A long-lost piece of Great Lakes history has been rediscovered. In May 2025, wreck hunter David Trotter and his team at the Undersea Research Associates located the SS James Carruthers, a massive Canadian freighter that vanished over a century ago during the Great Storm of 1913.
Once considered the largest missing shipwreck on Lake Huron, the Carruthers now lies upside down, about 190 feet deep, some 20 miles east of Harbor Beach.
The 550-foot vessel disappeared with all 22 crew members aboard during the infamous “White Hurricane,” which roared through the Great Lakes with 90 mph winds and 35-foot seas in November 1913. The ship was brand-new, having been launched in May the same year, and was last seen in the northern end of Lake Huron off Detour, on its way to Midland, Ontario.
“According to Trotter, they immediately knew they had found the Carruthers when her giant hull crawled across the screen, since no vessel anywhere near that size is still missing on Lake Huron,” says Brendon Baillod’s Facebook post, a friend of Trotter, announcing the discovery. “Interestingly, the Carruthers is not where many wreckhunters, myself included, expected her to be. She lies in U.S. waters well off Michigan’s thumb, and like many of the other ships lost in the great storm, she turned turtle and lies upside-down on the bottom.”
With this find, Trotter adds another major wreck to his list, which already includes more than 100 shipwrecks mapped in Lake Huron since the early 1970s.
trotter photo: Brendon baillod facebook
