Wilson G. Hunt was a steamboat that ran in the early days of steam navigation on Puget Sound and Sacramento, Fraser, and Columbia Rivers.

[1] The ship was named after a wealthy New York businessman who was a prominent cloth merchant and philanthropist founding the firm of Wilson G. Hunt & Co. in 1833.

[7][8] The Hunt had an old style "steeple type" steam engine with an enormous single cylinder of 36" bore by 108" inch stroke.

[10] The most unusual feature of the Wilson G. Hunt was the unusual steeple housing for her engine, which looked like an enormous slice of cheese: Between the wheels and rising high above the cabin was a tall steeple-like frame in which the piston rod rose and fell in guides and moved a pair of connecting rods or pittmans that turned the wheel.

This was extremely dangerous, as should the piston start pumping again, the bar could be flung out of the control of the men pushing it, killing them or breaking bones.

[11] Shortly after her completion word of the California Gold Rush reached New York and the Hunt was sent round the Horn to San Francisco.

[6] On arrival in San Francisco Hunt was immediately placed in the Sacramento River trade, and proceeded to make a fortune for her owners, clearing in a single year over $1,000,000.

Competition was fierce on the California rivers, and while "racing" as such was forbidden, steamboat captains were expected to "do their best" which in practice amounted to the same thing.

The resultant lawsult generated a clear picture what such a contest was like during the gold rush times in California: [The Hunt] was then about a quarter of a mile astern of the New World, and that the boat first arriving at Benicia got from twenty-five to fifty passengers.

[9] When news of the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush reached California, Hunt's owners sent her north to take advantage of the situation.

[16] Because there was a shortage of British vessels, the colonial government at Victoria had decided to license American steamers to move the resultant gold rush traffic up the river.

[7][16] Gold had been discovered in Idaho in the early 1860s, which led to the Hunt being bought in 1862[13] by the Oregon Steam Navigation Company and taken to the Columbia River.

Hunt continued running on the Columbia until 1869, and during that time enjoyed a flourishing business, repeatedly carrying from 50 to 300 passengers, 100 head of stock and plenty of freight on a single trip.

In 1869 the Oregon Steam Navigation Company, having achieved a monopoly on the Columbia River, decided to extend their steamboating ventures to Puget Sound.

[7] The monopoly sent the old steamer around to run in opposition to Duncan B Finch and the Wright family, who were operating the Eliza Anderson, reputedly one of the slowest but most profitable vessels ever to traverse the Sound.

Finch and the Wrights had, in the meantime, built the steamer Olympia, afterward called the Princess Louise, and when the competition ended, the Hunt was sent to San Francisco where she remained for ten years.

Captain Spratt replaced Maude with Wilson G. Hunt on the route from Victoria to Comox[7] and Nanaimo by way of the Gulf Islands and Chemainus.

She stayed on the beach in front of Cook's shipyard until 1890, when she was broken up where she lay by the San Francisco junk dealers Cohn & Co., and burned for her metal.