FAMOUS CLIPPER SHIPS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 20315, 25 January 1928, Page 12

FAMOUS CLIPPER SHIPS.

TWEED, LIGHTNING, AND OTHERS GREAT SAILING RECORDS. That the clipper ship is as dead as the dodo is the melancholy admission of all old sailormen. The “ steam kettle, ’ as they used contemptuously to describe steamers, has driven this thing of beauty off the face of the deep for ever, but though the clipper is dead, her fine tradition is likely to live for generations. Basil Lubbock, Joseph Conrad, and Miss E. Fox-Smith have done much to foster the tradition by their writings, and so has J. Spurling with his brush. In Sail, with pictures by Spurling and descriptive notes by Lubbock, we have one of the most sumptuous and authoritative volumes on the clippers that has yet been published (states the Melbourne Argus). Of the 30 ships described and illustrated, five possess special interest for Australian readers—the Tweed, the Sohraon, the Lightning, the Cutty Sark, and her great rival, the Thermopylae. THE TWEED. The Tweed, launched in 1854, was a visitor to Australia for 30 years and more. If she never equalled the performances of the Lightning, the Thermopyloe, or the Cutty Sark, she was always in the first rank of the flyers. In 1872 she ran from the Libard to Melburne in 72 days; and in 1875, from Sydney to Dungeness in 69 days. The Tweed was originally the paddle frigate Punjaub, of the old Indian Marine. Built throughout of selected teak, she was the costliest ship that ever left an Indian shipyard. During the Crimean war she did service as a troopship, and how speedy she was may be judged from the fact that though she was encumbered by her lumbering paddles, she once ran her consorts hull down in 24 hours with her fires out. After the Crimean war she was bought by John Willis and converted to sail. In bis "Mirror of the Seas,” Conrad refers to her in unexpected terms of dispraise. She was heavy to look at, he says, and not like a clipper at all, with her great sheer, her high bows, and her clumsy stern. The Tweed did not have high bows, she had exceptionally little sheer, and no one would have said that her stern was clumsy. She was, indeed, as stately-looking a craft as sailed the seas, and there was breeding in every line of her. Lubbock is certain that Conrad was confusing her with some other ship. After 38 years afloat she made a fitting end, for when she was broken up in 1888 her teak timbers were used for rooting a church in Port Elizabeth. South Africa. It was tho Tweed that inspired Herculo Linton in his design of the Cutty Sark. "When she was in dry dock, Willis took Linton to see her. He needed a ship for the China trade, and the Tweed was too large for this. A smaller Tweed was what he wanted. Linton was greatly taken with her shapely hull, and it influenced him in designing the Cutty Sark. THE LIGHTNING. Of all tire clippers that preceded the Tweed probably tho Lightning was the most famous Donald M'Kay launched many a fine vessel from his East Boston yard, and non© finer than the Lightning, unless it was the great James Baines—taken more than once, by the way, for the Flying Dutchman, for it was entered in tho logs that no mortal vessel could carry such a press of canvas in a howling gale as she did. Before she became watersoaked —a fate that overtakes all softwood vessels—she made some astonishing runs. Here are some extracts from the log of her second outward voyago:—February 9, 1855: “ Going 14 knot on a bowline with yards braced up.” February 20: “ Going 15 knots with royals set; yards slightly checked.” February 27: “Fresh gales, heavy squall, occasional rain and snow. Sea running high. During six hours in the morning the shipped logged 18 knots with royals,, main skysail, and top-gallant, studding sails set.” But she did better than this afterwards on two occasions by logging 18 knots for the full 24 hours! She was ageing after she had been afloat for 15 years, and might have ended ingloriously as a hulk had not the fates willed it otherwise. In 1869, after she had loaded wool at Geelong, she’- caught fire. They towod her clear of the wharf in a hurry and attempted to scuttle her. But the brave old ship had no “ kind of alacrity In sinking.” Morning dawned and saw her afloat and blazing fiercely. They trained two cannons on her, but she still declined to strike her flaming colours. Then another attempt was made to scuttle her, and this time it was successful. So, amid a cloud of steam and flame and smoke, she went to her last resting place. THE SOBRAON. A clipper that was newer much in tho Hxnelight was the splendid Sobraon, iron framed with teak planking, and the largest and costliest “ composite ” ever launched. She was of 2131 registered tonnage, and she measured 317 ft all over. The Sobraon was a passenger ship first and a Wool clipper second, so the comfort of the passengers being the first consideration she Was never driven. If she had been she might have broken all records, considering that she was the only ship which ever Sighted Cape Otway 60 days out. But for baffling winds she would have established a record on that occasion by anchoring in Hobson’s Bay in 61 days. The Sobraon was afterwards bought by the Government of New South Wales as a training ship (H.M.A.S. Tingira), and was lately sold to the shipbreakers. A GREAT PAIR. The most famous of the clippers were the Cutty Sark and the Thermopylae. Which was ,the faster has always been a matter of controversy. It was" only on one occasion that they actually raced. That was in 1872. They left Shanghai within a few hours of each other. The Cutty Sark travelled 600. possibly 1000, miles ahead of the Thermopylae; and then, when the race was won, so it seemed, the “ little lady,” as she was sometimes affectionately called, lost her rudder. They rigged a jury rudder, but it took three days to do it. When the Cutty Sark reached London she found that the Thermopylae had been- there five days. Lubbock’s opinion is that in ‘weather” the Cutty Sark had a little the better of her rival, but that in light lairs the Thermopylae could outsail her. It was the Thermopylae which established It record that has never been lowered by a sailing vessel, when in 1868 she anchored in Hobson’s Bay 62 days out from the Lizard. Unlike many of the fliers, the Thermopylae came to no mean ending. The Portuguese Government had bought her as a training ship, but when she was found too small for their work it was decided not to sell, but to sink her. One story is that she was used as a -gun target; a more picturesque version is that she was towed out to sea with colours flying and torpedoed. The Cutty Sark is still with us, sound as the day she was launched, now that her planking has been renewed, and looking spick and span as ever now that she has been re-rigged by her owner. Captain Dowman. It was he who bought her from her Portuguese owners. She is the Cleopatra among clippers, when ago cannot wither nor custom stale.” There was a rumour that Captain Dowman was going to wail the “little lady” out here for one last Voyage; but that is not to be. For the rest of her days she will lie in Falmouth Harbour as a stationary training ship.