This watercolour depicts the ship called the Chief Justice Robinson. It was built in 1842 as a wooden side-wheel steamboat by the Niagara Harbour and Dock Company and sailed the Toronto-Niagara River route. In August 1853, the local newspaper, The Niagara Mail, reported that the ship rescued Ben Hockley, a slave from Tennessee, after he was swept into Lake Ontario by the river’s current. He was found on a gate, which he used as a raft to cross the river from Lewiston to Niagara.