AH-WR-0624

Boone

Wooden Steam Cargo Ship · United States · Lost Present at Mallows Bay by at least 1929 · Chesapeake Bay

A wartime wooden steamship launched in the 1918 'Tidal Wave,' now a slowly dissolving hulk in the Mallows Bay ghost fleet.

Become Captain of Record See Shipwreck on Map

Artistic recreation based on recorded historical documents. See the documented evidence.

Interpretive Reconstruction, drawn to convey the vessel's era, type and general form. See the documented evidence.

The Vessel and Her Loss

Boone was built in 1918 by the Dantzler Shipbuilding and Drydock Company for the United States Shipping Board's Emergency Fleet program. Launched during the celebrated Fourth of July 1918 'Tidal Wave' of nationwide ship launchings, she never saw the wartime service she was built for before the Armistice made the wooden fleet obsolete. In the 1920s she was towed to the Potomac River and sold for scrap. Her hull has rested at Mallows Bay ever since, now part of one of the largest collections of shipwrecks in the Western Hemisphere.

Vessel

Built: 1918
Registry: Maryland archaeological site 18CH519
Builder: Dantzler Shipbuilding and Drydock Company
Yard: Moss Point, Mississippi
Material: Wood
Length: 281.8 ft
Beam: 45.2 ft
Tonnage: 3500
Propulsion: Steam, single screw
Owners: United States Shipping Board

Loss

Date: Present at Mallows Bay by at least 1929
Cause: Intentional sinking
Location: Mallows Bay, Potomac River
Water: Potomac River, Chesapeake Bay watershed
Voyage: Not established
Cargo: Not established
Aboard: Not established
Lives lost: Not established
Master: Not established

The Wreck Today

Depth: Not established
Condition: Resting on its keel, bow toward shore, remains over 258 feet long; ferrous fastenings, propeller shaft tunnel and four bulkheads recorded.
Orientation: Bow toward shore
Discovered: 1929 (documented at site)
Protection: Within Mallows Bay-Potomac River National Marine Sanctuary and the Mallows Bay-Widewater National Register Historic District