Sultana Disaster Museum

A Museum At Marion, Arkansas, Telling The Explosion And Sinking Of The Steamboat Sultana On 27 April 1865 The Worst Maritime Disaster In United States History, With A Death Toll Generally Estimated Above 1,100 And Possibly Far Higher. · Marion, Arkansas

On 27 April 1865 the steamboat Sultana, licensed for fewer than four hundred people and carrying somewhere near two thousand, blew her boilers on the Mississippi north of Memphis and burned to the waterline. Most of those aboard were Union prisoners of war released from Andersonville and Cahaba and going home. More than eleven hundred died - more than the Titanic - and almost nobody has heard of it, because the country was three weeks past Lincoln's assassination and eighteen days past the end of the war. The river has since moved, and the wreck is believed to lie under an Arkansas soybean field a couple of miles from the present channel. The museum in Marion tells it plainly.

104 Washington Street, Marion, Arkansas, 72364, United States

Open on daytime hours several days a week, typically Tuesday to Saturday, with reduced days out of season and closure on major holidays; hours have varied as the museum has grown and moved. There is a modest admission charge. The annual commemoration falls around 27 April. Confirm opening days before travelling, because this is a small institution in a small town.

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