Did you know? Floods on the Mississippi River have often acted as the catalyst for public action and concern. The great flood of 1858 might have led to immediate and substantial federal attention to navigation and flood control had it not been for the intervening Civil War that began in April 1861. Both the North and the South abandoned all efforts to improve the river during the conflict, and each contributed heavily to the destruction of what few improvements had been put in place. Levees were cut for military egress, an effort was made to change the course of the river around Vicksburg and at the end of the war the river and its tributaries were in far worse condition than any time since 1820. But by 1871 some sense of normalcy was returning to the river and Congress directed the Corps of Engineers to establish gages at specific points on the Mississippi and certain tributaries. The gages would be basic to statistical analysis and prediction of river conditions. Adding to the interest in the river was both the return of luxury steamboats and the fascinating spectacle of frequent steamboat races. The most famous of these was the 1870 race between the Robert E. Lee and the Natchez. Thousands of people lined the banks as the two vessels raced from New Orleans to St. Louis, all the more exciting since it was upstream against the current. The Lee’s record time of three days, 18 hours, 14 minutes stood until 1929 when the steamboat Bogie beat the record, but by only three hours. The first illustration shows a crevasse to a levee during the flood of 1858. The second shows Army Engineers attempting to reroute the Mississippi River in order to allow Union warships to pass Vicksburg without coming under attack from shore batteries. Next is a painting of the celebrated race between the Robert E. Lee and the Natchez. The final image is a rare photo showing the Robert E. Lee engaged in its more mundane business of hauling cotton and moving passengers up and down the river.
Posted on: Wed, 13 Aug 2014 17:19:06 +0000
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