Steamboat collision on the Ohio River kills forty-two people
At about eight o'clock in the evening, the steamboats Nathaniel Holmes, from Pittsburgh to St Louis, and the David Gibson, from New Orleans to Cincinnati collided near Aurora, Indiana on the Ohio River. The Pittsburgh vessel sank immediately and the Gibson while trying to make the shore. Estimates at the time were that forty-two people were drowned. (By John Osborne)
Source Citation
"The Gibson and Holmes Disaster on the Ohio River," New York Times, April 2, 1859, p. 4.