Late in 1883, the new steam tug HUNTER made its appearance in the Shoalwater Bay area. She was a new “Bar Tug” built by the Coos Bay Shipbuilding Company in “Old Town”, North Bend, OR. Coos Bay Shipbuilding Company was a subsidiary of the Simpson Brothers Lumber Company, which had mills on the Oregon and Washington Coasts. Asa Mead Simpson, of the Simpson Brothers Co, was tired of being at the mercy of the local shipping interests and decided he would rather own his own transportation sources for his lumber mills.
The New Arrival
So in mid-November 1883, Captain Albert T. Stream steamed into Sholawater Bay with his new steam-powered bar tug HUNTER. Capt. Stream was well acquainted with Shoalwater Bay and the surrounding area. He had lived here since 1868 and was a former commander of the North Cove Shoalwater Life-Saving Station. A job he held after the death of Captain George Johnson in a boating accident in 1881. During his time as the life-saving service commander, Captain Stream was involved in the rescue of all hands on the wreck LAMMERLAW. During that rescue, assistance was provided by some local tugs, which influenced Stream’s actions as a tug Captain.
In the year 1883, Capt. Stream was living on the Long Beach Peninsula of Shoalwater Bay in an area which would later become known as Klipsan Beach. (In fact, his wife was to become the Post Office Master for Klipsan Beach in 1912, and this was an area where he made up to $1,000 per month in real estate sales.) One of Shoalwater Bay’s specialties was the Shoalwater Bay oysters, and some of the HUNTERS’ first cargo besides escorting lumber schooners in and out of the Bay was to take hundreds of sacks of Oysters into Astoria for shipment to San Francisco.
In May of 1884, the HUNTER entered a race against the tug SOL THOMAS. The race, from Grays Harbor to Shoalwater Bay, was one that Capt. Stream and the HUNTER won. With this victory, they earned the honor to carry the “Broom” in the wheelhouse of the HUNTER. However, not all times aboard the vessel would be triumphant.
In March 1885, the HUNTER collided with the ALICE in the waters near Astoria, OR. Only minor damage to the vessels and some embarrassment. But the embarrassment was short-lived. A few days later, on the 25th of March, the lumber barkentine MELANETHON, loaded with lumber from John Wood’s Mill in South Bend, began to take on water. The HUNTER had her in tow while they crossed the bar, but something loosened her sides, and she immediately started to fill with water. By the time they got back to the docks in South Bend, she had 8 ft of water in the vessel. Soon, John Cruse from the Coos Bay Shipbuilding Co was on his way to start repairs. It took them about two months to repair the MELANETHON.
In January 1886 , Capt. Stream came into Shoalwater Bay from Grays Harbor and reported seeing a schooner of approximately 70 feet in length, floating bottom up. He tried to take her in tow but was unable. He could not discover her name, but suspects it was the schooner ANITA.
A few months later, in April, the HUNTER was towing both the TRUSTEE and the TANNER from Grays Harbor. Once they got to the narrows near the bar, he let the TRUSTEE go to anchor to wait its turn while he took the TANNER out across the bar. But the TRUSTEE started gaining on the TANNER, and before they knew it, they realized the TRUSTEE was trying to sail out on its own. The result was that the TRUSTEE wrecked on the bar.
The demanding work began to take its toll on the HUNTER, and in May of 1886, she required some repairs. These took slightly longer than expected, but soon she was back in operation, going in and out of Grays Harbor and Shoalwater Bay. Yet as the year 1886 drew to a close, an even more tragic event occurred.
While coming into Shoalwater Bay in December, the first mate, Michael Bugge (his real name is Bartholomaeus Mikal Bart Bugge from Bodo, Norway), was washed overboard and drowned. His body was recovered about 15 days later near Klipsan Beach by Albert & Edward Loomis, James Ellsworth, and Jo Supernant. The body was taken to South Bend and handed over to the IOOF for burial. Afterwards, there was an extended fight to clear his probate, but that is a different story.
