good ol' days journalism

Many, many years ago - don't bother asking how many - I did a story about testing of a weapon and the research drew me to a story in history that sent me to the Library of Congress and a gem that I copied and kept for the pure hysterics of how it was written. I have since forgotten the reason for the original story, but will share this from Thursday, Feb. 29, 1844, that begins with this headline:

MOST AWFUL AND MOST LAMENTABLE CATASTROPHE!

Followed by this subhead:

INSTANTANEOUS DEATH, BY THE BURSTING OF ONE OF THE LARGE GUNS ON BOARD THE UNITED STATES SHIP PRINCETON, OF SECRETARY UPSHUR, SECRETARY GILMER, COMMODORE KENNON, & VIRGIL MAXCY, Esq.

Then the story. But, first, the fact that the president of the United States was also on board the USS Princeton is not mentioned until deep into the second graph and then he isn't named.
Here then is the text of most of the story as it was printed with its italics and caps:

In the whole course of our lives it has never fallen to our lot to announce to our readers a more shocking calamity --- shocking in all its circumstances and concomitants - than that which occurred on board the United States Ship Princeton, yesterday afternoon, whilst under way, in the river Potomac, fourteen or fifteen miles below this city.

Yesterday was a day appointed, by the courtesy and hospitality of Capt.
STOCKTON, Commander of the Princeton, for receiving as visitors to his fine ship (lying off Alexandria) a great number of guests, with their families, liberally and numerously invited to spend the day on board. The day was most favorable, and the company was large and brilliant, of both sexes; not less probably in number than four hundred, among who were the President of the United States, the Heads of the several Departments, and their families. At a proper hour, after the arrival of the expected guests, the vessel got under way and proceeded down the river, to some distance below Fort Washington. During the passage down, one of the large guns on board (carrying a ball of 225 pounds) was fired more than once, exhibiting the great power and capacity of that formidable weapon of war. The Ladies had partaken of a sumptuous repast; the gentlemen had succeeded them at the table, and some of them had left it; the vessel was on her return up the river, opposite to the fort, where Capt. STOCKTON consented to fire another shot from the same gun, around and near which, to observe its effects, many persons had gathered, though by no means so many as on similar discharges in the morning, the ladies who then thronged the deck being on this fatal occasion almost all between decks, and out of reach of harm.

The gun was fired. The explosion was followed, before the smoke cleared away so as to observe its effect, by shrieks of wo which announced a dire calamity. The gun had burst, at a point three or four feet from the breech, and scattered death and desolation around. Mr. Upshur, Secretary of State, Mr.
Gilmer, so recently placed at the head of the Navy, Commodore Kennon, one of its gallant officers... (it named a number of others) were among the slain.
Besides these, seventeen seamen were wounded, several of them badly and probably mortally.


The story continues until this:

The scene upon the deck may more easily be imagined than described. Nor can the imagination picture to itself the half of its horrors. Wives widowed in an instant by the murderous blast! Daughters smitten with the heart-rending sight of their father's lifeless corpse! The wailings of agonized females!
The piteous grief of the unhurt but heart-stricken spectators! The wounded seamen borne down below! The silent tears and quivering lips of their brave and honest comrades, who tried in vain to subdue or to conceal their feelings! What words can adequately depict a scene like this?


No word in this story about the fate of the president - still unnamed! Oh, the president? John Tyler, who married Julia Gardiner, daughter of David Gardiner, who was killed aboard the Princeton.