[Merry]

I did find this....


Liverpool Mercury 24 September 1850 (Tuesday)

On Friday night, a terrific gale sprang up on lake Michigan, which continued during Saturday, causing great damage to the shipping. It was accompanied by heavy rain, which nearly flooded the whole country of northern Illinois and Wisconsin.

Several other papers have the date of the storm as Friday 6th Sept 1850. One says there were fatalities, but that seems to be on Lake Erie where the storm was on Sunday 8th Sept.

The London Evening Standard 21 September 1850 has more detail:

The brig, Flora is ashore a mile south of Chicago
Schooners George C Crew and George Watson ashore near Calumet
Brig C Blein ashore near Michigan city
Schooners N C Walton and General Thornton ashore near Calumet, the latter bottom up, the crew presumed perished
Brig Mohegan ashore
Schooner Charles Howard sunk
Brig T W Maurice capsized but crew saved
John C Spencer lumber vessel ashore, all hands lost
Schooner James McKay ashore at New Buffalo
Steamer J D Morton towed in two unnamed vessels

Then in the same paragraph the article switches to ships lost at Milwaukie - isn't that in Oregon? The way the piece is written you would think it was the same area as the rest of the list and continues referring to 'the lake' at the end of the paragraph.

In any case, there seems to have been a huge amount of damage. I wonder if my David Maynard had switched to a different ship and that's why there is no mention of SS Canada as he was employed on a different vessel?