to ports as distant and Kingston, Jamaica and Rio de Janeiro. He was heavily involved in trade between New Orleans and Texas during the early days of the republic. He later commanded transports for the U.S. government during the war with Mexico, and still later ran a steam packet carrying would-be prospectors between New Orleans and Panama during the California Gold Rush.

It could well be.

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Image: Titanic at Cherbourg on the evening of April 10, 1912. Original painting by Ken Marschall, 1977.

January’s sinking of Costa Concordia in Italy caused an odd legal ripple in Galveston Saturday, where the cruise ship Carnival Triumph was briefly “arrested” by federal authorities. The action came at the request of a plaintiff in a lawsuit against Costa which is a subsidiary of Carnival. Apparently by formally attaching one of Carnival’s ships to the case, this action ties that company into the case, and makes available any internal documents or communications within Carnival as potential evidence. But why Carnival Triumph, of all the ships Carnival operates out of U.S. ports?

[Plaintiff's attorney John Arthur] Eves said the lawsuit seeking to attach the Triumph was filed in Galveston federal court because of a quirk in maritime law. The plaintiffs wanted to attach a Carnival asset and thereby bring the U.S. arm of Carnival into the lawsuit but could only do so under maritime law by suing in a federal judicial district where the owner has no agent. Carnival has an agent in Miami, where most of the Concordia lawsuits in the United States have been filed, Eves said.

Eves said neither Carnival PLC nor the ship’s owner, Utopia Cruises Inc., have an agent in the Southern Judicial District of Texas. Utopia is a paper company incorporated in Panama by Carnival, he said.

It turns out there was a confidential agreement in place ahead of time that the ship would be allowed to sail, and she did, only a half-hour after the scheduled departure time.

I’d like to thank the folks who came out to the Houston Museum of Natural Science Tuesday evening to attend my talk on blockade runners. It was a good time — folks laughed where intended to, not where they weren’t, and there was lots of good Q&A at the end. I did get a little too technical on ship construction and machinery, though, and I oughter watch out for that in the future. Not everyone is that interested in frame spacing and entrance lines.

I’d also like to thank the folks who made my talk possible, particularly Amy Potts from HMNS and Ed Cotham. Thanks, y’all!

One thing that I didn’t have a chance to do, using the format of the talk, was to provide a list of suggested readings. And so:

• J. Barto Arnold III. The Denbigh‘s Civilian Imports: Customs Records of a Civil War Blockade Runner between Mobile and Havana. College Station, Texas: Institute of Nautical Archaeology, 2011.
• W.T. Block, Schooner Sail to Starboard: The US Navy vs. Blockade Runners in the Western Gulf of Mexico. College Station, Texas: Institute of Nautical Archaeology, 2007.
• Eric J. Graham. Clyde Built: Blockade Runners, Cruisers and Armoured Rams of the American Civil War. London: Birlinn Ltd, 2008.
• Thomas E. Taylor, Running the Blockade: A Personal Narrative of Adventures, Risks and Escapes during the American Civil War. Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1995.
• Rodman L. Underwood, Waters of Discord: The Union Blockade of Texas During the Civil War. McFarland, 2008.
• William Watson, The Civil War Adventures of a Blockade Runner. College Station, Texas: Texas A&M University Press, 2001.
• Stephen R. Wise. Lifeline of the Confederacy: Blockade Running during the Civil War. Columbia, South Carolina: University of South Carolina Press, 1991.

I’ll be speaking at the March 19 meeting of the SCV’s John Bell Hood Camp No. 50, at Shrimp & Stuff Restaurant in Galveston (7 p.m., in the private dining room). My talk will be a preview of my March 27 presentation at the Houston Museum of Natural Science, “For-Profit Patriots: Civil War Blockade Running on the Texas Coast.”

I appreciate the invitation, and am looking forward to it.

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Image: Digital model of the blockade runner Will o’ the Wisp, wrecked at Galveston in February 1865.

Both Carnival Magic and Royal Caribbean’s Mariner of the Seas were delayed sailing Sunday evening by fog, providing an opportunity to take some photos. Full-resolution versions here.

The maritime bloggers at gCaptain continue to provide the best English-language coverage of the disaster I’ve seen. Although news updates are less frequent now, nearly a week after the accident, the search to recover victims and efforts to secure the wreck continue.

