ARKANSAS HISTORICAL QUARTERLY; Volume 3, Spring 1944
CLEARING THE CHANNEL----THE SNAGBOAT
IN ARKANSAS*
BY DIANA SHERWOOD
Little Rock
- One hundred years ago the rivers of Arkansas Territory were being cleared of thousands of obstructions which made steamboating hazardous. It is a thrilling story of how Henry Miller Shreve came in with snagboats---his own invention---and removed the great rafts from Arkansas's rivers.
At that time the development of Arkansas Territory depended almost entirely on river transportation, which naturally made the settlers river conscious. In 1830 their representatives in Congress, Ambrose Sevier and Edward Cross, implored that body for appropriations for reclaiming the rivers and that streams, but the President refused their request for $15,000. Planters and settlers along the waterways---notably Red River---spent thousands of dollars trying to make them navigable.
CLEARING THE CHANNEL
- Henry Shreve was a Quaker. His father had been colonel of one of Washington's
regiments. Henry was reared on a farm at Brownsville, Pennsylvania, with
the banks of the Monogahela River for his playground. While a youngster
he propelled a keelboat loaded with merchandise to St. Louis---a matter
of only 1,000 miles down the Ohio and 200 miles up the Mississippi---and
returned with a load of furs which he sold in Pittsburgh at a surprisingly
fancy price. Henry disposed of much merchandise and furs in subsequent
trips and by the time he was 25 had acquired $11,000 in cash and still
greater wealth in experience as river pilot and navigator.
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- *Reprinted with permission from the Arkansas Gazette (Sunday Magazine), September 2, 1934. The
- editors of the Arkansas Historical Quarterly feel that the increasing
interest in Henry Shreve makes republication of this article on Shreve's
work in Arkansas very appropriate.
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