Myths

Capt. Herman Schuenemann was (primarily) a Lake Captain.

Of course, Capt. Schuenemann owned a number of vessels at one time or another, and had served as the master of several of these vessels at one time or another. However, it would be a misunderstanding to say the Herman Schuenemann was primarily a lake captain. The historical record shows that, in fact, he was more of a business man who invested in vessels, just as he invested in retail businesses and real estate in an effort to make a profit. It is a matter of fact, that on a number of the Christmas tree voyages in the later years, including his last voyage, Herman Schuenemann had hired someone else to be the captain of the vessel that he used. On other occasions he hired a vessel to pick up the trees for him and bring them to Chicago. Such was the case when he charterd the schooners M. Capron and Mystic. When the Rouse Simmons went down on November 23, 1912, Capt. Charles Nelson, not Capt. Herman Schuenemann was the master of the vessel. Of course, who was at the wheel, and whose opinion counted most in making decisions about when to sail, etc., cannot be determined.

Capt. Herman Schuenemann's wife Barbara became the captain of subsequent Christmas tree schooners after Herman's death.

This is certainly one of the most beguiling and popular myths about the Schuenemanns and the Christmas tree ships. Soon after the loss of the Rouse Simmons several of the newspapers that were more free to print hype and rumor spread the story that Capt. Schuenemann's older daughter, Elsie, had vowed that she would sail a vessel to the Upper Peninsula and bring back a load of Christmas trees in time for Christmas. The possibility of such a voyage is unimaginable given such practicle matters as the weather, the expense, and the lateness of the season (the holiday was only two weeks away). The next year the Schuenemann women did sell trees from a vessel docked in the Chicago river, and many may have assumed that the trees arrived in the city on that vessel. The truth of the matter, however, was that the trees arrived on a train and were transferred to the boat in order to give people the experience of the Christmas Tree Ship that they were nostalgic for. Although the Schuenemann women carried on the business for years (into the 1930's), no direct confirmation of them owning or sailing a lake vessel for their own use in the business has ever been found.

The myth was perpetuated by articles such as the one to the right from the "Algoma Record Herald" of 1925 which states in part that "in 1914 [Mrs. Schuenemann] chartered the Fearless, and with he elsest daughter and a crew of ten went up to the snow-packed forests. She supervised the men, and the ten lumber-jacks who had worked so long for the captain, and she brought down the precious cargo. Mrs. Schuenemann has never missed a year with her Christmas tree Ship. Gray-haired men, some of themthe pillars of Chicago's business structure, now descend the rotting stairs, go aboard, and sit in the little cabin. They talk to the wrinkled woman with the calloused palms, and with Elsie, now married, of the forty years that have passed. ...The woods are thinning out now, and the good trees have to be carted for miles to the water's edge. And the sharp winds slash the face and hands more bitterly than they did when the "Mrs. Captain" was younger.

The Note in the Bottle

Of all the myths about Chicago's Christmas Tree Ship, perhaps the most long-lasting has been the story of the note in the bottle. On Friday, December 13, 1912, the Chicago American broke a story with the headline "LOST SHIP'S STORY TOLD IN BOTTLE."

"The message bore the signature of Herman Schuenemann, master of the Rouse Simmons," reported the newspaper. "It was picked up by a fisherman off Sheboygan, Wis. The letter, written on a torn sheet of paper, tells in graphic language the story of the last hours of the tree-laden schooner and her crew of eighteen men.

"It reads:

"Friday - Everybody good-by. I guess we are all through. Sea washed off our

deck load on Thursday. During the night the small boat was washed off. Leaking

badly. Engwald and Steve fell overboard Thursday. God help us.

HERMAN SCHUENEMANN

"Michael Kovlovik, a fisherman, returning from a trip on the lake, discovered a bottle bobbing on the surface of the water off Sheboygan. he ran his smack alongside the object and picked it up.

"The black bottle was sealed with a whittled stopper, cut evidently from a limb of a Christmas tree. He uncorked the bottle and found the penciled note, writeen in a faltering hand on a sheet of torn writing paper.

"On arrival at Sheboygan he at once turned it over to authorities. United States marine officials at Milwaukee, who were communicated with to-day, sent the news to Chicago."

The only other newspaper to carry the story of the note was the Chicago Daily Journal, one of the more sensationalistic papers of the day. It elaborated with the following dramatic scene:

"The note in the bottle was addressed to Elsie Schuenemann, daughter of Capt. Schuenemann.

"When the text of the note was read by Elsie Schuenemann at her home she screamed and fainted.

"When she was revived, she creid hysterically, 'Oh my God, my God! My poor father!'

"'When I see the original handwriting I can tell whether father wrote the message or not,' she said later.

"She then broke into a denunciation of the crew of the life-saving station at Kewanee [sic], Wis.

"'Father and his men could have been saved if the Kewanee [sic] life-savers had taken their boat out to search for him,' she said. 'I know they never opened the door of their boat house.'

"Miss Schuenemann is ill in bed. Her illness was brought on over worry for the safety of her father.

"Mrs. Schuenemann was not at home when the news was brought to Elsie. Early in the day she had gone to the dock at the Clark street bridge to sell Christmas trees and greens."

From there the Daily Journal goes on to paint a highly speculative picture of the sinking of the Rouse Simmons: "While the little schooner struggled and fought its way through the gale, the merciless pounding of the heavy seas opened the cracks in its side. The pumps were manned by men all fagged out with the work of self-preservation and the 'trick' at the wheel.... Then there was a cracking and a straining of ropes and the Christmas trees burden bearers of the symbols of joy shot over the side and into the bosom of the lake...." etc.

The note in the bottle was also reported in Manitowoc and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and, like the Chicago reports, the story was said to have originated in Sheboygan. But, in Sheboygan there was no knowledge of such a note ever being found. On the same day that the reports were circulating in Chicago the Sheboygan Press printed an article with the heading "NOTE FOUND IN BOTTLE?" It began by printing out two telegrams that were sent from the American to M. C. Weimer, a former newspaper man in Sheboygan, requesting that he send them a copy of the note found in a bottle. From there the Sheboygan Press went on to say: "The above telegrams were received here this morning and were later truned over to the Press at the request of the American, but nothing could be learned concerning the finding of a note."

One week later the Sheboygan Press still could offer no confirmation of a note from Captain Schuenemann. The following story appeared under the heading "SON WAS ON ROUSE SIMMONS."

"A letter was received this morning at the police department from Chicago requesting the letter which was supposed to have been found in a bottle off this port last week by fishermen which announced the fate of the Christmas tree ship, Rouse Simmons. No such letter was found here. The story originated in Chicago. The Chicago papers even printed the contents of the note and announced the name of the person who had found it, giving a name unknown among the fishermen here.

"The letter was written by Alfred B. Dautz, Chicago, at the request of Mrs. Bausewein, whose son Philip was a sailor on the ill-fated ship. The police department returned an answer saying that the report was false, no such letter having been found here."

In the week after the original report came out three other papers in Wisconsin repeated the news that the story of the note in the bottle was a fake. The Chicago papers, however, apparently never recanted.