The North Jetty’s Turbulent Seas Laid the SS Corona to Rest in 1907

Wreckage of the SS Corona, off the Humboldt Bay Bar, March 1, 1907. [Photo colorized by Carl Young]

The 966-ton steamer was just nineteen years old when it was wrecked on March 1, 1907, on the north jetty of Humboldt Bay. The wreckage laid upon the massive boulders of the north jetty, rotting where she ran aground, her wreckage visible until the early 1970s.

According to an article on the front page of The San Francisco Call on March 2, 1907, Captain Boyd attempted to bring the passenger ship into the bay around 10 a.m. Met with billowing seas and waves in quick succession, the ship came ashore. The article stated, “Her stern, lifted high on the crest of a terrific billow, came down upon the submerged rocks of the north jetty which ground through the steel plates and allowed the water to rush into her hold and at the same time catching her in a grip from which escape was hopeless.”

Article from The San Francisco Call, March 2, 1907

Passenger counts vary from article to article, from 96 to 154 crew and passengers stranded on grounded ship awaiting rescue. Passengers that were told to remain in their cabins during the bar-crossing poured out of their cabins after the ship ran aground. Panic ensued, though eventually, the group was able to be calmed as they awaited rescue.

A boat was lowered with three crew and three passengers but was immediately capsized in the turbulent surf. Quartermaster Gun was drowned, the singular fatality in the shipwreck. The other five were able to make it to shore.

Rescue efforts took most of the day with Captain Boyd being the last to depart the ship just before 6 p.m.

The SS Corona was built in 1888 in Philadelphia with an estimated worth of $100,000. She was no match for Humboldt Bay, her final resting ground.

The San Francisco Call wrote the following about Humboldt Bay:

The Eureka run is one of the hardest on the coast, an account of the constantly changing nature of the bar across the entrance to the Humboldt River. The bar was breaking yesterday and a little misunderstanding would account for the mishap to the steamer. The north jetty, over which the seas carried the Corona, is a substantial affair built of huge bowlders. The smallest of the bowlders used in constructing the face of the jetty weighs nine tons, and the fact that many of these 18,000-pound rocks have been swept away at times by waves attests to the violence of the seas at this particular place.

To read more, visit San Francisco Call, Mar 2, 1907, p. 1 | NewspaperArchive®

Note: Carl Young brings back old photos to life by colorizing them. He often posts his enlivened photos on Humboldt County, California in pictures, old and new. Recently he shared this one with us.