The 1888 Wreck ABERCORN
The year 1888 started off with the HUNTER involved in the search for survivors from the wreck ABERCORN in Grays Harbor. Capt. Albert T. Stream and the tug HUNTER of North Cove had returned from Grays Harbor and sent an account of the wreck. The bark ABERCORN went ashore at 3 a.m. on Monday, January 30th.
ABERCORN, from Maryport, UK, was bound for Portland and was loaded with steel rails. She took on a pilot, Capt. Charles Johnson, of Astoria, just off the Columbia Bar on the 25th from the tug ASTORIA. Unfortunately, she was blown out to sea in a storm. Then, the weather became very calm, but a thick fog prevailed. This thick weather caused the pilot to lose his bearings. The vessel struck the Iron Sands, five miles north of Damon’s Point. The vessel proved a total wreck.
At daylight, a sea-otter hunter named Charles McIntyre and some Indians saw them, but as they had no boat, they could not help them. A little after noon, the vessel broke up. McIntyre and the Indians made a desperate effort to save the drowning men, nobly risking their lives in the surf time and again, but were only able to save two men and a cabin-boy who was unconscious for ten hours after being rescued. Twenty-four souls lost, including the pilot, Capt. Charles Johnson.
The British bark ABERCORN was a bark of 1262 tons register, built in Glasgow in 1885, by Stephen & Son for P.H. Dixon & Co., of Glasgow. She sailed from Maryport, England, on September 21st last, cosigned to Balfour, Guthrie & Co., with 2000 tons of steel rails for the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company. She made a good run to the mouth of the Columbia River, taking on Pilot Charles Johnson on January 23rd, when 124 days out. Since that time, she has been beating offshore. Her master, Capt McCallum, was known here as an experienced seaman.
Soon after, the HUNTER was sent to San Francisco for major repairs, a new propeller, and a hawser.
The closing of 1888 saw Capt Stream and the HUNTER back in Astoria with more oysters but also some sad news. They found the overturned boat of Richard Morris of Riverside. He had been missing for several days and presumed drowned, but now that his boat was found overturned near Toke’s Point, sufficient evidence existed to claim drowning.
The Wreck of GRACE ROBERTS
Later in December, the HUNTER under Capt. Stream was involved in assisting the Shoalwater Bay Life-Saving crew in the rescue of all souls on the wreck GRACE ROBERTS, a large bark from San Francisco, which went ashore in a fierce southwest gale, fifteen miles south of the Shoalwater bay life-station. It was early in the evening when she struck, and the vessel was not seen until the next morning at 9 o’clock, when John Hansen (No. 1 of the crew), being on watch, saw the distant wreck dimly through the mist, but only for an instant. Hansen gave the alarm, and the beach wagon was manned and on the march for the shore. Captain Brown, ascertaining the position of the wreck, and seeing that it was quicker and best to go fifteen miles south by water in Shoalwater Bay, and then across a narrow sand spit four miles to the ocean, he immediately secured assistance from the tug, HUNTER, under Capt A. T. Stream, command to enter on the perilous and stormy trip across the bay.
Captain Stream had been Captain Brown’s predecessor in charge of the life-saving station at North Cove. The beach cart apparatus was taken aboard the HUNTER, and the light cedar surf boat belonging to the station was towed through the raging sea, with all the crew at their posts in the surfboat and Captain Brown at the steering oar. It was deemed proper to take the surf boat along, as the wreck might be too far out to use the gun and lines. It was deemed a point of honor and duty with Capt. Brown that he and his crew should ride in the surf boat rather than on the HUNTER . So every man sat at his post, cased in his cork jacket, oar in hand. Capt. Stream put on all the steam the HUNTER would stand, and in about one hour, he landed the life-saving crew on the south shore, four miles from the wreck.
Here, Capt. Brown was able to hire four horses to haul the equipment across the sands to the ocean side of the peninsula, where the GRACE ROBERTS lay broadside on shore, full of water and nearly submerged. Bulwarks and housings were all washed away, and the crew was aloft in the mizzen rigging where they had lashed themselves. Every sea broke clean over the vessel’s hull, and the cold spray dashed constantly over the exhausted and benumbed crew. It was early in December, and the waters were icy cold.
