The Perilous 42-Day Voyage of the SS Shawmut
Passengers recount a chaotic journey from Manila to Tacoma, marked by boiler failures, mutinous crews, and the tragic deaths of three firemen.
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.
After an eventful trip of 42 days, the Boston Steamship company's big steamship Shawmut reached port at 7 o'clock last night. According to the reports made by the passengers, the trip was one succession of delays and accidents. Three Japanese firemen were drowned, several crews of stokers were released and many deserted, quarreling among the officers occurred frequently, and general chaos at times had full swing on the boat. It took the boat five days to run from Manila to Hongkong. At Hongkong the Shawmut was placed in drydock for a week repairing her boilers and machinery. The passengers were by this time very dissatisfied, and many of them demanded that a part of the money paid for their tickets be refunded. Among the passengers who came in on the Shawmut were Pay Director Stephen Rand, J. S. Leech of the Philippines, and E. H. Jones of Tacoma, who has been a missionary at Gen Dai for the past 20 years.
“General chaos at times had full swing on the boat.”
The maritime hardships of 1904 highlight the brutal conditions faced by ship laborers at the turn of the century. The journey of the SS Shawmut serves as a reminder of the human cost behind the trans-Pacific trade that helped build Tacoma.
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