Clipper
Clippers were generally narrow for their length, small by later 19th-century standards, could carry limited bulk freight, and had a large total sail area.
The etymological origin of the word clipper is uncertain, but is believed to be derived from the English language verb "to clip", which at the time meant "to run or fly swiftly".
At first, these fast sailing vessels were referred to as "Virginia-built" or "pilot-boat model", with the name "Baltimore-built" appearing during the War of 1812.
In the final days of the slave trade (circa 1835–1850) – just as the type was dying out – the term, Baltimore clipper, became common.
[8] A clipper is a sailing vessel designed for speed, a priority that takes precedence over cargo-carrying capacity or building or operating costs.
The last defining feature of a clipper, in the view of maritime historian David MacGregor, was a captain who had the courage, skill, and determination to get the fastest speed possible out of her.
[10]: 43–45 An alternative measure of sharpness for hulls of a broadly similar shape is the coefficient of underdeck tonnage, as used by David MacGregor in comparing tea clippers.
As commercial vessels, these are totally reliant on speed to generate a profit for their owners, as their sharpness limits their cargo-carrying capacity.
They often made passages as fast as extreme clippers, but had less difficulty in making a living when freight rates were lower.
A 1789 drawing of HMS Berbice (1780) – purchased by the Royal Navy in 1780 in the West Indies – represents the earliest draught of what became known as the Baltimore clipper.
[15]: 91 Ann McKim, built in Baltimore in 1833 by the Kennard & Williamson shipyard,[16][17] is considered by some to be the original clipper ship.
[18] (Maritime historians Howard I. Chapelle and David MacGregor decry the concept of the "first" clipper, preferring a more evolutionary, multiple-step development of the type.
[15]: 72 ) She measured 494 tons OM, and was built on the enlarged lines of a Baltimore clipper, with sharply raked stem, counter stern, and square rig.
A contemporary ship-design journalist noted that "the design of her model was to combine large stowage capacity with good sailing qualities.
[12][page needed] The Flying Cloud was a clipper ship built in 1851 that established the fastest passage between New York and San Francisco within weeks of her launching, then broke her own records three years later, which stood at 89 days 8 hours until 1989.
Composite clippers had the strength of an iron hull framework but with wooden planking that, with properly insulated fastenings, could use copper sheathing without the problem of galvanic corrosion.
The iron framework of composite clippers was less bulky and lighter, so allowing more cargo in a hull of the same external shape.
[11]: 84–88 [12][page needed] After 1869, with the opening of the Suez Canal that greatly advantaged steam vessels (see Decline below), the tea trade collapsed for clippers.
[12]: 332 From the late 1860s until the early 1870s, the clipper trade increasingly focused on the Britain to Australia and New Zealand route, carrying goods and immigrants, services that had begun earlier with the Australian Gold Rush of the 1850s.
Damaged by fire on 21 May 2007 while undergoing conservation, the ship was permanently elevated 3.0 m above the dry dock floor in 2010 as part of a plan for long-term preservation.
The fast ships were ideally suited to low-volume, high-profit goods, such as tea, opium, spices, people, and mail.
Donald McKay's Sovereign of the Seas reported the highest speed ever achieved by a sailing ship of the era, 22 knots (41 km/h), made while running her easting down to Australia in 1854.
This gave an accelerating fall in freight rates that was halted, however, by the start of the Crimean War in March 1854, as many ships were now being chartered by the French and British governments.
The end of the Crimean War in April 1856 released all this capacity back on the world shipping markets – the result being a severe slump.
No true steamer (as opposed to an auxiliary steamship) had the fuel efficiency to carry sufficient cargo to make a profitable voyage.
Holt had persuaded the Board of Trade to allow higher steam pressures in British merchant vessels.
Running at 60 psi instead of the previously permitted 25 psi, and using an efficient compound engine, Agamemnon had the fuel efficiency to steam at 10 knots to China and back, with coaling stops at Mauritius on the outward and return legs – crucially carrying sufficient cargo to make a profit.
In 1869, the Suez Canal opened, giving steamships a route about 3,000 nautical miles (5,600 km; 3,500 mi) shorter than that taken by sailing ships round the Cape of Good Hope.
Departures of clipper ships, mostly from New York and Boston to San Francisco, were advertised by clipper-ship sailing cards.
With their rarity and importance as artifacts of nautical, Western, and printing history, clipper cards are valued by both private collectors and institutions.