Capt. Brown calculated the wreck to be about 400 yards from the shore. At his first shot, he succeeded in throwing the projectile over the bark’s rigging between the fore and main masts. A strong southward-flowing current carried the slack of the rocket line within the grasp of the imperiled crew. According to instructions, they attached the tail block to the mizzen mast just below the mizzen top. The poor fellows were so exhausted and benumbed by the cold that they could hardly accomplish the otherwise simple task. The time from firing the shot until the hawser was made fast was 90 minutes.
Then the breeches buoy was sent out to the GRACE ROBERTS crew. Soon, eight exhausted and nearly frozen men were hauled to land and safety, and the ninth trip brought Capt. Larsen, the last man to leave his ship. Just as Captain Larsen was lifted out of the breeches buoy, up came the life-saving crew from Cape Disappointment, having galloped 20 miles with four horses attached to their beach wagon from their station at the mouth of the Columbia River. They were too late to take part in the rescue, but gave three cheers for the gallant lifesaving crew from Shoalwater Bay, in which the nine rescued men joined feebly, but with all the strength they had.
New Home For HUNTER
Halfway through 1890, Capt. Stream relinquished his position on the HUNTER mostly due to the owners, The Simpson Brothers, wanting to transfer the HUNTER to the Coos Bay area. But Capt. Stream had his eye on becoming a ship structural inspector and working some real estate dealings in the Klipsan Beach area at that time.
By 1891, the HUNTER was busy in the Coos Bay area, especially in the Siuslaw River. It may have been a new area, but the HUNTER would soon be involved in recovering people from wrecks again.
On 10 September 1892, the HUNTER was involved in the rescue and salvage of the wrecked whaleback ship called SS CHARLES W WETMORE. The SS CHARLE W WETMORE went ashore on the 8th of Sept 1892, carrying a load of coal from Tacoma, WA, for San Francisco, when a storm and dense fog forced them ashore. Soon, the HUNTER again, she had the Life-saving crew in tow to try to get close to the wreck, but with no success. Eventually, all the crew were safe except the captain and two crew members. Capt. O’Brien and two watchmen remained on board to keep back the looters. It took so long to get these last three off the ship, and they had taken such a beating in such cold, foul weather, it was feared that they had died, but they did survive and were eventually taken off on the 28th. And just in time, too. They had one biscuit of food left for the three of them to share, and they had been on “one meal per day” rations for four days. The SS CHARLES W WETMORE was a total loss.
The next wreck the HUNTER was involved with was the EMILY in July 1893. But only in the recovery of part of her hull.
Another wreck the HUNTER assisted was the schooner WESTERN HOME in February 1895, which was successfully recovered and towed into Coos Bay.
In October 1896, the wreck of the ARAGO was the next wreck assisted by the HUNTER. The ARAGO wrecked near the same location as the SS CHARLES W WETMORE a few years earlier. In the case of the ARAGO, 13 lives were lost. 4 were passengers, and 9 were crewmen.
December 1897 saw the HUNTER reporting on the wreck of the TRUCKEE. Then, in 1898, the HUNTER assisted with the recovery of ECHO, which was limping into the Coos Bay area with considerable damage from its trip overseas from China.
In January 1898, Captain Scott of the Bandon Life-Saving Station reported a large four-masted vessel in distress about six miles south of the Coos Bay Bar. She had her flag at half staff and was flying a signal of distress. One of her topmasts was gone, also her headgear, and Captain Scott thinks that she has lost most of her sails. There was such a heavy sea running that it was impossible for the tugs to cross out to her assistance, either from the Coquille River bar or Coos Bay bar. The tug HUNTER sat close to the Coos Bay bar and waited to cross out as soon as the sea permitted. The vessel was supposed to be the barkentine ECHO, direct from China, bound for Coos Bay and owned by the Simpson Lumber Company. ECHO was recovered and repaired.
1899 and 1900 had no excitement outside of the day-to-day towings and a few excursions in the Umpqua River area.
In 1901, the HUNTER assisted in refloating the British bark BARODA, which had gone aground near Bandon.
In 1902, it was the HUNTER that had a narrow escape. Under Capt. Cornwall, she almost became a wreck on the Umpqua bar. She struck hard, and a number of heavy seas washed into the engine room and almost put out the fires. She managed to return to her dock in Gardiner.
