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Photographer: Barry Swackhamer
Taken: May 26, 2014
Caption: The Bertrand Excavation Site
Additional Description: April 1, 1865: The Bertrand Goes Down

The Bertrand left St. Louis on March 18, 1865, on its maiden voyage up the Missouri to Fort Benton, Montana Territory. That spring saw many such departures, as steamboat owners rushed to complete the 2,000-mile journey during the high water season.
At dawn on April 1, the boat boat left Omaha and proceeded upriver, making almost 25 miles by mid-afternoon. At 3 pm the boat road up on a snag, causing the steer to swamp with water. The passengers and crew were able to scramble to safety, but the boat and its cargo sank to the bottom. Only the superstructure, pilot house and smokestacks remained above water.
Although some upper fittings were removed soon after the sinking, the shifting sediments of the river soon obliterated all traces of the steamboat.

Caption: The Missouri River, the waterway to the west, was especially treacherous because of its changing channels, shifting sandbars, and numerous snags. The Bertrand was only one of more than 400 steamboats wrecked on the Missouri during the heyday of the riverboat.
Submitted: June 3, 2014, by Barry Swackhamer of Brentwood, California.
Database Locator Identification Number: p274929
File Size: 3.500 Megabytes

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