Eight-Gun Clipper Hermaphrodite Brigantine Apprentice, built at New York City for a foreign account, 1838-39. 



rather than take the risks of industrial, urban employ- 

 ment. During the Revolution, for example, when the 

 frigate Virginia was building at Baltimore, there was 

 very great difficulty in getting men to finish the ship. 

 Again, in the War of 1812 the frigate Java was de- 

 layed by the lack of labor in the city, while the con- 

 struction of privateer schooners in the country yards 

 gave more attractive employment to workmen. Thus, 

 local conditions limited the Chesapeake Bay ship- 

 builders to the production of small vessels, and since, at 

 least to 1857, there was a profitable market for these 

 small, fast-sailing vessels, the Bay yards were kept 

 busy, with little surplus labor available for Baltimore. 

 While a few clipper ships and packets were built on 

 the Bay, the whole number was very small compared 

 with the output of Boston, New York, or of the New 

 England States. It may be said, however, that the 

 Chesapeake Bay clipper-ships maintained their great 

 reputation for fast sailing, and in spite of the limited 

 output of clipper ships on the Chesapeake, some very 

 fine small vessels were built for ocean trade, and for 

 coasting. 



An example of the small ocean-trading clippers was 

 the topsail schooner Vaquero, built at Baltimore, by 

 fames M. Foster and Thomas Booz, for Captain 

 Josiah D. Nason of Medford, Massachusetts. This 

 was a large 2-masted schooner intended to carry 

 frrisjht and passengers in the Pacific Ocean trade. 

 Built in 1853 at the height of the clipper-ship boom, 

 her general hull lines were those of an extreme clipper 

 ship. She was about 133 feet 6 inches at rail, 120 feet 

 9 inches between perpendiculars, 27 feet 2]i inches 

 moulded beam, and drew 13 feet aft, 11 feet 4 inches 

 forward, loaded. 



This schooner was as large as many ships and barks 

 in her time. She sailed to California and there gained 



the reputation of being the fastest vessel out of the 

 port of San Francisco. Described as having very fine 

 passenger accommodations and as being a first-class 

 vessel in all respects, the Vaquero was the first vessel to 

 carry passengers from San Francisco to Melbourne, 

 .\ustralia, and for a few years she ran between these 

 ports and Honolulu. This big 2-master held the 

 record between Melbourne and Honolulu; in 1858 

 she made the run in 36 days, and her previous two 

 runs were 42 and 41 days. The Vaquero was lost at 

 sea on June 9, 1859, after 5 years in the trade. 



By 1850 the original Baltimore clipper model had 

 nearly gone out of fashion, except in small schooners 

 and in a few brigantines. Most fast vessels built on 

 the Chesapeake, brigs, brigantines, 3-inast schooners, 

 barks and ships, had been on models very similar to 

 those used at New York and in New England, except 

 that the Bay-built vessels commonly had somewhat 

 sharper ends. The last Baltimore clipper type built 

 on the Bay was the "pungy," a shallow-keel schooner 

 used in the Bay trade and in fishing. Some pungies 

 were employed as coastal packets and a few were in 

 the Bahama-Baltimore fruit trade until late in the 

 19th century. The type finally disappeared about 

 1940 on the Bay. However, the basic principles of 

 the Baltimore clipper model were sound and, 

 throughout the last half of the f9th century, pilot 

 schooners and some yachts continued to show much 

 resemblance to the old model. 



One of the trades in which Baltimore clippers en- 

 gaged was slaving. A few were actually built for the 

 trade, often very extreme models — brigs, brigantines, 

 and schooners. Few ships, or ver\' large vessels, en- 

 gaged in slaving, though occasionally one was found 

 with slaves aljoard. The slaver was commonly, how- 

 ever, a cheaply built or secondhand vessel and most 



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