THE GREENSBOROUGH PATRIOT, (now spelled Greensboro) North Carolina, May 4, 1850 

* "Belle of the West" steamboat explosion 
* Ohio River near Warsaw, Kentucky

Inside has: "Terrible Steamboat Disaster & Loss of Life" bound from Cincinnati to St. Louis, with California emigrants. Also: "Gold Hunters" and: "Gold and Graves" which are on the Calif. gold rush.
Four pages, very nice condition.

background: On April 22, 1850, the steamboat Belle of the West was consumed by a catastrophic fire on the Ohio River near Warsaw, Kentucky, resulting in one of the deadliest steamboat disasters of its time. The fire is believed to have started in the hold—possibly from a candle or lantern—and rapidly engulfed the vessel, which was carrying around 200 passengers, including many emigrant families bound for the West. As the flames spread with terrifying speed, the crew managed to steer the boat toward shore and lower gangplanks, but the blaze moved too quickly for many to escape. Chaos ensued, with passengers leaping into the river and families separated in the panic. Despite heroic efforts, including some by local residents and crew, an estimated 50 to over 100 people perished—many of them unregistered children and German Moravian emigrants. The tragedy, misattributed by some early reports to a boiler explosion, highlighted the dangers of steamboat travel in the mid-19th century, where lax safety standards and overcapacity often turned minor accidents into mass-casualty events.