KEY STATS:
Ship Type: Dreging Barge (ex paddlewheeler)
Lifespan: Built 1897 Sunk 1985
Length: Length 160 ft
Depths: 110 ft
Location: Near Pigeon Island, Lake Ontario, Canada
GPS: N44.01.00 W76.36.23
Built in 1897 this iron hulled steamer named the White star, was built for the Oakville Navigation company for a passenger route of Oakville, Toronto, bronte and Hamilton area. While being refitted during the summer of 1903 the White star burned and was declared a total loss.
The insurance company refused to settle and she was abandoned until 1905 when she was bought by the St. Lawrence and Ontario Navigation Company and rebuilt for service in Cornwall as a day boat.
Again in 1926 she was gutted by fire in Hamilton, then sold to John Solwards who rebuilt her as a coal barge for 13 years before being abandoned yet again.
In 1949 here remains were purchased by the Simpson Sand Company and rebuilt into a sand sucker and renamed the SM Douglas.
She was again abandoned in 1973 in Brockville and is being reported as a dive site in the Brockville Narrows but in 1977 she was moved to Kingston to be used as a breakwall.
In 1985 the SM Douglas was finally towed out of Kingston harbour and scuttled. She was reloctated in 1997 by Spencer Shoniker, Rick Neilson and Willy Dempsey.
Kingstonunderwater is the personal property of Tom Rutledge and all pictures are by Tom Rutledge, occasionally Photos from Dan Mackay, James Pate, Anne Campbell, Barry Mutch, Kevin Ripley and Sean Felts may get posted as they would more then likely use my camera on a dive with me or have access to their own equipment in most of those cases I would be the subject as well.
Kingston Underwater supports the Great Lakes Underwater Explorer Club (GLUE) out of Northern Tech Diver - Divers that practice and preach wreck conservation like Save Ontario Shipwrecks.
