This is a photo of the Anchor that was originally part of the steamboat Ruthven. The Ruthven was completed in the spring of 1860, though information concerning her home port and construction details are not clear. Before the civil war, the Ruthven seems to have been engaged in the Magnolia to Galveston trade carrying both goods and passengers. During the war she was chartered as a Confederate transport, hauling troops, military supplies, and the Confederate mails along with her usual cargos. As the war progressed and the Northern blockade of Galveston became more effective, the Trinity River trade tapered down to nearly nothing, suffering because of the inability to either ship cotton out or to receive goods on a regular basis. At the end of the war, however, this trend was reversed. Cotton and other agricultural produce once again flowed southward, and goods such as salt, flour, sugar, coffee, whiskey and clothing were brought north. At that time, shipment of cotton from Magnolia to Galveston cost from seven to ten dollars per bale. In Palestine, anyone expecting goods on a incoming steamboat would wait in town at "Steamboat Corner" until the steamboat blew its whistle as it came within a few miles of the Magnolia landing. All of those waiting would then proceed to the landing to receive their shipments. The river was so narrow at Magnolia that steamboats had to go several more miles upriver in order to turn around for the return trip to Galveston. While the Ruthven was leased to Captain Robert Mercer, the boat gathered into debt. A Captain Gordon then took command, but the debt, which remained with the vessel, was too great. A suit was filed by the crew against her for services rendered, and the courts ordered the boat to be sold. Captain Gordon managed to get a stay of execution for the court order and ran the boat until the next season, 1868, when he laid her up at Parker's Bluff. The boat was then sold at auction, the highest bidder being Col. George Wright, who bought her for $900.00. He had travelled up the Trinity on the Ruthven on her last voyage. The engines, boilers and iron were removed from her and sold, as Col. Wright expected to use the hull as a flatboat. She remained tied to a tree on the riverbank for a time, but soon she began to take on water until she sank to the bottom of the river in 1869. In 1912, when the water was low, the hull of the old steamboat became visible, as was its anchor. The anchor and bell were salvaged from the wreck by W.D. Small, who had been second clerk aboard the Ruthven, at the request of Dr. John M. Colley, then owner of Parker's Bluff. The anchor and bell were taken into Palestine to be exhibited on the lawn of the Young Men's Business League, later the Chamber of Commerce, but the bell disappeared before the artifacts could be fixed in place. This is where it was when this picture was taken. Later the anchor was moved to the front lawn of the Howard House Museum in Palestine and then was moved a final time to a monument that sits at the southeast corner of S. Magnolia and Spring Streets.
Place Name coordinates. (May be approximate.)
Place Name coordinates. (May be approximate.)
