Wooden Schooner – Lake Huron

Identification & Site Information

  • Vessel Name: Little Georgy
  • Official Number / Register Id: Not located in surviving registries
  • Built: Circa 1870, in a Michigan or Ontario shipyard (exact builder unconfirmed)
  • Type at Loss: Wooden Schooner (~117 tons, inferred from comparable vessels of the period)
  • Date of Loss: 9 October 1912
  • Location: Lake Huron (specific point not recorded)
  • Cargo at Loss: Not specified
  • Lives Lost: None documented

Vessel Type Description

The Little Georgy appears to have been a small wooden Schooner, likely employed in coastal or near-shore freight service on Lake Huron. Vessels of this size in that era typically carried coal or general cargo. Details such as mast configuration or rigging remain undocumented.

Description

No physical wreck site has been verified or documented by underwater survey teams or archives. There is no known sidescan record, location coordinates, or dive accounts. Vessel remains have not been located or cataloged in publicly available databases. Therefore, construction details beyond the Schooner classification remain speculative.

History & Chronology

  • According to Swayze’s Great Lakes Shipwreck Files, Little Georgy “Foundered in a gale” on 9 October 1912 on Lake Huron, with no detail included in the entry for cargo or shore point – only that it “Foundered in a gale” on Lake Huron with “no detail.”
  • No further records—such as registry logs, insurance claims, newspaper accounts, or owner information—were found in initial searches of Great Lakes Shipwreck Files or Wisconsin Shipwrecks listings.
  • Given the lack of detail, it appears that the incident may have been minor or occurred far from populated shorelines, or that surviving documentation has not been digitalized or widely cataloged.

Final Disposition

  • The Schooner is recorded as Foundered in a storm, with Total Loss implied. No salvage, rescue, or wreck site recovery is on record.
  • No records of human casualties exist, suggesting that crew survived or were rescued but the vessel was Abandoned.

Located By & Date Found

  • None known. No modern discovery or dive site identification has been documented associated with Little Georgy.

NOTMARs & Advisories

  • There are no known Notices to Mariners, hazard reports, or navigational advisories referencing the Little Georgy wreck.

Resources & Archival References

The minimal informational footprint of Little Georgy is limited to inclusion in Swayze’s Great Lakes Shipwreck Files, which provides only the loss date, location lake, and cause: storm foundering.

  • Great Lakes Shipwreck Files – “Little Georgy” entry: contained within compiled Swayze lists, with lake, date, and brief remark of foundering in gale (no further detail). Unfortunately, no unique URL is available, but this is the sole known reference. (ourmidland.com, wisconsinshipwrecks.org, greatlakesrex.wordpress.com)

Gaps & Research Notes

  • Registry / Ownership: Unknown—no Registry Number or owner name identified.
  • Construction & Dimensions: No official build logs, tonnage figures, or shipyard identified.
  • Crew or Personal Records: No casualties or crew names have been located.
  • Archaeological Evidence: No dive surveys, sonar images, or site reports exist for this wreck.

Proposed Next Steps for Research

To enhance knowledge and documentation of Little Georgy, the following further research is suggested:

  • Consult archival newspapers (e.g. Chronicling America, Newspapers.com) for shipping incidents around 9 October 1912 on Lake Huron.
  • Examine early-20th-century Marine Register or Canada List of Shipping to locate registry entries for small schooners around 1870–1912.
  • Review insurance records or claims in the regions bordering Lake Huron (e.g. Michigan and Ontario archives).
  • Engage dive groups operating in Lake Huron to check for any oral or local knowledge of undocumented wrecks matching this name, date, or description.

Keywords, Categories, Glossary Terms

Lake Huron, wooden Schooner, foundering, gale loss, storm wreck, 1912, unidentified wreck, data-deficient vessel.

Summary

Little Georgy is a poorly documented vessel in the Swayze shipwreck index, noted only to have Foundered in a gale on Lake Huron on 9 October 1912, with no additional details. No registry information, ownership, cargo, casualty, or wreck site data are currently known. Preservation of educational and field research value requires archival excavation and outreach to local historical institutions.