The Eliza Battle Disaster, May 1, 1858

"The Eliza Battle was called the Aworkhorse of the river, and the AQueen of the Tombigbee. It was the most majestic and palatial boat that ever plied the river. This three hundred and fifteen ton steamer, note for her luxury and entertainment, had the misfortune to catch fire and sink on May the first, eighteen fifty-eight, carrying many from this county to a watery grave. As one walks through the cemeteries in the county, in east Mississippi and west Alabama, crumbling stones stand as a reminder of this tragic event. There were few homes along the river that were not touched by the tragedy.

The story of the Eliza Battle dates back to prior to, the War Between the States. Built in eighteen fifty-two, it was ready for the spring run in eighteen fifty-eight. It was only at this stage of the river that such a large boat could travel up and down the river, and could go as far as Cotton Gin Port. The Eliza Battle had only planned to go as far as Vienna, but finding the stream of water so high, it decided it would make the trip on up to Aberdeen. Its trip had been widely publicized, and the boat not only had hired a good string band but had recently installed a calliope, which is more like an electric piano, that we could call today, or an organ, and it could be heard for great distances up and down the river. This calliope had caused quite a stir when it was first introduced on any Alabama river, and some had declared that the loud blasting was vulgar, but this was soon accepted. And when the Eliza Battle advertised that it had a calliope, everyone wanted to go. It was a great attraction.

It was also Mardi Gras season, and many had been making plans to go down to Mobile. And as the majestic Eliza Battle went upstream, all along the river people went down to the riverbank to listen to the calliope, and make arrangements for passage back down the river when it started back to Mobile.

After loading its cargo in Aberdeen, it began to steam southward, taking on passengers and cotton at Columbus, Pickensville, Fairfield, Memphis, Vienna, and many of the plantation landings along the way. The cotton was stacked high on the lower deck. Every room available was being put to use for passengers, and the music played, the bar was busy, the click of the poker chips could be heard out over the voices of the dancers, the loud music and gay laughter filled the air, and echoed into the night. The Eliza Battle carried a cargo of approximately two thousand bales of cotton, and at least two hundred passengers. Among these passengers was a bride and a groom, and a jilted lover, about whom a beautiful
Story had been written.

On adjoining plantations along the river, near Warsaw, lived the Sanders family and the Taylor family. Mary Taylor and Phillip Sanders had been childhood sweethearts. They planned to marry, and Mary had accepted Phillip's ring. But now Fate stepped in, for Mary was sent back to South Carolina to attend college and get better educated. She returned home during the Christmas holidays, and told her family that she had fallen in love with someone in South Carolina, and she planned to marry him in the spring when she came home. She returned Phillip Sanders' ring and began making elaborate plans at the beautiful Taylor mansion was made ready for the wedding to be in April. Seamstresses and milliners were kept busy as they sewed for the pretty trousseau. The wedding gown was sent up by boat from New Orleans.

Then the day of the wedding arrived, and with it came unusually bad weather for early spring. Soon the lawn at the Taylor was filled with buggies and surreys, as friends and relatives from miles around came to witness the ceremony. Among the guests was Phillip Sanders, the jilted lover. With a heavy heart he watched the one he loved become the wife of another. Following the wedding a beautiful reception was given, more like a buffet dinner, with every, duh, delicacy imaginable filling the tables there. The guests wined, dined, and danced until late into the night, when the whistle of the Eliza Battle was heard upstream. Then the bride, the groom, and Phillip Sanders, along with others, prepared to board the boat for a trip to Mardi Gras down in Mobile. The cotton was loaded, the passengers aboard, and young Captain Frank Stone ordered the gangplank raised. Daniel Epes was the pilot on this boat, and he barked out his orders as the great side wheels sloshed backwards into the muddy river. Now the wheels stopped, and they moved forward, and the boat started going downstream. Daniel Epes was a good pilot, but he became worried. He knew the river like the back of his hand, but the rising water had erased many of the landmarks he knew. He thought of the Choctaw name for the river. They called it the Itombe Igobee, a word taken from a creek that flowed into the river, and meant Abox-maker's creek. The Indians had named the creek for an old Indian who had lived there and made coffins. From the name the white man named the river Tombigbee, and some called it Tombeckbee. Epes worried that the boat was becoming overloaded, but Captain Stone assured him that the Eliza Battle was stout enough to carry the load, that she weighed three hundred and twenty-five tons. The boat was named for a member of the same family as the Battle House in Mobile was named for. In the darkness of the night, sleet mixed with rain slanted across the deck, and soon the trees, the bushes, and the snags in the swollen stream stood like statues in the night as they became weighted down with a thick coat of ice.