One particularly worthwhile update has been this video, which uses AIS data to trace the final maneuvers of the ship before, during and after her fatal collision with the “Le Scole” rock just south of Porto Giglio. The lideo is long, and not especially polished, but pending release of official findings based on the voyage data recorder — the ship’s “black box” — this may be the best summary of the vessel’s maneuvers at the time of the accident.

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Image: Carabinieri scuba divers inspect the Costa Concordia, on January 19, 2012. Italian rescue workers suspended their search of the capsized Italian cruise liner Costa Concordia after the ship moved again on Friday, firefighters’ spokeman Luca Cari said. (Reuters/Centro subacquei dei Carabinieri)

The tragedy in Italy has little direct connection to Texas, but it’s of interest to me due to the cruise ships operating out of Galveston, under three lines — Carnival (parent to Costa), Royal Caribbean and Disney. Rick Spilman at Old Salt Blog and gCaptain have been all over this story, and the latter particularly has some strong commentary. Here’s Rob Almeida, in an Op/Ed at gCaptain:

This wasn’t simply an accident.  This was negligence.

The Costa Concordia didn’t hit rocks.  At 9:30 PM on Friday night, the ship hit the bloody ISLAND as they were literally showboating around in the darkness.  It just so happens the ship’s bilge picked up a big chunk of the island in the process.

On a state-of-the-art, and fully automated cruise ship like this one, you can’t get right up close to an island without shutting off a half dozen alarm systems that tell you that you are entering shallow water.   These alarms would not be disregarded by the ship’s officers, the decision to bypass these safety alarms while in close proximity to land would certainly have been made by the Captain.

Reports indicate that after plodding along for a full hour, with the sea gushing into open holes in the ship’s hull, the captain finally acknowledged that he, and his ship, were totally screwed.  He then turned the ship around, sent his first MAYDAY call, and ran it aground.  Unfortunately however, because of the delay of the MAYDAY call, by the time rescuers arrived, the ship was heeling so drastically that only one side of the ship could be used to offload guests effectively.

It’s a tragic situation, and equally as unbelievable to think that a ship’s captain would have put his own ship in such a precarious position.  It truly calls into question whether or not he had the requisite shiphandling experience to understand the actual risks involved in taking a ship that close to shore.

In a public statement he made over the weekend, he mentions that he was at least 150 meters from shoal water, and about 300 meters from land.  Putting those numbers into context, he had knowingly put his ship within half a ship-length of shoal water, in the dark, and without a pilot on board.  Anyone who’s ever driven a ship understands how foolish that is.

Observes one commenter at gCaptain, “I’m glad they got the captain safely in a jail cell before the second mate could beat him to death with a copy of Bowditch.”

Good news for the fundraising effort to make critical repairs to the iron barque’s hull:

The Galveston Historical Foundation is inching closer to its goal of raising $3 million to restore the tall ship Elissa. . . .

“Elissa has been berthed in the same location for over 30 years and regularly maintained without this ever occurring before the months after Hurricane Ike,” [GHF Director Dwayne] Jones said. “Keeping Elissa sailing is very important to the foundation as she is one of three tall ships in the world that still sails. The foundation has sailed her with its very committed volunteer crew every year since she was restored.”

Jones said the Keep Elissa Sailing campaign has been successful, with progress on most of the funds needed for the hull and deck restoration expected to be reached this year.

Some of that help comes from the sale of Elissa beer, an India pale ale brewed by St. Arnold’s Brewery in Houston. Some of the proceeds of the Elissa beer sales are donated to the historical foundation.

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How To Help

• Those interested in donating to help restore the tall ship Elissa can make a $10 gift by texting “Elissa” to 50555 on their cellphone.

• Galveston Historical Foundation’s website, www.Galvestonhistory.org, has a complete schedule of fundraising events.

Image: Crew members and invited guests are silhouetted aboard the 1877 barque Elissa as they sail in the ship channel March 22, 2010. The Keep Elissa Sailing campaign aims to raise $3 million to pay for repairs to the tall ship. Published January 02, 2012. Photo by Jennifer Reynolds, Galveston County Daily News.