Tragedy on the Skagit: Six Miners Lost in River Crossing
A supply-laden canoe capsized near the Portage, ending the lives of six men seeking their fortune in the gold-rich mountains.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
On Monday last, a canoe capsized near the Portage on the Skagit River, and six miners were drowned. Six others, including an Indian who were in the canoe at the time, escaped with their lives. The accident is attributable to the overloading of the canoe, which contained, besides the 12 men in question, 700 pounds of freight. Following are the names of the men who perished: David Ball, of Skagit; Arthur J. Dempsey, of Quincy, Cal.; William Murry, of Seattle; William H. Gaucher, of Oregon; James Scahan, of Quincy, Cal.; and Capt. Stephen Blaney, of Seattle.
“The accident is attributable to the overloading of the canoe, which contained, besides the 12 men in question, 700 pounds of freight.”
This 1880 disaster highlights the extreme risks taken by laborers in the early Pacific Northwest gold rushes. Much like modern headlines about the dangerous informal economy or remote infrastructure, it serves as a stark reminder of how high the cost of 'frontier enterprise' was for the individual workers involved.
From readers
No comments yet. If you know something about this story — a correction, a family memory, a source — it belongs here.