David W. Lenox and the Tugboat Adriatic

David W. Lenox
1822–1911

After spending much of his early life as a seafarer, David W. Lenox (1822–1911) and his brother William M. Lenox engaged in the steam-powered transport of cargo and timber rafts on the Delaware River between Trenton and Philadelphia. This proved a lucrative enterprise but the timber lands to the north were eventually depleted while the railroads took much of the cargo traffic.

The story may have ended there but for two newspaper articles: one in the Daily State Gazette on December 21, 1909, and the other days after his death in the Daily True American on February 23, 1911.

At the start of the Civil War, Lenox chartered his steam-powered tugboat Adriatic to the U.S. Government. The tug was sent to Fort Monroe, Virginia, where it remained for the duration of the war, and it was from this vantage point that he was thrice an eyewitness to history.