Did you know that a shipwreck rests just next to the Burlington breakwater? Wrecked during a brutal winter gale that came howling across Lake Champlain, the story of one of Burlington’s most famous shipwrecks, General Butler, is an incredible tale of survival and rescue. Everyone survived thanks to quick thinking and two first responders.
Wrecked by a Winter Storm
General Butler was built in 1862 in Essex, NY and is a great example of a Lake Champlain sailing canal boat designed to sail on the lake and, with masts removed and centerboard raised, towed though the canals.
On its last voyage, General Butler was under the command of its third owner, Captain William Montgomery of Isle La Motte and had four other people aboard including Captain Montgomery’s teenage daughter, Cora. While sailing to Burlington on December 9, 1876, a powerful winter gale struck fast and furious, damaging the boat. As they approached Burlington, General Butler’s steering mechanism broke, and the captain lost control of the vessel. Though he attempted some quick solutions, dropping the storm anchor to buy time to jury-rig a tiller bar to the steering mechanism with chains, Captain Montgomery was unable to maneuver General Butler around the breakwater and into safe waters. Waves, kicked up by the storm, were so fierce that they picked up the boat and crashed it headlong into the breakwater. In fact, the force of the water was so great that the vessel was repeatedly lifted and smashed into the ice-covered stones.
Quick Thinking and a Daring Rescue
Realizing there was no way to safely land and that the boat was finished, the captain ordered everyone off the ship. One by one, as General Butler was lifted and smashed onto the breakwater, each of the ship’s company made the perilous jump off the boat and onto the icy breakwater. The captain was the last to leave the ship which, as noted by eye-witness accounts from that day, immediately sank into the 40 feet of water next to the breakwater.
While they had escaped drowning with the ship, the five survivors of General Butler now risked freezing to death on the breakwater. A crowd of onlookers had formed on shore to watch the sad fate of the ship, but the vicious winter storm made the prospect of rescue almost impossible. All surely would have been doomed had it not been for the heroic actions of Burlington ship chandler, James Wakefield and his son, Jack. Upon witnessing the shipwreck, they commandeered a 14-foot lighthouse boat, rowed out to the breakwater in the storm, and rescued all five souls off the breakwater.
A Story Preserved by Time and Water
While the wreckage of General Butler was declared a total loss for Captain Montgomery, the shipwreck has been invaluable to future generations. It still rests where it sank, just off the breakwater, and today is a protected historic site.
Careful archaeological excavation of the ship has confirmed much of the dramatic story: a tiller bar was found chained to the steering mechanism and an axe rested on the bow where a crew member desperately cut through the storm anchor line so the captain could make a final attempt to maneuver around the breakwater.
The hull of the ship is still completely intact from stem to stern, 88 feet long and 14 feet wide. The five cargo hatches are evident and the original blocks of marble that Captain Montgomery was delivering to Burlington still rest in the hold. Artifacts recovered from the boat by archaeologists from Lake Champlain Maritime Museum also confirm that this boat very much was a family-owned vessel. A toy wooden boat, which resembles General Butler, tells us this boat was more than a tool but a part of their lives. A woman’s rubber overshoe is evidence that this boat was crewed by men and women.
The careful study of this boat has also given us a better understanding about the construction of sailing canal boats from Lake Champlain and share this unique boat with the public. Using details from General Butler and other canal boat shipwrecks, the Museum’s shipbuilders constructed a full-size model of this type of boat in 2004, the replica sailing canal boat Lois McClure. Today the public can visit Lois McClure in Port Byron, NY at the Canal Society of New York State’s Heritage Park. Using photogrammetric data, in 2021, the Museum published a fully digitized 3D model of General Butler, which is free for the public to explore online.
Because of the archaeological significance of this shipwreck, it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and a part of the Lake Champlain Underwater Historic Preserves. These official designations offer certain protections from the federal government and allow us to steward this site, share the captivating story with present future generations of the Champlain Valley, make the archaeological site available to the public for research, and open the site for the diving community to visit for free. Artifacts from General Butler are on display in our new exhibit Underwater Archaeology: Diving into the Stories of People and Canal Boats on Lake Champlain.