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Lydia Roosevelt gives birth aboard the New Orleans. They make preparations to take the boat over the Falls of the Ohio.
The excitement of people on shore believing that Roosevelt's steamboat, the New Orleans was the British coming to attack passed. However, more excitement was yet to come. An Additional Passenger ArrivesTwo days later, after anchoring in Louisville, Kentucky, a new form of excitement arose, this time aboard ship when tiny but vocally lusty Henry Latrobe Roosevelt was born aboard the New Orleans. Although this could have be a life or death situation, all went well. But now there remained an anxious trial by water that all aboard well knew could result in life or death. The Falls of the OhioOn the Ohio River, between Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and the river's junction with the Mississippi River, nature had placed a great impediment to river travel. The Falls of the Ohio, located at a large bend in the Ohio River, took in its sacrificial due at least a dozen boats a year. The past financial losses were staggering. The rapids, just below the falls, presented to the brave who would make an attempt to traverse it, eddies, islands, and hull-ripping rocks along a two-and-a-half mile passage. The Roosevelts intended to navigate the New Orleans over this treacherous passage. Before such an undertaking could be made the Roosevelts had to wait for the autumn swell, that is, for the river to rise, bringing its level as far upward to the top of the falls as possible. Finally, on December 8, it was deemed they could start. This time even Lydia's husband begged her not to make the passage aboard, but to take the children and travel by buggy around the peril. Lydia relented only as far as the children were concerned, sending them ashore with two maids. Lydia Roosevelt stayed with the boat. Standing in the stern with her Newfoundland dog, Lydia could see the rapids racing along at fourteen miles per hour. The boat would have to beat that speed or else the current would take it over, sending it wherever, and crashing into whatever it pleased. Nearing the Falls of the Ohio: Birth Aboard the Boat, continues with Over the Falls of the Ohio: The Shaking Quaking Earth . Previous: Fulton Designs Steamboat: Largest and Grandest on the River .
The copyright of the article Nearing the Falls of the Ohio in American History is owned by Mary Trotter Kion. Permission to republish Nearing the Falls of the Ohio in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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