Inner Harbour Hulks

(W)oolen Mill - (C)anadian Dredge & Dock - (N)ormandy Hall

KINGSTON'S INNER HARBOUR

The slow-moving waters of the Cataraqui River made it a natural aquatic avenue for transportation, travel and trade. The Inner Harbour is considered an embayment of Lake Ontario, extending nearly five miles north to Highway 401. The Cataraqui River is one of two distinct river systems comprising the Rideau Canal connecting Kingston to Ottawa. It drains 930 square kilometres of rural, Canadian Shield bedrock drainage into Lake Ontario via the Inner Harbour. As a mixing region typical of an estuary, sediment from upstream tributaries mix with sediments from the inlet to Lake Ontario. 

NORMANDY HALL EXCAVATION - 1953

Wooden remains of four vessels were unearthed during the construction of Normandy Hall, a training facility being built across Ontario Street at the western end of the LaSalle Causeway, in 1953. At first thought to be French vessels destroyed by the English, during the capture of Fort Frontenac in 1758, this was not the case. Based on their construction and location, it was determined that they were four barges abandoned in shallow water north of the Tete-du-Pont Barracks. 

Calls for the removal of said barges were made as early as 1861. The use of wonderfully-Victorian terms like "Asiatic cholera" and "malarious exhalation" to describe the dangerous of waterborne disease belied the view of Kingstonians of the time that these eyesores were seen by some merely as a source of firewood, at least above the waterline.

INNER HARBOUR BONEYARD

Throughout the late 19th-century, other hulks began to accumulate in the Inner Harbour near the Cotton Mill, such as the schooner Belle. During the 'coal famine' caused by striking coalminers in 1902, eight hulks were hauled up on shore near the Cotton Mill (later known as the Woolen Mill). Firewood was harvested from their exposed vertical ribs and planking. These included the steamer Indian and the former sidewheel-steamer turned-barge City of Kingston.

The Kingston & Pembroke built two pile-wharves (also known as spile-docks) out into the harbour, to facilitate the transfer of minerals from mines located on its northern end, to ships. These pile-wharves had become derelict by the turn of the century. Though there was no formal Kingston ship graveyard, some were scuttled in Lake Ontario off Amherst Island and near Nine-Mile Point. Still others could not make that journey, and made it only as far as the Inner Harbour. By 1910, numerous skiffs, yachts and steamers were abandoned there, many near the pile-wharves, and most up to 50 years old. 

A FOOT-OF-THE-LAKES TERMINAL PROPOSED

In 1911, the idea of a Foot-of-the-Lakes Terminal was floated. Kingston was not exactly possessed of a great harbour. The Outer Harbour had been dredged to 18 feet, but only to provide a channel to the Montreal Transportation Co. and Richardson elevators, as shown on a 1920 hydrographic chart. Elsewhere, depths ranged from seven to 16 feet. A small portion of the Inner Harbour, just north of the causeway bridge, was dredged to a depth of 14 feet.

Kingston’s ambitious bid to become just such a terminal relied on the Inner Harbour. The only way to achieve an equal footing with major lake ports Midland, Port Arthur and Toronto would be substantial government funding. The city requested dredging of the Inner Harbour to a depth of 22 feet, connection of Belle Island to the mainland with the dredged sludge, and replacement of the old Cataraqui Penny Bridge. This would open up the Inner Harbour to lake shipping. Water in the Inner Harbour was only six to eight feet deep, for the most part.

The Department of Public Works submitted a $1.8 million plan to the city in 1912. The plan included a new rolling-lift bridge with 125-foot vertical clearance and dredging ($157,000) to open up the Inner Harbour via a new Lasalle Causeway. The Causeway’s bridge, 950 feet of dock and 1,700 feet of roadway ($230,000) were the initial steps in a grandiose plan to make the Inner Harbour a true Great Lakes Terminal! Further funds would be required for the envisioned five million-bushel grain elevator ($1,224,690) with further expansion to forty million bushels and fifty-car long loading tracks, coal-handling plant, docks, freight shed and a 500-car freight yard! The proposed Inner Harbour basin, its 53 acres dredged to 25 feet, would host 600 x 60-foot freight sheds adjacent to Belle Island. Wintering facilities for lake vessels would also be built.

