It does sound that way....I had been doing research on sunken steamboats in and around Cairo and never heard of the Ruth and contents...Wonder why that was?...Mass histeria prolly....People going out on flatboats and dying...lol...Seriously though, From what I read the general consensus is it was a attack on the North from a Rebel to try and destabalize the Union armies finance, and with that amount of money lost they would think Union troops would just desert because of no pay.....Seems it didnt work......What I would like to know is in what context was the money in?..Bullion, coins or paper money.