Captain Warren E. Morris

A long and varied career has been the lot of Captain Morris, who has now sailed on the Great Lakes for nearly forty years. He was born near Erie, Penn., September 29, 1849, and is a son of Capt. Isaac T. and Sarah C. (Cook) Morris, natives of Herkimer, N.Y. and Orange, Vt., respectively. The father was a sailor until 1895, then engaged in the vessel brokerage business for a time, and later became connected with the Chicago Board of Trade.

As a boy, Warren E. Morris went with his father on the schooner Ethan Allen for one season, and in the spring of 1860 was again with him on the bark S.B. Pomeroy, in which the father owned a one-fourth interest. He remained on the Pomeroy until 1865, when in February of that year he enlisted in the 193rd O.V.I., serving with that command until the close of the war. After being mustered out at Camp Chase, Ohio, in August of that year, he went to Cleveland and began sailing. Making his way to Buffalo on the propeller Arctic, Captain Morris again joined the Pomeroy and laid her up in the fall. In the spring of 1866 he went on the bark Naomi with Capt. James Carpenter, remaining with that vessel until October 1868. On March 12 of that year, he had married Miss Elizabeth A. Shafer, and lived in Cleveland. The same fall he went as second mate with Capt. Charles Deott on the schooner William Case. The following year he was second mate on the Colonel Cook with Capt. Richard Neville until September, when he went as first mate on the schooner Consuelo, leaving the latter vessel in October to ship on the schooner Sea Bird with Capt. Loftus Gray. The Sea Bird went to Rock Falls for a load of lumber, was caught in a northeast wind while at her dock, broke her lines, and drifted on the beach. The next year Captain Morris was first mate on the bark Kate Darley, with Capt. James Grant, and later in the season was mate on the bark Margaret R. Goff. He sailed the Pomeroy the next two seasons, the schooner Eliza Gerlach one season, and in the spring of 1874 again took charge of the Pomeroy, sailing her one season. He was then captain of the schooner A. H. Moss three seasons, the bark Kate Darley two seasons, and the schooner R. B. Hayes eight seasons. He sailed the steamer Germanic during the season of 1888, and the next year purchased an interest in the Horace A. Tuttle, which he sailed for two seasons. He was captain of the George Presley in 1891, the steamer Joseph Fay in 1892, the E. B. Hale in 1893, and the Maurice B. Grover from 1894 up to the present time.

Captain and Mrs. Morris have one daughter, Claudia A., who is the wife of T.C. Collings, a dealer in bicycles and saddles, and is interested in the manufacture of horseless carriages.

Return to Home Port

Volume I

This version of Volume II is based, with permission, on the work of the great volunteers at the Marine Captains Biographies site. To them goes the credit for reorganizing the content into some coherent order. The biographies in the original volume are in essentially random order.

Some of the transcription work was also done by Brendon Baillod, who maintains an excellent guide to Great Lakes Shipwreck Research.