Around 2 a.m., three of the overloaded steamboat's boilers suddenly exploded. The Sultana erupted into a floating inferno. Hundreds died instantly in the blast. Survivors clung to wooden debris and the carcasses of charred horses bobbing in the flood-swollen Mississippi. Those unable to swim — which were most of the passengers — were forced to make split-second decisions between burning or drowning. For days afterward, rescuers plucked bodies from trees near the blast zone and pulled them from the river as far south as Vicksburg, Miss., some 200 miles away.
Historians believe that more than 1,800 of the paddle-wheeler's passengers perished in what still remains the greatest maritime disaster in American history. And as the 150th anniversary of the tragedy arrives, expect to hear the same thing you have heard about the Sultana for the last 150 years — nothing. Unlike the sinking of the Titanic, which claimed 300 fewer lives, the Sultana disaster never spawned any Hollywood blockbusters, theme park-style attractions, souvenir plate collections, or breathless anniversary commemorations.
Although they did not perish in battle, the soldiers aboard the Sultana paid for their service with their lives, and that sacrifice deserves to be remembered just as it is at Gettysburg and Antietam. The corrupt quartermaster and captain who overcrowded the steamboat in order to line their pockets also serve as a cautionary tale about the destructive power of greed, but unfortunately the failure to heed the Sultana's lessons echoes today in the spate of deadly shipwrecks involving crammed vessels carrying migrants across the Mediterranean Sea.
What's more, as the Sultana demonstrates, when we respond to tragedy with the reflexive mantra of "We will never forget," it's not always true. So why do some historical figures and episodes become the subjects of weighty historical tomes while others barely garner footnotes? A closer look at the Sultana, Titanic, and some local history reveals eight lessons as to why certain people and events are stuck in our collective memory and others are swept into the dustbin of history.
Timing is everything
The ‘story’ part of ‘hi-story’
Location, location, location
Pop culture crossover
Warren's martyrdom at the Battle of Bunker Hill cemented his fame in early American Republic, while patriot Paul Revere was a virtual unknown. "Leading up to the Civil War, Paul Revere was known only to some people who lived in his old neighborhood," says historian Sam Forman, author of "Dr. Joseph Warren: The Boston Tea Party, Bunker Hill, and the Birth of American Liberty.'' Then, 40 years after his death, Revere received the PR boost of a lifetime when Henry Wadsworth Longfellow penned his famous — and historically challenged — poem about the Boston silversmith's midnight ride. Perhaps because he simply had an easier name to rhyme than fellow rider William Dawes, Revere subsequently became familiar to generations of American schoolchildren. Although Warren dispatched Revere on his mission, he was written out of Longfellow's poem — and out of American memory.
Leave a paper trail
Pilgrimage sites trump naming rights
Don’t be a downer
We typecast heroes
"To get a story re-remembered, you need a constituency," Raphael says. He points to those who have pushed history textbooks in recent years to present fuller portraits of previously underrepresented groups such as African-Americans, Native Americans, and women.
Raphael's 2002 book, "The First American Revolution: Before Lexington and Concord," has prompted one local constituency to rescue a forgotten episode from its past — the "Worcester Revolution of 1774." On Sept. 6, 1774, in response to the crown's suspension of self-rule in the wake of the Boston Tea Party, more than 4,500 militiamen flooded Worcester and forced the British-appointed magistrates to resign. Seven months before Lexington and Concord, Worcester's patriot rebels effectively rendered themselves independent in a political act that was repeated again and again throughout Massachusetts in 1774.
What Raphael has called "the most successful and enduring popular uprising in the nation's history" was highlighted by early American historians but began to be overshadowed by Lexington and Concord by the time Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about "the shot heard round the world" in 1837. Raphael's re-telling of the story resonated with residents and community organizations in Worcester County who last year staged the first-ever reenactment and commemoration of the Worcester Revolution of 1774 and will do so again this fall. "It has mushroomed and become this huge source of local pride," Raphael says.
After being knocked off his pedestal in the Civil War era, Joseph Warren is also experiencing a historical revival after more than a century of obscurity. In addition to Forman's 2011 biography, Warren prominently featured in Nathaniel Philbrick's 2013 bestseller, "Bunker Hill." Pop culture latched onto the dashing doctor earlier this year as one of the main characters in the History Channel's "Sons of Liberty" miniseries.
Political constituencies have played a hand in Warren's historical reawakening, Forman says. "Warren is one of the favorite patriots of the Tea Party, but even those not as politically charged see Washington's political leaders failing us with perpetual gridlock, so there is a romantic attachment to the Founders' aspirational views of what America is and could be," he says. "Warren's aspirational views of America are stirring, and I think some people are getting attracted to that."
So perhaps there is some solace for the lost souls of the Sultana. But which constituency will speak for them? Who will honor their memory and fulfill our promise to "never forget"?
Christopher Klein is the author of "Strong Boy: The Life and Times of John L. Sullivan, America's First Sports Hero." Follow him on Twitter @historyauthor.
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