Steamboat Incident

The steamers Lady Pike and Mary Stephens started nearly together from Cincinnati on Monday evening for Louisville.  The Lady Pike was a few lengths ahead, and in this position reached the head of the bar at McCullum's ripple, a narrow and difficult channel.  At that point the Mary Stephens ran up on the lower side of the Lady Pike when Captain Fuller, of the latter boat, ordered Mr. Knox, the pilot at the wheel of the former, to stop his boat, as he was forcing him on a flatboat of produce that was directly in the channel ahead of him. 

The pilot of the Mary Stephens paid no attention to the order of the Captain of the Lady Pike, and the latter immediately withdrew a revolver and shot at him twice, and snapped his pistol three or four times at him, and then threw it overboard.  The engines of the Lady Pike were reversed at the time, and the Mary Stephens went ahead, and when about 200 yards in advance, Capt. Fuller sent a rifle ball after her, which like the other shots were ineffectual.

The flatboat was in great danger of being sunk, but luckily escaped.  The Captain of the Mary Stephens says he ordered his pilot to stop the boat, but when he saw the Lady Pike's engines stopped, he concluded to go ahead, to keep off the bar, and was some distance in advance when the last shot was fired. - Lou. Courier

 

from the Carroll County Times, November 5, 1851