PS Lady Elgin - Maritime Rulings

Maritime Rulings

Following the wreck, the ship's owner, Gurdon Saltonstall Hubbard, received a $12,000 payment from his insurance company, but neither Hubbard nor the insurance company accepted abandonment of the ship. The Captain of the Augusta, Darius Malott, was arrested and tried in Chicago, but found not guilty of navigational negligence. A coroner's jury declared the second-mate, Mr. Budge of the Augusta, to be incompetent, and the crew of the Augusta to be of principal blame. However, steamboat historian Peter Charlebois noted that after the investigation, Captain Malott of the Augusta and the crew and owners of the Lady Elgin were absolved of any blame. He reported:

The judgement was based on a law that not only gave sail the right of way over steam, but did not require sailing vessels to carry running lights. Apparently the Augusta had sighted the passenger steamer twenty minutes before the collision but in the rain had misjudged the distance between them. Four years after the disaster, in 1864, a new ruling was made requiring sailing vessels to carry running lights. Since there were still nearly 1,900 ships under sail by 1870 the regulations were long overdue.