Second Canal

In 1837, the Legislature of Upper Canada had already converted the sizeable debt amassed by The Welland Canal Company from loan to stock. In 1841 with the union of Upper and Lower Canada the government decided to purchased the Canal and to enlarge it to 9 foot navigation and to complete the St. Lawrence Canals, which were necessary to avoid the various rapids between Lake Ontario and Montreal.

The word of canal improvement and the possibility of employment spread quickly. Immigrants, mostly Irish, came in droves looking for security and stability. Soon there was a surplus of labour as canal work progressed slowly bringing disappoinment and unrest, as families began to struggle to survive. Troops and a mounted police force had to be stationed along the canal route to keep the peace as best as possible.

Work did continue and phase one, begun in 1842, of the Second Welland Canal soon opened to navigation.

The forty wooden locks were, by increasing the lifts, reduced to twenty seven locks, which were built of cut stone, each 150 feet long, 26 feet wide with 9 feet depth on the sills. The Port Maitland, Dunnville branch was built at this time, and this route, or Second Canal, was opened to traffic in 1845. The section of the Canal between the Feeder Junction (Welland) and Port Colborns was then enlarged and opened for navigation in 1850. This Canal remained in operation after the Third Canal was completed, being used for power purposes, and all its locks are still in existences In 1853 the navigable depth was increased to 10 feet by raising the banks and the walls of the locks, but it was not until I881 that the Canal was fed from Lake Erie at Port Colborne. The original cost of construction, including the first enlargement, or the total expenditure prior to Confederation (1st July 1867) was $7,638,239.83. That portion of the Second or Old Canal, as it is now called, between Allanburg and Port Dalhousie, ceased to be used for navigation about 1890.

THE THIRD CANAL

Twenty two years after Upper and Lower Canada had completed the nine foot navigation between Lake Erie and Montreal, the Dominion Government took up the question of Inland Navigation, and the Commission of l870 recommended a uniform scale of navigation for the St. Lawrence route and the Welland Canal with Locks 270 feet long, 45 feet wide and 12 feet of water on the sills. This depth of water was later increased to 14 feet.

This Canal left Lake Ontario at Port Dalhousie and climbed the escarpment East of the Second Canal to Allanburg. From the latter place to Port Colborne it followed the route of the Second Canal. Its locks were built of cut stone, with lifts of 12 to 14 feet. It was carried over the Chippawa Creek at Welland, by a cut stone aqueduct.

This Third Canal, 26 miles long, was opened to traffic for 14 foot navigation in 1887, and the St. Lawrence Canals in 1901.

When the Northwestern Steamship Company of Chicago placed a fleet of four steamers (2,000 tons capacity) in commission between Chicago and Europe. On more than one occasion the boats were loaded to slightly over the 14 feet limit.

The Third Canal up to the 31st of March, 1929, cost for capital construction and permanent improvements $33,344,039.86 and $13,929,287.44 for repairs and maintenance. These amounts include the cost and maintenance of the Grain Elevator at Port Colborne but not of the Port Colborne Breakwaters. The St. Lawrence and Welland Canals, between Lake Erie and Montreal, cost Canada up to 31st March, 1929, $82,864,401.08 on capital construction and permanent improvements and $33,338,908.30 for repairs and maintenance. These amounts do not include the aids to navigation between Port Colborne and Montreal, nor the expenditure to date on the Welland Ship Canal and the Montreal Quebec Channel. In 1901 the total tonnage passing through the Third Canal was only about 620,000 tons.

George Butt Studios

In 1914, it had increased to 3,860,000 tons, indicating that since the completion of the 14 foot navigation system in 1901, the St. Lawrence Route had gradually drawn more heavily, year by year, upon the Great Lakes Atlantic seaboard trade.

As a result of the Great War taking many lake vessels into service on the high seas, traffic through the Third Canal fell off from 3,860,000 tons in 1914 to 2,200,000 tons in 1918-19, but since this latter time traffic grew rapidly year by year with to a maximum annual tonnage record of 7,439,617 tons in 1928. This vast increase indicated it was only a matter of time before the present canal would surpass its capacity.

The short sighted policy of 1870 left the Welland Canal as much out of date in 1887 as it was when the improvements were begun in 1873, whereas a moderate increase in the length of the locks alone would have enabled a large part of the fleet of 1901 to descend to Montreal, instead of being confined to the Upper Lakes. These Canals, locks and river channels are entirely inadequate for use by the Great Lakes today, and can now be considered as of little more than barge size.

The improvement of the Welland and St. Lawrence Canals to such dimensions as would accommodate ships of at least 26 foot draft, had been contemplated for many years. During the past quarter of a century, exhaustive surveys have been made to determine the feasibility and cost of such a waterway and another has been carried out recently by the International Joint Commission. Following the opening of the St. Lawrence Route in 1901 for vessels drawing 14 feet of water, the Canadian Government began improvements to the Port Colborne entrance of the Welland Canal, these consisting of deepening the harbour to 22 feet, constructing a million bushel modern concrete elevator (completed in 1908) and building large breakwaters.

The execution of these works and public agitation for the building of a Canadian deep waterway via the Welland Canal and St. Lawrence route versus the Georgian Bay and Ottawa route finally led to exhaustive surveys being made for a ship canal across the Niagara Peninsula and the adoption of the Ten Mile Creek location for the canal and the inception of the work in 1913.

After the surveys, it was decide the new Ship Canal, would follow the valley of the Ten Mile Creek, between its mouth (Port Weller on Lake Ontario) about three miles East of Port Dalhousie, and Thorold, crossed the Third Canal below Lock 11, where the water level of both Canals was at Elevation 382 feet above mean sea level.

The new Ship Canal again crossed the Third Canal below Lock 25 south of Thorold, where the water levels of the two again coincided at elevation 568 feet. Between Thorold and Allanburg a new cut has been made for the purpose of straightening the alignment between these two points and on to Port colborne. And so ends the use of Port Dalhousie as the Lake Ontario terminus for the Welland Canal. But that was not to be the end of Port's marine importance.

To sailing vessels, this is without doubt the most important Port on the Lake. Every vessel bound to or from the Upper Lakes is obliged to pass through the Welland Canal, and consequently to enter or leave this Port. It has the advantage of being easily made in any weather, and with any wind.
It is furnished with an excellent Lighthouse, built on the end of the east pier, containing a revolving bright light.
There are no shoals or dangers of any kind to be feared in approaching Port Dalhousie; the only caution requisite for a sailor, is to guard against standing inside the range of the West Pier in working in, as between it and the remains of an old wharf there are two rocks and a shoal (all below water) on which he would put his vessel ashore. The piers run N. and S. to the bend, thence to the lock N. E. and S. W.; they are about 3,000 feet long, 200 feet apart, with an average depth of 12 feet water. The basin or pond to the east of the steam-boat landing is too shoal to be of any service, and it reflects no little discredit upon the Commissioners for allowing so much valuable space to be lost, when at a comparatively small cost the capacity of this important port could be so greatly improved.It has been told me as a fact, that between three and four miles N. or N. by W. of the lighthouse, the compass dips, and for a short time becomes so disturbed as not to be relied upon. I have not been able to verify this, but shall feel much obliged to any of the Captains frequenting this Port, communicating to me the result of their experience.

This paragraph was taken from a contemporary book of the time by Edward M. Hodder, M.D. for more reading you can access Mr. Hodder's book at http://www.hhpl.on.ca/GreatLakes/documents/Hodder/default.asp?ID=s028