Quote Originally Posted by Servius1234 View Post
If a 1,719 ton steam boat meant for river travel could carry 2,400 people, I'm pretty sure an Indianman (1,100-1,400 ton) of ~70% the size could have carried 10% of the human cargo. Keep in mind that the Sultana was also transporting soldiers, normal passengers, and cargo.
Armies have a vast supply train and huge numbers of non-combat personnel. A river steamboat also doesn't have a large compliment of sailors to keep it going and the entire upper deck taken up by those labour intensive sails, and a riverbourne passenger vessel wastes not a single square centimeter on defensive armament. The oceangoing troop carrier is also pretty much its own world in the sense that it isn't at all times within friendly territory for resupply like a riverboat will be, it has to be much more liberal in its provisioning. Finally, the Sultana, with but the most cursory research, was so vastly overcrowded even the decks were completely stuffed. It was a floating sardine can.

Carrying a ready to fight army in open seas is simply in no way comparible to just stuffing as many people as possible in a steam riverboat.....especially considering that the official explanation for the Sultana disaster was because it had been so heavily overcrowded.