Finding Great Lake sunken shipwrecks ???

 Guess what I found on a web site with a searchable first letter name  of Ships.

It includes when vessel was built..  It also has the date of the sinking and various other information. As well as which of the Great Lakes it sunk in.

 Good Luck on your search !!! 

 http://www.boatnerd.com/swayze/shipwreck/  

Lake Erie Ship Wrecks

In seeking out one of my ancestors origins there was a ship wreck in Lake Erie spoke of. 

Finding out such information based in fact has been very difficult.  

There are several Lake Erie shipwreck web sites to use:  

http://greatlakeshistory.homestead.com/

http://www.alcheminc.com/shipwrck.html

http://www.shipwreckworld.com

http://www.ohioshipwrecks.org/Shipwrecks.php

http://www.lakeerieimprovement.org/shipwrecks/

http://seagrant.psu.edu/education/stear/SHIPWRECKS%20Lost.pdf

Great Lakes Shipwrecks

greatlakeshistory.homestead.com/files/m.htm

http://www.northernmaritimeresearch.com/famous-gls.html

Enjoy the information & Good Luck!
You have to check them out and see if you can gain information for yourself.

"Good Intent" Sunk in Lake Erie 1806?

Lake Erie Ship Wrecks, Ship Wrecks around the world.  Disclaimer:  I may make some of you Angry, please read all the way through and respect me for my opinion & family lore.  Because of the family lore I cannot accept that All Captains did or why would they go down with their ship?

Lose of a Loved one is never happy. I am most sincerely sorry for those affected by such tragic happenings.

I know we all hear of the stories of a ship wreck/sinking and the Captain going down with the Ship!

I say No Way!!! Not all of these Captains went down with their Vessel.

How can I say this???

In my Family History there is the Family Lore that such a thing occurred.  That I have a Male Ancestor that was Captain of a Lake Erie vessel.  That it sank.  He however did not go down with his ship.  Instead he and the crew went in the Life Boat.  They made their way to foreign shore.  

My ancestor never returned to his parents family.  The family always believed him dead. That he was sunk with his vessel.  I know nothing of his crew.  Was he really a crew member and not the Captain.  Since being a captain makes for better Family Lore.


 My ancestor made a new life for himself. 

 He married had children.  Died in his new adopted home.

So when men come out of nowhere in your family history.  You might want to start looking for Ship Wrecks and if they were crew or Captain of a ship.

New way to search out a Male Ancestor.  I say Good Luck on finding such info though. Cause not only can I not find crew list I can barely find out anything on the ship wreck.  Its widely reported where it went down but who was on these vessels???

There are legal obligations to the Captain.  So if he is reported lost with his crew that eliminates his  Legal Obligation. 

 Hence in my family lore, it states that his father who was alive at the time was security for the Lake going ship.  I have been searching out  newspapers stating that a man was ruined since he was security to the Sinking Ship.  Nothing yet 

Am I just banging my head for nothing I will not know till I turn over every stone.

From Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Captain_goes_down_with_the_ship about *Ship Captain going down with his Vessel:

History

The concept is closely related to another protocol from the nineteenth century, "women and children first." Both reflect the Victorian ideal of chivalry in which the upper classes were expected to emulate a morality tied to sacred honor, service, and respect for the disadvantaged. The actions of the captain and men during the sinking of HMS Birkenhead in 1852 prompted praise from many due to the sacrifice of the men who saved the women and children by evacuating them first. Rudyard Kipling's poem "Soldier an' Sailor Too" and Samuel Smiles' Self-Help both highlighted the valour of the men who stood at attention and played in the band as their ship was sinking.

In practice

The idiom literally means that a captain will be the last person to leave a ship alive prior to its sinking or utter destruction, and if unable to evacuate his crew and passengers, the captain will not evacuate himself. It is therefore related to the idiom, "the last one off is a rotten egg," which is the opposite sentiment. In maritime law the responsibility of the ship's master for his ship is paramount no matter what its condition, so abandoning a ship has legal consequences, including the nature of salvage rights. So even if a captain abandons his ship in distress, he is generally responsible for it in his absence and would be compelled to return to the ship when danger to the vessel has relented. If a naval captain evacuates a vessel in wartime, it may be considered a capital offense like desertion, mutiny, or sedition unless he subsequently destroys the ship or permits it to sink.
  

Lake Erie Ship Wrecks

  Seeking out my ancestors ship wreck in Lake Erie is not easy at all.  Not only are ship wrecks shrouded in mystery but so are Maritime records.  Where does one even begin to know where to search?

 

I have been trying discover all possible leads on The ship "Good Intent".  I find more then one vessel with the same name:

Here are some things I have discovered:

Newspaper clipping web site Maritime History Of The Great Lakes., 

 NAVIGATION OF LAKE ERIE.---The GOOD INTENT, of 35 tons, was built by Capt. Lee in 1799 and navigated the lake till 1806, when she ran on Point Abino and was lost, together with her cargo and crew.
      Monroe Evening News
      February 1, 1834


The Schooner GOOD INTENT of 35 tons, was built in 1810, and lost on Point Appineau in 1816.
      Report on Buffalo Harbor
      Commercial Advertiser & Journal, Buffalo
      Wednesday, June 9, 1841 pp 2 col. 3, 4 & 5

   ___________________        _________________________     ------------------------

See my dilema

Then in books/Web addresses I have found by searching the Internet:

 ------------------------------------------------------ 1187
GOOD INTENT
Other names : none
Official no. : none
Type at loss : schooner, wood
Build info : 180?, Mill Creek, Lake Erie
Specs : (30 t.)
Date of loss : 1825
Place of loss : 2 mi NE of Dunkirk, NY
Lake : Erie
Type of loss : (storm)
Loss of life : ?
Carrying : ?
Detail : Wrecked, no detail available.
Another vessel named GOOD INTENT (maybe same vessel) was reported lost in 1805 or 6 on Point Abino with loss of all hands. She was built by Capt. Wm Lee in 1799 or 1800.
Sources: sol,h,hgl,mpl

Nothing conclusive.  Do you think they could ever say who the Captain was for the trip when it Sunk???

----------------------------------

Erie County, Pennsylvania

History of Erie County, Pennsylvania 1884

by Samuel P. Bates, 

Submitted by Gaylene Kerr Banister

---

Chapter XVI - Lake Navigation

The first vessel to sail the waters of Lake Erie was built by Robert Cavalier de la Salle, an adventurous Frenchman, on the Niagara River, six miles above the Falls, in the year 1677. She was named the Griffin, and was of sixty tons burthen. La Salle navigated Lakes Erie, Huron and Michigan, to Green Bay, in the present State of Wisconsin, where, with a picked number of men, he left the vessel and marched overland to the Mississippi. The remainder of the crew attempted to return to the Niagara, and are supposed to have been lost in a storm, as neither vessel nor men were heard from afterward. Nearly a hundred years later the French built another sailing vessel with which they undertook to navigate the lake. This second venture was as unsuccessful as the first, the vessel having foundered and forty-nine of her crew having been drowned. No record is to be found of any other sailing vessel on the lake until 1766, when the British, who had secured possession of both shores, built and launched four. They were of light burthen, and were chiefly used for carrying troops and army supplies. All transportation of a commercial character, and all of the very limited passenger business was carried on by batteaux until after the close of the Revolutionary war. They kept close to the shore, were mainly propelled by paddles or oars, and if a sail was used it was simply a blanket fastened to a pole, to take advantage of favorable winds. The earliest American sailing vessel on the lake was a small boat, owned and run by Capt. William Lee, in which he carried passengers and light articles of freight between Buffalo and Erie. She was constructed to use oars in going against the wind, and had no crew, the passengers being obliged to work for their passage. The first sailing vessel built on the south shore of Lake Erie was the sloop Washington, of thirty tons, under the superintendence of Eliphalet Beebe, at the mouth of Four Mile Creek, for the Pennsylvania Population Company, owners of the bulk of the land in the Triangle. She was launched in September, 1798, was employed for some twelve years in the service of the company, and was removed on rollers across the Niagara Peninsula, to Lake Ontario in 1810, where she was lost. The first vessel launched at Erie was built at the mouth of Mill Creek, in 1799, Capt. Lee and Rufus S. Reed being her principal owners. She was named the Good Intent and sunk at Point Albino in 1806, with all on board. The Harlequin, built at Erie in 1800, by Mr. Beebe, was also lost the first season, with her entire crew. About 1801, the Wilkinson, of sixty-five tons, was owned at Erie. She was commanded by Capt. Daniel Dobbins, in 1805. Another early Erie vessel was the schooner Mary, of 100 tons, built by Thomas Wilson, 1805.

Now to just find out where the ship was built???