On June 15, 1904, a massive fire consumed the paddle steamer General Slocum
as it sailed along New York City’s East River, killing more than 1,000 people.
Many of the victims were women and children who had been part of a church group’s annual picnic.
It remained New York City’s deadliest disaster for nearly a century — that is until the terrorist
attacks on September 11, 2001. Even to this day, it remains the city’s worst maritime disaster.
And yet, it’s a disaster that is often overlooked — perhaps
because it lacks the allure and romance of other shipwrecks.
The General Slocum, after all, was not a luxurious ocean liner filled with dignitaries and tycoons.
Rather, she was an aging pleasure cruiser in disrepair — her victims … mostly German
immigrants, simply looking forward to a church picnic. In the eyes of history,
what happened on the General Slocum was nothing more than a gruesome accident.
As to why the disaster is often overshadowed, one survivor of the General Slocum later said … “The
Titanic had a great many famous people on it. This was just a family picnic.”
Perhaps what is just as chilling as the disaster itself … is the gross
negligence leading up to the events of that day.
How could one small fire grow into such a deadly inferno?
Why did the life preservers on the General Slocum actually contribute to a higher death toll?
Today, we explore the story behind the General Slocum
and the German immigrant community that was forever changed on that fateful day.
The paddle steamer General Slocum was named after one of the youngest major generals in
the American Civil War, Henry Warner Slocum. By age 35, Slocum had helped lead the Union army
to victory at Gettysburg and would later go on to serve three terms in Congress.
In other words, the name “Slocum” became synonymous with respect, honor, and glory — and so
it was a name, the owners thought, that would lend an air of respect and dignity to their new ship.
When she was launched in 1891, the 264-foot-long paddle steamer
was an impressive sight. She had a gross tonnage of just under 1,300 and featured
3 watertight compartments — a relatively new safety feature for this type of ship.
Her wooden hull was painted a brilliant white, and her yellow funnels towered high on the upper deck,
which was also known as the hurricane deck. The Slocum
was a visually striking ship that stood out against the other ships in the harbor.
On each side of the Slocum were two massive paddle wheels, each of them 9 feet wide and
31 feet in diameter. Her two boilers could get her up to speeds of around 15 knots.
Inside, she had two large saloons on the middle and lower decks,
where natural light and fresh air poured in through the numerous windows. Passengers
could take in views of the cityscape from the comfort of velvet-upholstered wicker chairs.
From May to October, travelers could pay 50 cents for the five-hour round
trip from Manhattan to Rockaway to enjoy seaside activities.
The General Slocum certainly lived up to her dignified name,
but only for a brief period — just four months after her launch,
she ran aground off New York’s Rockaway Point and had to be towed to freedom.
This was just the beginning of a series of groundings and
serious collisions over the next several years.
By 1904, the General Slocum was no longer the star of the East River. Faster and more luxurious
steamboats were attracting upper-class clientele — but the Slocum remained just as busy as ever,
chartering church groups and other social organizations for a day of seaside fun.
She and her sister, the Grand Republic, still had the distinct honor of being the
largest excursion steamboats coming out of New York. And standing on her decks
gave passengers invigorating views of the shoreline as she steamed down the river.
However, since the Slocum had essentially become a water taxi for the lower class,
her owner—the Knickerbocker Steamboat Company—no longer made her maintenance a priority.
The lifejackets, which had been stored on the upper deck, exposed to the elements for 13
years—had rotted. The fire hoses were cracked and rotted from having never been replaced.
And the lifeboats were wired to the deck in such a way that they were inaccessible in an emergency.
To make matters worse, her crew had never practiced a fire drill.
Years of negligence and greed were about to come to a head — and the lives of more than
1,300 passengers and their families were about to be forever changed with a single spark.
On Wednesday, June 15, 1904, hundreds of parishioners of St. Mark’s German
Lutheran Church lined the Third Street Dock under clear blue skies.
The majority of passengers that day were Sunday school teachers, mothers, and their children.
For $350, the church had booked the Slocum to carry the group up the East River to Long Island
for their 17th annual summer picnic.
They departed around 9:30 that morning and started up the East River.
About 30 minutes later—as the ship passed through a section of the river called Hell Gate—a
fire started in the Lamp Room in the forward part of the ship.