What a strange contrast as Epes looked out on the river, sleet in dangerous black waters; in the ballroom below there was music, laughter, dancing, and not even one hint of worry or apprehension. The passengers kept slipping the Negro musicians a little nip, and they were soon in the groove, or way out, as one might say in this generation. Later someone remembered that they played a new song that night, and the new song was AWay Down Upon the Suwanee River. The Eliza Battle met another steamer going upstream, and the passengers crowed the decks and cheered as they passed in the night. Then back to the ballroom the gay crowd went, and John Powell, the bartender, was kept busy. The band began playing such snatchy tunes as AAlabama Girl, Won't You Come Out Tonight, and Dance by the Light of the Moon, old tunes that some people like to sing today.

But soon, the cry of Afire!! was heard, and Captain Stone rushed to the ballroom and calmly announced that the boat was on fire, but not to panic. He ordered the boat to be driven into the bank, but the tiller rope had burned through, and it was out of control, and spun and turned and drifted as it bumped against the snags. There were no lifeboats made available. Passengers began pushing the bales of cotton into the water, hoping to ride them to shore, but there was no shore because water stretched out hundreds of yards from the channel; it was at a time when the Tombigbee was at its highest. As the fire burned more and more passengers jumped into the freezing waters. Some made it to trees, and climbed into the branches, but they soon became frozen, and dropped one by one back into the water in the dark night. During this panic, Phillip Sanders kept his eye on Mary and her husband. He watched as they held hands and jumped into the icy river. And now Phillip jumped into the swirling water, and in the light of the burning ship he saw Mary Taylor when she came back up. She looked around for her husband and screamed, but he was gone. Phillip swam to Mary and reached out just as she was sinking. He swam to a nearby tree, pulled her to the low-lying branches; she was unconscious. But he held her in his arms and managed to hold on. Seeing that he might become unconscious and fall, he removed his belt and fastened the lifeless Mary to the tree. His screams for help were heard, and someone in a skiff, angled against the current, and reached them. They were carried to safety, and the warm fires that had been built on the riverbank. The glare from the burning ship alarmed people downstream, and planters with their slaves rushed to the scene to help. Survivors were picked from trees and fires were built, and, but the rain and sleet continued to fall. Many survivors were moved to the Rebecca Coleman Pettigrew plantation, where the big house, the barn, and all the other outhouses became emergency hospitals. Huge washpots of hot soup were ladled up to fight the chill, and at least seventy-five survivors were cared for there. For a week Mrs. Pettigrew's family and servants cared for these people. Many families came to comfort the living and bury their dead. Men in rowboats gathered bodies for days afterward, and as they found them, lodged in brushes, on shore when the water receded. Oh, what a terriblest thing this was to happen on such a night as a wedding night. Every boat that went upstream carried either survivors or bodies to be buried, and at the Pettigrew house Phillip Sanders nursed Mary Taylor. Many times she cried out in the night for her lost husband, as she hovered between life and death. But every cry was like a dagger, piercing the heart of Phillip. But he remained at her bedside, giving her nourishment and praying for her life.

Mary lived and went back upriver to her plantation. She soon lost her parents and became mistress of this large plantation. Again Phillip Sanders asked her to marry him, and again she refused. But soon the War Between the States started, and Phillip was among the first to volunteer. He became a colonel in the Confederate army, and was wounded in the battle of Vicksburg. Hoping he could be moved home, his mother with a slave drove a wagon, filled with hay, to Vicksburg. She found Phillip not only wounded but depressed, and having lost the will to live. After a few days, with the Yankee boats shelling the city, and the Confederates still holding on, a carriage drew up before the hospital where Phillip was, and Mary Taylor climbed down. She rushed into the hospital, found Phillip's room and went to his bedside. She still loved him, she said, and wanted to marry him. And now he was ready to be moved home. This time, it was Mary who sat by the bedside, and she nursed him back to health. They were married and lived out their days on the banks of the Tombigbee, not too far from the sunken hulk of the Eliza Battle."