On the morning of June 15, 1904, the steamboat General Slocum caught fire in the East River with approximately 1,300 people on board, including many children, and in the course of 20 minutes an estimated 1,021 people died. Prior to September 11, 2001, it had the highest death toll of any disaster in New York City history. The triple-decker wooden side paddler, built in 1891 and named after Henry Warner Slocum, a Union Army general who later represented the City of Brooklyn in Congress, had been chartered by Saint Mark's Evangelical Lutheran Church for its 17th annual excursion to the Locust Grove Picnic Ground on Eaton's Neck, Long Island. The church, located on Manhattan's Lower East Side, served primarily German immigrants. After passengers boarded at the Third Street dock and the ship headed up the East River at about 9:40 a.m., people danced on deck as a band played and passersby waved from shore. Near Astoria, onlookers waved frantically because smoke was billowing from the portholes, but passengers at first assumed the smell came from the kitchen, and although a few crewmen knew about the fire, they did not alert the captain. Except for the captain and chief engineer, the 35-man crew lacked experience and had never conducted a fire drill. No alarm was sounded, and many passengers jumped from the boat while it passed through Hell Gate, choosing New York's most turbulent channel over remaining on board. Most of the lifejackets proved worthless because their cork buoyancy material had turned to dust over time, and the life preservers absorbed water and pulled wearers underwater. Hundreds of bodies floated in the ship's wake and washed up on Astoria's shoreline. As the ship passed Randall's Island, the smoke below deck gave way to massive flames, and only then did the captain receive word of the blaze. He beached the General Slocum on North Brother Island. As the ship raced to shallow water, the crew tried to fight the blaze, but the fire hoses burst under pressure. A dozen tugs, two fireboats, a police boat, and more than a hundred other vessels joined the rescue effort, and some rescue ships caught fire themselves while trying to get people off the vessel. In 15 minutes the Slocum had burned to the waterline. President Theodore Roosevelt appointed a Commission of Investigation, which found that multiple causal factors led to the disaster and identified organizational and leadership failings within the United States government's Steamboat Inspection Service, which had inspected the vessel five weeks earlier. Inspectors had certified the 13-year-old lifebelts as up-to-date and of good quality, but they had not examined the fire pump and hoses and had not realized that all six lifeboats were stuck to the ship by a thick coat of paint. In 1906 the city dedicated a fountain in Tompkins Square Park in remembrance of those who died, and a ceremony is held there every year to honor the victims.