It’s presumed a discarded match or cigarette started the fire—but whatever it was,
it certainly did not take much to ignite the room, which was littered with straw and oil rags.
On the upper deck, Pastor George Haas (HAWZ) was enjoying the cruise
with his wife and daughter when he recalls the scene that followed:
“The band was playing … and the women and the children were crowded around
the musicians listening to the piece. Then came the cry of fire and the awful scene.
In three minutes—it could not have been more—all three decks were ablaze.”
In what seemed like the blink of an eye, the fire consumed the General Slocum.
Flames shot up through the upper deck as it collapsed,
causing passengers to fall down into the burning ship.
Masses of panicked passengers ran to the back of the ship to escape the flames,
trampling women and children.
Others scrambled to find life jackets — only to find that they
had rotted and practically fell apart in their hands.
The life jackets that didn’t fall apart were actually more dangerous.
The cork inside them had turned to dust, causing them to absorb water like a sponge. Children who
were tossed into the water wearing them would often sink and drown from the weight of them.
Survivor John Kircher recalls how his wife put a life preserver on their daughter
and threw her overboard, assuming she would stay afloat.
“But the child never appeared,” Kircher said. “She had sunk as though a stone were tied to her.”
Even the few people who knew how to swim struggled in the water,
as they were often dragged down by their heavy wool clothing — or
by panicked passengers clamoring to hold onto anything they could grab.
The fire hoses were as useless as the life preservers. When crewmen
tried turning them on, they simply burst and fell apart.
Fire engines waiting on the shore could do nothing but watch as the
General Slocum turned into a ball of fire — as passengers jumped into the river only to drown.
When the Slocum finally beached and sank off North Brother Island,
the scene was catastrophic. Doctors and nurses from a nearby hospital ran out to assist
passengers in the water but quickly realized they were bringing more bodies ashore than survivors.
In the end, out of the estimated 1,342 souls on board, more than 1,000 of them died. Entire
families—who just 20 minutes before had been looking forward to a church picnic—were now gone.
Devastated husbands who had been at work at the time of the disaster
were now searching morgue after morgue trying to find their wives and children.
In Manhattan’s Lower East Side, the German immigrant neighborhood known as Little Germany
would never recover. A large number of its core population died on the General Slocum,
and over the next several years, its population continued to dwindle
as the few remaining residents moved to the Upper East Side neighborhood of Yorkville.
The church that chartered the General Slocum would suffer a similar fate.
With most of its congregation dead—and with the remaining parishioners moving away—it
finally merged with the Zion Church in Yorkville in 1946.
Despair over the disaster turned to anger as families of the victims wanted answers
as to how something like this could have happened.
Many people placed the blame squarely on Captain William Van Schaick for not beaching the ship
immediately. Others said the ship’s owner, the Knickerbocker Steamboat Company, was at fault
for not keeping up on the Slocum’s maintenance.
Throughout the inquest and trial, scores of witnesses testified in great detail
about the rotting life jackets that fell apart in their hands — and the
lifeboats that were sealed to the railing, preventing escape.
On January 27, 1906—the jury found Captain Van Schaick guilty of criminal negligence
and misconduct. The nearly 70-year-old captain—who, up until the Slocum disaster
had had a respectable 30+-year career without a single loss of life—was
sentenced to 10 years of hard labor in New York’s Sing Sing prison.
His initial request to be pardoned was denied by President Teddy Roosevelt,
but he was finally pardoned in 1912 by President Taft.
Meanwhile, despite a mountain of evidence that the ship was not safe—the
company only received a nominal fine and was essentially acquitted of any wrongdoing.
In the end, Captain Van Schaick was the only person to serve prison time for the accident.
For the Knickerbocker Steamboat Company, time was money.
Just days after the Slocum disaster, her sister ship, the Grand Republic, resumed service. And—not
surprisingly—it was discovered later that same summer that she too had rotten life preservers.
As for the General Slocum, what was left of her was salvaged and converted into a
625 ton barge—which later sank in a storm in 1911.
To this day, the General Slocum disaster is a stark reminder of what happens when greed
and classism collide. The Knickerbocker Steamboat Company failed to maintain a ship that primarily
served the lower class — instead, choosing to pocket the profits for their own gain.
The resulting disaster killed hundreds of people,
wiped out entire families, and left a scar on New York’s German community.