The Steamship "New Orleans" set off on a trip down the Mississippi shortly after the New Madrid earthquake ravaged the river.
Ravaging floods are not the only disasters to occur along the Mississippi River. Centered in the boot heel region of Missouri along the Mississippi River is the New Madrid Fault line. Between December 16, 1811 and late April of 1812 the fault produced roughly 2000 tremors, three of which have been estimated to be nearly or greater than 8.0 on the modern day Richter Scale.
Those tremors were felt as far away as eastern Canada, New York, New Orleans, Washington, D. C., and the western parts of the Missouri River, a tributary of the Mississippi.
More than one and a half million square miles of the earth’s surface were affected. Towns were destroyed; Reelfoot Lake, an eighteen mile long and five mile wide lake was created; and at three places the Mississippi River flowed backwards.
Ironically only days earlier Chief Tecumseh who tried to create a Native American alliance to drive whites from North America prophesied that he would stomp his feet and bring down all houses of white settlers. Immediately after the first earth quake northern and southern Native Americans united and fought with the British in the Great Lakes region to defeat U. S. forces. Ultimately, the U. S. forces were successful and Tecumseh was killed in battle.
Two events occurred on December 15, 1811 that were also prophetic in American history. Two nephews of Thomas Jefferson murdered one of their slaves, chopped the body to pieces, and threw them into a raging fire along the frontier of the eastern side of the Mississippi. Later the body parts were discovered as a result of the earthquake.
Further up the rivers at Pittsburg, the steamboat New Orleans began its maiden voyage down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to the port of New Orleans. Piloted by inventor Nicholas Roosevelt, a member of the prominent Roosevelt family of New York, the steamboat New Orleans successfully made the trip to New Orleans in fourteen days. Aboard was only one passenger, the wife of Nicholas Roosevelt. The steamboat was still on the Ohio River when the first tremors occurred. While surviving the frightening earthquake, the New Orleans later sank in the Mississippi River.
These and other fascinating tales can be found in When the Mississippi Ran Backwards: Empire, Intrigue, Murder, and the New Madrid Earthquake by Jay Feldman. It’s one of those books that is hard to put down.