A 1921 chart showed six steamers and three barges near the pile-wharves, now part of Canadian Pacific Railway following its 1913 acquisition of the Kingston & Pembroke. The vessels had been made surplus due to a post-war depression and fleet modernization, or simply old age. Steamers Rickarton, Nicaragua, Sarnor, Stormount, Maplegreen, Maplegeorge, Mapleglen (the last four belonging to Canada Steamship Lines); coal schooner Abbie L. Andrews; and Montreal Transportation Co. barges Chicago and Glengarry.

Some of these derelict vessels could be towed away, but most would have to be exploded and dredged-out. Then there were the difficulties of establishing ownership, performing the work, and absorbing the cost. 

City Council heard in 1923 that there were as many as 40 hulks to be dealt with before the ambitious terminal project could proceed. It never did.

DEALING WITH THE BONEYARD

The CPR agreed to remove the pile-wharves in 1929. The work was supervised by W.J. Gates, 85 years old at the time! It was hoped that this action, and the removal of nearby hulks, would make the Inner Harbour at least a prime winter lay-up site for lake vessels. Throughout the 1920's and 1930's, some of the vessels were towed by Donnelly and Sincennes-McNaughton salvage tugs to the lake graveyards and sunk. The Three CSL Maple vessels were so removed in 1925. Otherwise, they were susceptible to arson if they remained.

Several smaller hulks remained near shore, in locations unlikely to pose a threat to navigation. Their wooden skeletons slowly rotted away in the silty harbour water. Their intended purpose and placement may have been to act as pier extensions or breakwaters for docks. 

In the 1950's, several newer floating hulks accumulated near Canadian Dredge & Dock. Examples were the coal barge Theresa T., government tender Concretia, and a CD&D barge now known as C.D.110, formerly the steamer Rapids Queen.

The construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway made CD&D a beehive of activity as dredges and scows went out to work in the shipping lane. After the Seaway's completion, Kingston's standing as a port all but sank. CD&D's now-surplus fleet rapidly became an eyesore in itself.

THE BONEYARD STUDIED

A 1994 archaeological and historical study, funded by the Ontario Heritage Foundation, was conducted by Jonathan Moore and managed by Maurice Smith. The results were published in the catch-up issue of FreshWater - A Journal of Great Lakes Marine History, published by the Marine Museum of the Great Lakes at Kingston, 1995-96, and in which the two charts in this post were presented. The study charted the extant remains of 14 vessels. All faced east-west, were upright, and submerged or partially-submerged. Wooden-hulled except for one with steel plating, the method of propulsion could not be reliably ascertained due to their advanced state of decay. One was screw-propelled, and at least three had been unpropelled scows. 

The identity of only three of the 14 vessels can be known. All three are 100-200 metres off Doug Fluhrer Park, at the end of Wellington Street. These are:

• barge Glengarry (1873/1915)
• barge Chicago (1872/1915)
• coal-schooner Abbie L. Andrews (1873/1920).

Dates in brackets are (Date Built/Date Arrived in Inner Harbour or register entry closed). Other vessels that were known to have entered the boneyard but not known to have exited: 

• schooners Belle (1857/1885); N.H. Ferry (1867/1913); Mary A. Daryaw (1866/1927)
• steamers Indian (1853/1882); City of Kingston (1874/1901)
• pinflat Adele (1893/1908)

THE BONEYARD TODAY

Weed growth, landfill, sediment and shallow depths make many of the remaining hulks' locations inaccessible, therefore invisible. Knowledgeable boaters and rowers are aware of areas to avoid. 

Going back in time when the hulks were visible, they were seen as eyesores and hazards. Today they are barely visible, viewed with intrigue, curiosity and as mysterious melancholy reminders of Kingston's marine history.