Tennessee Cove is an embayment with a sandy beach roughly 600 feet (180 m) long on the Pacific Ocean, between Pirates Cove to the north and Rodeo Cove to the south, in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area about 10 miles (16 km) north-west of San Francisco and 3.6 miles (5.8 km) south-west of Mill Valley, California. Tennessee Valley Creek starts from an elevation of around 1,000 feet (305 m) on the southern flank of Coyote Ridge and flows generally south and west to Tennessee Cove. The land was originally part of a Mexican land grant called Rancho Sausalito, which was given to William A. Richardson by Governor Juan Alvarado on February 11th 1838. The 19,571-acre (7,920 ha) rancho encompassed much of the Marin Peninsula and what was then known as Elk Valley for the thousands of tule elk that provided lard and hides for local rancheros. The small beach and cove were apparently unnamed until the American period, when they were called Indian Cove. The cove was renamed after the steamship Tennessee ran aground there in 1853.
Tennessee was a wooden side-wheel steamship built in 1848 for the New York and Savannah Steam Navigation Company by William H. Webb in New York. The ship displaced 1 thousand 2 hundred and 75 tonnes and was 2 hundred and 11 feet long, with a beam of 36 feet and a draft of 22 feet. The company operated steamers carrying passengers, high-value freight and cotton between Savannah, Georgia, and New York. In 1849 Tennessee was sold, modified to carry more passengers and sent to the Pacific to join the Pacific Mail Steamship Company‘s line of steamers connecting Panama City and San Francisco. The California Gold Rush attracted tens of thousands of fortune-seekers from around the world. Dozens of ships transported them from eastern American ports to the Isthmus of Panama at Chagres on the Atlantic coast, where they travelled up the Chagres River by canoe, then overland by mule to Panama City on the Pacific coast, before boarding another steamer for the voyage north to San Francisco. Tennessee made 29 voyages from Panama City to San Francisco carrying passengers, freight and mail, and returned with gold.
On March 6th 1853 Tennessee was steaming towards the Golden Gate in fog, commanded by Captain Edward Mellus, who was unaware of the outgoing tide’s strong current that swept Tennessee north past the bay entrance towards the Marin Peninsula. The ship’s lookout sighted breakers and Mellus ordered the engines reversed; however, large rocks blocked the ship and Mellus had no choice but to beach it. It was hoped the vessel could be pulled off, but heavy surf on March 8th broke the keel, ruptured the steam pipes and flooded the hull. The crew managed to salvage the mail, baggage and gold. By March 21st the remains of Tennessee had mostly disintegrated in the surf. Today, remnants of the ship can be seen during extremely low tides at the south end of the beach. Read more here and here. Explore more of Tennessee Cove and Golden Gate National Recreation Area here: