Roanoke (ship)

Last updated
History
Flag of the United States (1896-1908).svgUnited States
Name:Roanoke
Builder: Messrs. A. Sewall and Co., Bath, Maine
Launched: September 20, 1892
Fate: burned August 10, 1905
General characteristics
Length: 311 ft (94.8 m)
Beam: 49 ft (14.9 m)
Draft: 27 ft (8.2 m)
Depth of hold: 29 ft (8.8 m)
Sail plan: barque

Roanoke was one of the largest wooden ships ever constructed.

Contents

Service

Roanoke was a four-masted barque built by Messrs. A. Sewall and Co. in 1892 on the Kennebec River at Bath, Maine, in the United States. With the exception of Great Republic and the six-masted wooden schooner Wyoming (3,730.54 GRT, 450 ft length over all) she was the largest wooden ship ever built in an American yard. Her gross register tonnage was 3,347, but on a draft of 27 feet (8.2 meters) she could stow away 2,000 additional tons. [1] Her length was 311 feet (94.8 meters), her beam 49 feet (14.9 meters), and her hold depth 29 feet (8.8 meters). [2] Her lower yards were 95 feet (29 meters) long, and her foremast truck was 180 feet (54.9 meters) from the deck. The keel was in two tiers of 16-inch (40.6- cm) white oak, her garboards were eight inches (20.3 cm) thick, and her ceiling in the lower hold was 14 inches (35.6 cm). Into her construction went 1,250,000 board feet of yellow pine, 14,000 cubic feet (396.4 cubic meters) of oak, 98,000 treenails, and 550 hackmatack knees. [1]

Barque type of sailing vessel with three or more masts

A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts having the fore- and mainmasts rigged square and only the mizzen rigged fore-and-aft.

Kennebec River river in Maine, United States

The Kennebec River is a 170-mile-long (270 km) river within the U.S. state of Maine.

Bath, Maine City in Maine, United States

Bath is a city in Sagadahoc County, Maine, in the United States. The population was 8,514 at the 2010 census, and 8,357 as of 2013, the population has had a change of -10.2% since 2000. It is the county seat of Sagadahoc County, which includes one city and 10 towns. The city is popular with tourists, many drawn by its 19th-century architecture. It is home to the Bath Iron Works and Heritage Days Festival, held annually on the Fourth of July weekend. It is commonly known as "The City of Ships". Bath is part of the metropolitan statistical area of Greater Portland.

Loss

Roanoke left New York City on her final voyage in June 1904 and was involved in a serious collision with the British steamship Llangibby off the coast of South America in August 1904, requiring repairs for three months in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. [3] After delivering cargo to Australia, Roanoke was loading chromium ore near Nouméa, New Caledonia, when she was destroyed by fire on the night of August 10, 1905. [2]

New York City Largest city in the United States

The City of New York, often called New York City (NYC) or simply New York (NY), is the most populous city in the United States. With an estimated 2017 population of 8,622,698 distributed over a land area of about 302.6 square miles (784 km2), New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the United States. Located at the southern tip of the state of New York, the city is the center of the New York metropolitan area, the largest metropolitan area in the world by urban landmass and one of the world's most populous megacities, with an estimated 20,320,876 people in its 2017 Metropolitan Statistical Area and 23,876,155 residents in its Combined Statistical Area. A global power city, New York City has been described as the cultural, financial, and media capital of the world, and exerts a significant impact upon commerce, entertainment, research, technology, education, politics, tourism, art, fashion, and sports. The city's fast pace has inspired the term New York minute. Home to the headquarters of the United Nations, New York is an important center for international diplomacy.

Steamship type of steam powered vessel

A steamship, often referred to as a steamer, is a type of steam powered vessel, typically ocean-faring and seaworthy, that is propelled by one or more steam engines that typically move (turn) propellers or paddlewheels. The first steamships came into practical usage during the early 1800s; however, there were exceptions that came before. Steamships usually use the prefix designations of "PS" for paddle steamer or "SS" for screw steamer. As paddle steamers became less common, "SS" is assumed by many to stand for "steam ship". Ships powered by internal combustion engines use a prefix such as "MV" for motor vessel, so it is not correct to use "SS" for most modern vessels.

The Llangibby was a British steamship named after the town of Llangybi, Monmouthshire.

Related Research Articles

USS <i>Dunderberg</i>

USS Dunderberg, which is a Swedish word meaning "thunder(ing) mountain," was an ocean-going casemate ironclad of 14 guns. She resembled an enlarged, two-masted version of the Confederate casemate ironclad CSS Virginia. She was originally designed to have both gun turrets and a casemate but the turrets were deleted while the ship was still being built. Construction began in 1862, but progress was slow and she was not launched until after the end of the American Civil War in 1865.

