Lake Michigan shipwreck of steamship discovered after 150 years

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Lac La Belle at Marquette Michigan in 1866 from an original steroview in the Baillord Collection

FOX 2 - After sinking in Lake Michigan over 150 years ago, the Lac La Belle passenger steamship had been missing - until now.

Illinois-based shipwreck hunter and scuba diver Paul Ehorn announced the discovery of the ship on the site shipwreckworld.com.

The backstory:

The steamer sank on Oct. 14, 1872 during a storm, with eight people dying when their lifeboat capsized, according to Wisconsinshipwrecks.org

It was bound from Milwaukee to Grand Haven with 53 crew and passengers carrying 19,000 bushels of barley, 1,200 barrels of flour, 50 barrels of pork and 25 barrels of whiskey.

"The steamer had left Milwaukee at nine o'clock in the evening and began leaking when approximately twenty-five miles off Racine," the site says. "About midnight after considerable leaking, during a gale out of the north, she shipped a heavy sea which extinguished the fires in the boilers. The Lac La Belle was left to the mercy of the waves."

Lac La Belle on Sonar by Paul Ehorn

Other shipwreck hunters had searched for the Lac La Belle, but the size of the search grid and the location of it was not well known, making it difficult.

Dig deeper:

The first breakthrough came in 2022, when maritime historian Ross Richardson found a new historical clue that drastically narrowed the grid down, shipwreckworld.com said.

Ehorn and partner Bruce Bittner set out using Klein side scan sonar for a search when two hours in on a second pass, they came across the object. After viewing it at higher resolution and spotting it - with much of the 217-foot ship preserved intact.

"It was a moment of real jubilation," Ehorn told Shipwreckworld.com. "We knew we had done it."

Lac La Belle by Paul Ehorn

Due to the distance from shore, it prevented a closer examination for nearly two years until recruiting a couple divers to film the shipwreck.

"Although her superstructure is blown off, you can see all of her wooden framing and some of her cargo is visible," Ehorn said.

The Lac La Belle was built in 1864 at Cleveland, Ohio, where it was used for runs from Cleveland to Lake Superior before an unfortunate collision sank her in 25 feet of water in the St. Clair River in 1866.

The boat was raised until 1869 and was completely reconditioned before being purchased by Milwaukee’s Englemann Transportation Company which used it in the passenger trade to Grand Haven, Michigan.

At 5 a.m. on Oct. 14, the captain ordered the lifeboats lowered and the passengers and crew watched as she went down stern first.

Lac La Belle's hogging arches by Paul Ehorn

Ehorn’s interest in Great Lakes shipwrecks began when he became a certified scuba diver in 1960 at the age of 15.

He started searching for shipwrecks in 1965, discovering several of Great Lakes shipwrecks including the automobile carrier Senator, in 2005.

Ehorn’s plans to create a 3D photogrammetry model that will record the condition and layout of the wreck in detail before he releases the location.

The bow of the Lac La Belle by Paul Ehorn.

He will present the discovery at the 2026 Ghost Ships Festival at the Inn on Maritime Bay in Manitowoc, Wisconsin on March 7th, 2026.

As part of the presentation, he will show underwater video of the site and tell the story of the discovery. Visit www.ghostshipsfestival.com for more information.