Steamboats of The Upper Columbia and Kootenay Rivers - Later Operations On The Upper Columbia River

Later Operations On The Upper Columbia River

While Armstrong was on the Kootenay and the Klondike mining booms, a few interlopers had appeared on the upper Columbia. In 1899, H.E. Forster a wealthy politician and occasional steamboat captain, brought Selkirk by rail from Shuswap Lake to Golden, where he launched her but used her as a yacht and not, at least initially, as commercial vessel. Also, Captain Alexander Blakely bought the little sidewheeler Pert and operated her on the river. In 1899 Duchess became involved in the Stolen Church Affair, in which a dispute arose over ownership of a church in Donald, with one party packing up the entire church and moving it to Golden, and disputant party removing the bell from the church while en route to Golden on board Duchess. (The church itself was later moved to Windermere, without the bell.)

In 1902 Duchess was dismantled. In 1903 Captain Armstrong built a new steamer, Ptarmigan, using the engines from Duchess which by then were over 60 years old. In 1911, the same engines were installed in the newly-built steamer Nowitka. With the construction of railroads, and economic dislocation caused by Canada's participation in the Great War, steamboat activity tapered off starting about 1915. Steamboat men from the route themselves went to war. Captain Armstrong supervised British river transport in the Middle East, on the Nile and Tigris river. Captain Blakey's son John Blakely (1889–1963), who had trained under his father and Captain Armstrong, went to Europe and was one of only six survivors when his ship was torpedoed in the English Channel.