Businessman captain engineer inventor
Moses Rogers was born in 1779 in New London, Connecticut. He was the eldest of seven children of Amos and Sarah (Phillips) Rogers. The family, which included among its members many mariners and fishermen, traced its American ancestry to James Rogers who was living in New London as early as 1660.
Moses learned to manage a sailboat in boyhood and by 1800 was in command of a sailing vessel on Long Island Sound.
He became greatly interested in steamboat experiments, especially those of John Stevens, in some of which he may have had a part.
It is frequently stated that he commanded Fulton's Clermont, but no original record has come to light which proves this assertion.
In any event, he could have commanded it for only a few trips in the fall of 1807 before he was selected by John and Robert L. Stevens to command their steamer, the Phoenix.
He continued as captain while the Phoenix plied between Philadelphia and Bordentown, New Jersey, the first steamer on the Delaware and the western link of a stagecoach-steamboat route from New York to Philadelphia.
In 1815 he commanded the Eagle on the first voyage made by steamer from New York to Baltimore, and later he became part owner of a bi-weekly line between these ports. He also took out patents in 1814 and 1815 for a horse-power ferry-boat which was adopted on several ferry-lines in New York harbor and evidently used in other places.
In 1818, seeing the future Savannah under construction in New York, Rogers persuaded Scarborough & Isaacs, a Savannah shipping firm, to purchase it, fit it with engines, and experiment in the use of steam on the ocean. Rogers superintended the building of the engines, paddle wheels, and accompanying machinery. The paddle wheels he constructed so that they could be quickly taken from the water and placed on board in case it was desired to use only sail, an innovation dictated by his experience on the maiden trip of the Phoenix when the paddle wheels were badly damaged by storm. After having made the journey from New York to Savannah, Rogers left the latter city on May 22, 1819, for Liverpool. With him on this voyage, as navigator, went Stevens Rogers (February 13, 1789 - November 30, 1882), also of New London, designer of the Savannah's rigging, who had been associated with him in the Phoenix and the Eagle and later became his brother-in-law.
This first voyage of a steamship across the Atlantic can scarcely be called the first crossing of the ocean by steam, since the passage consumed twenty-nine days and eleven hours, of which time sails were used for twenty-six days and three hours. The voyage was continued to Stockholm and St. Petersburg, where the Savannah was visited by many of the nobility, including the Prince of Sweden and the Emperor of Russia.
On the stormy voyage home sails were used until the ship was in the Savannah River.
The owners were forced to sell the Savannah, and Rogers formed new connections with a company about to operate steamers on the Great Peedee River between Georgetown and Cheraw, South Carolina.
He superintended the construction of the Peedee in 1820, and while in command of it the following year was stricken with malarial fever. He died and was buried in Georgetown. Though his Savannah undertaking did not bear immediate fruit in promoting transatlantic steamship service, Rogers deserves credit for mechanical ingenuity and courageous seamanship.
On February 18, 1804, he married Adelia Smith, by whom he had three sons and two daughters.
On February 18, 1804, he married Adelia Smith, by whom he had three sons and two daughters.
With him on this voyage, as navigator, went Stevens Rogers (Feb. 13, 1789 - Nov. 30, 1882), also of New London, designer of the Savannah's rigging, who had been associated with him in the Phoenix and the Eagle and later became his brother-in-law.