HMS <i>Warrior</i> (1860) Warrior-class ironclad

HMS Warrior is a 40-gun steam-powered armoured frigate built for the Royal Navy in 1859–1861. She was the name ship of the Warrior-class ironclads. Warrior and her sister ship HMS Black Prince were the first armour-plated, iron-hulled warships, and were built in response to France's launching in 1859 of the first ocean-going ironclad warship, the wooden-hulled Gloire. Warrior conducted a publicity tour of Great Britain in 1863 and spent her active career with the Channel Squadron. Obsolescent following the 1871 launching of the mastless and more capable HMS Devastation, she was placed in reserve in 1875, and was "paid off" – decommissioned – in 1883.

<i>Royal Sovereign</i>-class battleship class of pre-dreadnoughts of the Royal Navy

The Royal Sovereign class was a group of eight pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy in the 1890s. The ships spent their careers in the Mediterranean, Home and Channel Fleets, sometimes as flagships, although several were mobilised for service with the Flying Squadron in 1896 when tensions with the German Empire were high following the Jameson Raid in South Africa. Three ships were assigned to the International Squadron formed when Greek Christians rebelled against the Ottoman Empire′s rule in Crete in 1897–1898.

<i>Warrior</i>-class ironclad class of ironclads of the Royal Navy

The Warrior-class ironclads were a class of two warships built for the Royal Navy between 1859 and 1862, the first ocean-going ironclads with iron hulls ever constructed. The ships were designed as armoured frigates in response to an invasion scare sparked by the launch of the French ironclad Gloire and her three sisters in 1858. They were initially armed with a mix of rifled breech-loading and muzzle-loading smoothbore guns, but the Armstrong breech-loading guns proved unreliable and were ultimately withdrawn from service.

Thames sailing barge type of commercial sailing boat

A Thames sailing barge is a type of commercial sailing boat once common on the River Thames in London. The flat-bottomed barges with a shallow draught and leeboards, were perfectly adapted to the Thames Estuary, with its shallow waters and narrow tributary rivers. The larger barges were seaworthy vessels, and were the largest sailing vessel to be handled by just two men. The average size was about 120 tons and they carried 4,200 square feet (390 m2) of canvas sail in six working sails. The mainsail was loose-footed and set up with a sprit, and was brailed to the mast when not needed. It is sheeted to a horse, as is the foresail; they require no attention when tacking. The foresail is often held back by the mate to help the vessel come about more swiftly.

HMS <i>Royal Oak</i> (1862) Prince Consort-class armoured frigate

HMS Royal Oak was a Prince Consort-class armoured frigate built for the Royal Navy in the 1860s. The lead ship of her class, she is sometimes described as a half-sister to the other three ships because of her different engine and boiler arrangements. Like her sisters, she was converted into an ironclad from a wooden ship of the line that was still under construction.

USS <i>Roanoke</i> (1855)

USS Roanoke was a wooden-hulled Merrimack-class screw frigate built for the United States Navy in the mid-1850s. She served as flagship of the Home Squadron in the late 1850s and captured several Confederate ships after the start of the American Civil War in 1861. The ship was converted into an ironclad monitor during 1862–63; the first ship with more than two gun turrets in history. Her conversion was not very successful as she rolled excessively and the weight of her armor and turrets strained her hull. Her deep draft meant that she could not operate off shallow Confederate ports and she was relegated to harbor defense at Hampton Roads, Virginia for the duration of the war. Roanoke was placed reserve after the war and sold for scrap in 1883.

Russian cruiser <i>Rossia</i> ship

Rossia was an armored cruiser of the Imperial Russian Navy built in the 1890s. She was designed as a long-range commerce raider and served as such during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904–05. She was based in Vladivostok when the war broke out and made a number of sorties in search of Japanese shipping in the early months of the war without much success.

<i>Great Republic</i> ship

Launched on October 4, 1853 Great Republic is noteworthy as the largest wooden clipper ship ever constructed.

<i>Shenandoah</i> (schooner) schooner

The Shenandoah is a 108-foot (33 m) square topsail schooner built in Maine in 1964. Operating as a cruise ship and educational vessel in the waters of Vineyard Haven Harbor, Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, she is claimed to be the only schooner of her size and topsail rig without an engine within the world.

<i>Wyoming</i> (schooner) wooden six-masted schooner

Wyoming was a wooden six-masted schooner, the largest wooden schooner ever built. It was built and completed in 1909 by the firm of Percy & Small in Bath, Maine. Wyoming was also the largest wooden ship ever built, 450 ft (140 m) from jib-boom tip to spanker boom tip, and the last six-masted schooner built on the east coast of the US.

