 |
History of the Cutty Sark
• The Story of the Famous Tea Clipper
 Images |
|
|
 Related Articles |
|
|
 On the Web |
|
|
By
The Minx
Monday,
21 May, 2007
The Cutty Sark was one of the last great sailing ships which sailed between the UK and the Far East. It was a tea clipper - bringing tea from China back to the UK. It is believed to be the last surviving ship of its type in the world.
The 280ft (85.4m) ship was built to be the fastest boat in the tea trade, it narrowly failed to win that honour but in 1885, the 85-meter (280 feet) ship achieved a record-breaking wind-powered voyage from Australia to England, completing the distance in 72 days.
The Cutty Sark was built by Scott & Linton in Dumbarton, Scotland in 1869, one of the last great sailing ships to be built in wood and cast iron, for Jock Willis, known as 'White Hat Willis' for his trademark white top hat. He named the ship "Cutty Sark" after the Scottish dialect phrase for a short petticoat, cited in a Robert Burns poem.
It left London on its first voyage on February 16, 1870, sailing around Cape Hope to Shanghai. Commanded by Captain George Moodie, she carried "large amounts of wine, spirits and beer. The ship made only eight voyages to China in the tea trade, as steam ships replaced sail on the high seas. Her last cargo of tea was carried in 1877.
From 1885 to 1895, she was used in the wool trade with Australia, bringing the new season's clip from Sydney to London, setting new speed records year after year. By 1895, she was losing money and was sold to the Portuguese as the "Ferreira", although her crews called her "Pequina Camisola" ('little shirt'). She was worked by her new owners between Oporto, Rio, and Lisbon until 1920, when she was sold again, this time becoming the "Maria do Amparo".
In 1922 she underwent a refit in the Surrey Docks, London, and was driven to shelter from a storm in Falmouth harbour on her way home. A Captain Wilfred Dowman saw her there, and bought her from the Portuguese owners, returning her to British ownership again as part of his floating maritime school. His widow donated the Cutty Sark to the Thames Nautical Training School at Greenhithe in 1938.
The vessel was maintained there until the Cutty Sark Preservation Society was founded under the director of the National Maritime Museum, Frank Carr, with HRH the Duke of Edinburgh named patron. She was eventually towed to Greenwich and placed in a specially constructed dry dock in 1954.
After much restoration work she was opened to the public in 1957. Since then the ship has been regarded as the pinnacle of merchant sail vessel development and one of Britain's most important maritime treasures. More than 15 million people have visited the ship in its dry dock at Greenwich, a World Heritage Site on the southern bank of the River Thames.
Richard Doughty, chief executive of the Cutty Sark Trust described the ship as "the Ferrari of her day because she was the epitome of speed under sail. This is a ship that helped to make the wealth of London. She travelled the world, she belongs to the world. She is the first ship anywhere that was conserved for the nation."
Now only one clipper from the same period is left intact - the City of Adelaide, built in 1864 and currently housed at the Scottish Maritime Museum in Ayrshire, which had been due for demolition. The City of Adelaide was built in 1864 and, like Cutty Sark, combines a cast iron frame with a wooden hull. Later renamed The Carrick, the clipper is currently housed at the Scottish Maritime Museum in Irvine, Ayrshire butis to be demolished shortly as its retoration would be uneconomic.
Update: by the end of May over £500,000 had been raised in the public appeal for funds to restore the fire damage. Follow our link to find out more or donate.
The Naked Reader 2007
| |
