Howe, 120-gun Ship of the Line Robert Seppings, 48 years old, previously Master Shipwright at Chatham dockyard, now Surveyor of the Navy for two years, applied his system of diagonal bracing to the whole hull of a new ship, Howe, a tremendous 120. He also used iron knees in substitution for grown timbers, so difficult to find within sparse woods. ¤ In England as in France, loggers stride over stands of oaks in search of curved boughs that could become wooden knees to suppo

Franklin at the forefront Franklin, launched in 1815 at the Philadelphia Navy Yard, rated as a 74 in the USA, has passed by Portsmouth to bring the new minister, Richard Rush, 37 years old, replacing John Quincy Adams to negotiate a treaty with Britain, to settle the borders with Canada in particular. It has given British officers the opportunity of examining this astonishing ship. She has made an impression, to say the least. "She is built of seasoned oak, admirably put to

Profile of Courageux, a French 74 Courageux was a French 74, designed by Jean Geffroy, launched at Brest dockyard in 1753. Battered by raking broadsides at point-blank, having 240 men killed and 110 ones wounded out of a complement of 650, she surrendered in 1761 off Vigo to the British 74 Bellona after a short duel. ¤ Both ships were excellent. French guns were excellent as well, even better perhaps than the British ones. During the approach, the French achieved to damag

Lightning It has been said that enthusiasm for clippers was waning lately. No doubt that experts question the future of clipper against steamer on the long run. Yet the clipper is in full boom today, thanks to China tea trade, to California gold rush and to Australia gold rush, which have urged fast transport as well as mass migration. China, California and Australia are still too far to expect reaching them through steam navigation, There are meant to clipper runs as fas

Caledonia in two positions Caledonia has just been launched. She is the first 120-gun man-of-war of the British navy. She supersedes the previous giants, two 110-gun vessels, Ville-de-Paris and Hibernia. It was decided to build her in 1797 under the feeling that larger ships were necessary to face the French three-deckers, especially the tremendous 118s designed by Jacques-Noël Sané twenty years ago. ¤ At the battle of the Glorious First of June (1794), the 110-gun Révolu

Nonsuch, Baltimore schooner Nonsuch has been launched in Baltimore. This is an outstanding model of a sort of swift merchant vessels built lately on the East coast of the United States of America. She is meant to fast trade travels between Maryland and the West Indies. She displays a long bowsprit fit for multiple jibs, raked masts carrying large gaff sails, a stem and a stern both raked, and a V-shaped hull. She is 90-foot long and 29-foot broad. Her tonnage is likely a

Paddlewheel aviso Sphinx (1829) It is well known that Muhammad Ali Pascha, 64 years old now, Wali of Egypt for the Ottoman sultan, viceroy if one prefers, offered France the two obelisks flanking the gate of the temple of Luxor. It was three years ago. The operation consisting in extracting, moving, boarding, transporting, unloading and erecting the gift in Paris has been entrusted to Jean-Baptiste Apollinaire Lebas, a naval engineer aged 36 by now. A first obelisk has come

Isambard Kingdom Brunel Famous Engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, 39, made William Patterson & Son build at Bristol the new vessel of the Great Western Steamship Company for the purpose of transatlantic packet service. She is named Great Britain. Her commissioning was delayed by the solution of high-level engineering issues. She displays two innovative, we may say bold, features : an iron hull and a screw propeller. She was launched two years ago, and has just started to op

Charles Napier Aaron Manby, named after the master of the Horseley Ironworks, Aaron Manby, 46, is a small 116-ton iron-hulled steamship. Jointly designed by Manby, by his son Charles, 18, and especially by Captain Charles Napier, 36, she was launched last year. She is up to date of innovation. She is obviously meant to prove validity of Napier's conceptions and of a Manby's invention. ¤ Manby is a talented civil engineer. In 1813, he patented a technique to form blocks o