USS <i>Concord</i> (PG-3) Yorktown-class gunboat

USS Concord was a member of the Yorktown class of steel-hulled, twin-screw gunboats in the United States Navy in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She was the second U.S. Navy ship named in honor of the town of Concord, Massachusetts, site of the Battle of Concord in the American Revolutionary War.

HMS <i>Royal Oak</i> (1892) Royal Sovereign-class battleship

HMS Royal Oak was one of seven Royal Sovereign-class pre-dreadnought battleships built for the Royal Navy during the 1890s. Upon her completion in 1894, she was initially placed in reserve until mobilised in 1896 for service with the Flying Squadron. After returning briefly to reserve, the ship was assigned the following year to the Mediterranean Fleet. Royal Oak remained there until 1902 when she returned home; after a refit, the ship was assigned to the Home Fleet, where she served as the flagship of the fleet's second-in-command in 1904–05. Royal Oak was then reduced to reserve until she was taken out of service in 1911. The ship was sold for scrap in early 1914.

<i>Yorktown</i>-class gunboat class of American gunboats

The Yorktown-class was a class of three steel-hulled, twin-screw gunboats built for the United States Navy beginning in 1887. All three ships of the class were named after cities near American Revolutionary War battles.

Russian ironclad <i>Kreml</i> Russian ironclad

The Russian ironclad Kreml was the third and last Pervenets-class broadside ironclad built for the Imperial Russian Navy during the mid-1860s. She joined the Baltic Fleet upon completion and accidentally sank a Russian frigate in 1869. The ship was assigned to the Gunnery Training Detachment in 1870 and was frequently rearmed. Kreml sank in shallow water after a storm in 1885; she was refloated and returned to service. The ship was placed in reserve in 1904 and disarmed the following year before being sold for scrap in 1908.

<i>Shearwater</i> (schooner)

The Shearwater is an 81.5-foot (24.8 m) wooden schooner docked in Lower Manhattan in New York City in the U.S. state of New York. The schooner was designed by Theodore Donald Wells and built by the Rice Brothers Corporation in East Boothbay, Maine in 1929. During World War II, it was requisitioned into the United States Coast Guard to patrol for German U-boats. The Shearwater completed a circumnavigation of the world in the early-1980s and later worked as a research laboratory for the University of Pennsylvania's Institute of Environmental Medicine. Docked about 200 yards (180 m) west of the site of the World Trade Center, it is operated by Manhattan by Sail, which gives 90-minute-long tours of New York Harbor, and is licensed to carry 48 passengers. The schooner was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2009.

<i>Volage</i>-class corvette

The Volage class was a group of two screw corvettes built for the Royal Navy in the late 1860s. Both ships spent the bulk of their active service abroad. Volage spent most of her first commission assigned to the Detached or Flying Squadron circumnavigating the world and then carried a party of astronomers to the Kerguelen Islands to observe the Transit of Venus in 1874. The ship was then assigned as the senior officer's ship in South American waters until she was transferred to the Training Squadron during the 1880s.

HMS <i>Volage</i> (1869)

HMS Volage was a Volage-class corvette built for the Royal Navy in the late 1860s. She spent most of her first commission assigned to the Flying Squadron circumnavigating the world and later carried a party of astronomers to the Kerguelen Islands to observe the transit of Venus in 1874. The ship was then assigned as the senior officer's ship in South American waters until she was transferred to the Training Squadron during the 1880s. Volage was paid off in 1899 and sold for scrap in 1904.

SB Kathleen

The SB Kathleen was a spritsail Thames barge built by Glover at Gravesend, Kent in England in 1901, and registered in Rochester. Her official number was 113,708. She was built to carry grain- for capacity rather than speed. she was 82.8 feet (25.2 m) long and had a beam of 19.7 feet (6.0 m). Light, she drew 30 inches (76 cm) of water, and laden 6 feet (1.8 m).

SS <i>Iosco</i>

The Iosco was a Great Lakes freighter that served on the Great Lakes from her construction in 1891 to her foundering on September 2, 1905, when she and her tow, the schooner barge Olive Jeanette sank on Lake Superior. While the Jeanette's wreck was located in over 300 feet (91 m) of water about eight miles (13 km) off the Huron Islands in the 90s, the Iosco's wreck has not yet been found.

References

Notes

  1. 1 2 Rowe, 1948.
  2. 1 2 The Argus, Melbourne, Friday August 11, 1905
  3. The Sydney Morning Herald, Friday December 16, 1904