Steamboats of The Upper Columbia and Kootenay Rivers - Beginning of Steam Navigation

Beginning of Steam Navigation

In 1886, Frank P. Armstrong assembled a steamboat from miscellaneous planks and timbers that were lying around at an old sawmill. The result was the Duchess, launched in 1886 at Golden. Two early passengers wrote that her appearance was "somewhat decrepit" and Armstrong himself later agreed that she was "a pretty crude steamboat."

In 1886 an "uprising" among the First Nations was occurring far down the Rocky Mountain Trench along the Kootenay River. A detachment of the North-West Mounted Police, under Major (later General) Samuel Benfield Steele (1848–1919), was sent to Golden with orders to proceed to the Kootenay to quell the so-called uprising. Steele decided to hire Armstrong and the Duchess to transport his troopers. This proved to be a mistake, as once the expedition's horse fodder, ammunition, officers' uniforms, and other supplies were loaded on board, Duchess capsized and sank. After this setback, Steele decided to hire the only other steam vessel on the upper Columbia, the Clive.

Clive which like Duchess was assembled from various cast-off and second-hand components, was an even worse vessel. Once Steele had loaded his trooper's equipment on Clive, that vessel sank as well. Steele and his troop ended up riding the 150 miles (240 km) south to Galbraith's Landing. This took about a month. When they arrived, the troopers set up a standard military encampment which later became the town of Fort Steele. By this time, the "uprising" was over.