Commerce de Marseille, launched at Toulon Dockyard in August 1788, the largest ship in the world Three years ago, an Anglo-Spanish fleet under Admiral Samuel Hood's command brought troops to the city of Toulon, where an uprising against the French Republic had broken out. The French fleet was caught in port. There were 31 ships of the line, 13 frigates, 11 corvettes and 2 brigs in the harbour, under construction, under refit or active - a heavy blow to the French navy which

a later edition of Hoste's treaty Paul Hoste, a Jesuit priest and a mathematician, aged 45, publishes two masterworks : L’Art des Armées Navales ou Traité des Évolutions Navales and Traité de la Construction des Vaisseaux. The first one is especially original and even foundational. Hoste's career looks like Georges Fournier’s one, sixty years ago. They both are Jesuit priests and mathematicians. They both became chaplains for the Atlantic fleet, so they were scholars scrut

Henry Wimshurt Henry Wimshurt, 34, designed and also built Archimedes, a 240-ton three-masted schooner launched last year, which this year has been fitted with a machinery supplied by Mssrs Rennie, consisting in a flue boiler feeding twin vertical 30-hp engines acting on the same crankshaft, itself extended by a shaft driving a whole 360° screw in a single thread. This propeller is retractable so as to reduce its drag when the ship intends sailing instead of steaming. It is

SS President President, the largest packet ship in the world, has disappeared with all 136 souls aboard in her third voyage. Last year, the British and American Steam Navigation Company, led by Junius Smith, 61, and Macgregor Laird, 43, famous for having made the Sirius cross the Atlantic ocean under steam for the first time three years ago, commissioned a second steamship for the line New York-Liverpool, after the successful 1850-ton British Queen (1838). She was the 2350-t

Thomas Slade Britain and France are at war in North America. War has been latent for two years between the endless rivals but, on the other side of the Atlantic ocean, events have already gone bad. Last year, on the Ohio river, the French thwarted the aggression of a fort by a militia led by a certain George Washington. The British navy is now harassing French merchant fleet and just seized a ship of the line. The awful struggle of the British settlers against the allied

Body Plan of 74-gun Terrible The 74-gun Terrible was lately launched in Toulon dockyard. Built after a design by François Coulomb the Younger, aged 48, this ship seems to be the prototype of a new sort of mighty two-deckers. Coulomb streamlined and enlarged the hull of former 74s so as to reach superb qualities of seakeeping and of swiftness as well as to accommodate 28 guns at the main deck, 30 guns at the upper deck, 10 guns at the quarterdeck and 6 more at the forecastle

92-gun three-decker Prins Willem Last year, Cornelis Evertsen, 42 years old, Lieutnant-Admiral of Zealand has replaced Tromp as Lieutnant-Admiral General. He is known as being both gallant and skilful, and also considered as politically neutral, in contrast with Tromp, an active Orangist. Present time requires consensus behind Prince Willem for a war against France is considered as short-term unavoidable by every observer. ¤ Moreover, Tromp is certainly known as competent

Cornelis Marteenszoon Tromp The Staten-Generaal, that is the assembly of senate and house of representatives, has decided to build thirty-six ships to replace the core of the fleet built in the 1660s. This decision results, first, from the French threat, on land as at sea, and, second, from the decay of the ships hastily built in the 1660s, many having already been broken up. ¤ As everybody knows, Duquesne defeated Ruyter in the Mediterranean sea in 1676, and D'Estrées defe

Anne-Hilarion de Costentin, comte de Tourville Many ship constructions have already been ordered since the opening of this war between France and the Grand Alliance of England, of the United Provinces and of most of the states of the Holy Roman Empire of German Nations, including Austria and Brandenburg, joined by Spain last year. Yet the late French victory near Beachy Head has exacerbated arms race. The defeat of the Anglo-Dutch fleet led by Arthur Herbert, earl of Torring

Jean-Baptiste Colbert, 61 years old, Secretary-of-State for the Navy since 1669, has established three schools of naval architecture for naval officers at Brest, Toulon and Rochefort. It may look strange to address such schools to officers rather than to apprentice shipwrights but this decision is consistent with the creation in 1671 of the ‘Conseils de Construction’ to collect feedback from the officers about the performances of their ships – which, in its beginnings, unvei

SS Sirius Two steamships - SS in short -, Sirius and Great Western, simultaneously cross the Atlantic Ocean from Cork in Ireland for the first, from Bristol in England for the second, to New York, in 18½ and 15½ days respectively, the second departing 4 days after the first and arriving the day after, that is on the 23rd of April while Sirius arrived on the 22nd. Sirius has transported 45 passengers, Great Western only seven. ¤ Great Eastern caught fire in her machinery dur