In 1904, the tug EL ROSCOE had the schooner DEL NORTE in tow going over the Siuslaw Bar when the hawser parted, and both vessels went up on the spit. The HUNTER delivered the Umpqua life-saving crew and assisted in getting the EL ROSCOE pulled off the spit, but the DEL NORTE was considered a loss.
In 1906, the HUNTER towed in the re-floated remains of the wreck SADIE.
Off To Puget Sound
In 1909, the tug HUNTER was purchased and altered from 104 gross tons to 185 gross tons in a Portland shipyard. She had been procured by Robert Frederick for use in the San Juan Island circuit in the Puget Sound.
Here is how an article reads; “25th June, 1909: San Juan Islander: New Boat For The Island Run: Organization of the Bellingham Transportation Company has been affected and Robert Frederick Jr.., manager, announces that beginning July 1, the steamer HUNTER, a first class passenger and freight boat will be placed on the Bellingham-San Juan Islands run in consummation of a plan begun through the agency of the Chamber of Commerce of Bellingham several months ago. The HUNTER is described as a magnificent type of combination passenger and freight craft. It is 100 feet long. Twenty-two feet beam, draws eleven feet of water, and travels at the rate of ten miles an hour. It is an oil-burning steamer and is equipped with 300-horsepower engines. It is also equipped with an electric light plant and carries a powerful electric searchlight, and the entire vessel is heated with steam. It is equipped for handling freight consisting of a steam winch and cargo beam, thus facilitating the easy and rapid moving of freight to and from the vessel. There is ample room for 150 passengers and 100 tons of freight. The vessel carries an excursion permit to carry 200 passengers. It is announced that a daily schedule will be operated by the vessel leaving the Whatcom Creek Waterway each morning, returning in the evening. It is proposed to have the trip made via Birch Bay and all points on the north side of the San Juan Islands on one day and alternate via the south side points the next, thus making a daily circuit of all commercial points on the San Juan Islands. The HUNTER will run in connection with the steamer launch, ELMO, which has been purchased by the company. “
By the 26th of June, 1909, alterations to the tug HUNTER had been completed at the Supple Shipyards, and the craft was in drydock for cleaning and painting.
The new “Steamer” HUNTER arrived in Port Townsend on July 3, 1909. and started out making the circuit, but soon she was reduced to just making excursions and some freight. By 1910, she was sold to the Seattle-Everett Navigation Co., basically doing passenger transport between Bremerton and Seattle.
On the 17th Oct, 1911, she had overturned and was found lying on her side, sinking fast in about 400 ft of water off Brush Point, Whidbey Island. No reports of lives in danger, so she may have slipped her moorings and gone astray before overturning. She was discovered by the power boat MONAGHAN, which successfully pushed her ashore so she could be refloated.
In 1912, a deck hand, Fred Wilson, fell overboard during a freight loading and drowned at the Galbraith dock in Seattle (pier 53 today)
In 1914, her home port was shifted to Seattle, and in 1916, her first captain, Albert T. Stream, died in Hoquiam. WA.
Sometime in here, she started going to Alaska. In March of 1917, she is reputed to have helped recover the Schooner HAROLD BLEEKUM that had grounded at Eagle Harbor, near Kodiak, AK.
Back To Hoquiam
By 1918, she was back in the Hoquiam area, towing scows for the Foss Company and under the ownership of Grays Harbor Construction Company. During this time, she also picked up in Portland the old ferry known as the CITY OF VANCOUVER and delivered her to Tacoma for use as a county ferry for Gig Harbor, Vashon Island, and Old Town Docks, Tacoma.
On 15 May 1920, the HUNTER itself sank 10 miles south of Umatilla Reef. She was discovered sinking by the stmr PHYLLIS after she heard the distress whistles from the HUNTER. The HUNTER’s Capt and crew were all saved, but the HUNTER soon disappeared from sight. She had just been sold to a new owner, Carry-Davis Tug Company. The new owners had their own crew, and one of the new owners was on board when she was lost beneath the waves.