one of these, the Hannibal, built at Bahimore in 1810 

 and captured and taken into the Royal Navy during 

 the War of 1812, has been found. This ship, 135 feet 

 6 inches long on deck, 37 feet 51^ inches beam, and 

 10 feet 11 inches depth of hold, had rather marked 

 dcadrise but her longitudinal lines were rather full. 

 The trend in design illustrated in the Hannibal seems 

 to have developed rather slowly, largely in smaller 

 brigs and brigantines; in fact it may be more correct 

 to say the basic design reappeared from time to time, 

 rather than to say that it was developed. By 1838 

 the Baltimore shipowners and shipbuilders had be- 

 come very conscious of the shortcomings of the sharp- 

 model vessels as peacetime carriers, recognizing that 

 the old sharp-model vessels could no longer pay as 

 they carried too little cargo in proportion to their 

 dimensions, tonnage taxes, and crew costs. As a re- 

 sult, some attempts were being made to build ships of 

 greater relative capacity with as little loss in speed as 

 possible. This was done by combining the full body 

 of the New England ships of the "Boston model" with 

 the sharper ends of the "Baltimore model." A ship 

 launched about this time was claimed to represent this 

 combination, but her builder's model and drawings 

 have not been found and no report of her performance 

 seems to exist. 



It is obvious, then, that the idea of employing a full 

 body with fine entrance and run was nothing new 

 when the Rainbow was built, not only because of the 

 Baltimore effort, but also because of the evidence in 

 ship plans dating at least as far back as 1806. Indeed 

 as early as 1800 there had been two schools of thought 

 in American shipbuilding, one considering extreme 

 rise in the floor in the midship section necessary for a 

 fast ship and the other that a large midsection with 

 low dead rise could be used as well if the entrance and 

 run were sharp. 



The California gold rush in 1849 had brought the 

 still ubiquitous Baltimore clippers into the new trade, 

 but these small vessels were soon replaced by the new 

 class of ships on the China-trade model; the famed 

 and shortlived California clipper. The demand for 

 fast ships in which speed rather than cargo capacity 

 was paramount produced a boom in shipbuilding, 

 and soon yards from the Chesapeake to the Canadian 

 border were turning them out in numbers. At first 

 the extreme clippers were built at New York (a few 

 were built to the southward), while New England 

 produced only moderately sharp vessels, but soon 

 they were on the stocks in Massachusetts and Maine, 



as well as in New Hampshire, Connecticut, and 

 Rhode Island. 



Actually there were three types of ships that could 

 be truly called "clipper ships" because of their having 

 higher potential maximum speed than other sailing 

 ships. The most radical type were the extreme clip- 

 pers, built primarily for speed and with the least 

 regard for cargo capacity. These might be modifica- 

 tions of the old Baltimore clipper model, with marked 

 dead rise and fine ends, as in the Samuel Russell, 

 Xightingale, Sea Witch, Witch of the Wave, Staghound, 

 and Gazelle. Some of these were far more radical in 

 design than others. 



Less radical were the clippers, the ships of sharp 

 but more practical model in which there was a definite 

 intent to combine speed with fair cargo capacity. 

 Among these were such noted vessels as McKay's 

 Flying Cloud, Sovereign oj the Seas, and James Baines; 

 Webb's Comet, Young America, and Invincible; and 

 Samuel Pook's Surprise, Red Jacket, and Belle oJ the 

 West. The ships of this class usually had a moderate 

 rise in the floor, and a rather short but very sharp 

 entrance and run, whereas the extreme clipper had a 

 very long entrance and run. The two classes were 

 not sharply divided but shaded gradually from one 

 category to the other. The Lightning exemplifies this; 

 with a rather full body she had, to a very marked 

 degree, sharply formed ends, and these were quite 

 long. Hence, even among naval architects and ship- 

 builders, there could be a valid difference of opinion 

 as to how some ships should be classed. 



Least extreme were the medium, or half clippers, 

 vessels in which capacity came first but in which the 

 designer had attempted to produce a reasonably fast 

 vessel. Examples of this class were the Nor^ Wester, 

 Andrew Jackson, and Golden Fleece. This class, too, 

 shaded imperceptibly into the next class below, the 

 full-ended ship. 



Building of clipper ships reached a maximum in 

 1853-54, and in these two years many excellent 

 examples of each of the three basic classes of clipper 

 ships came off the ways. A fine example of an extreme 

 clipper was the Surmv South, designed and built by 

 George Steers at Williamsburg, New York, in 1854. 

 Steers had won notice as a designer of fast vessels by 

 modeling and building notable pilot boats of the 

 New York fleet and, in 1850-51, be designed the 

 yacht America whose success in England brought him, 

 still a young man, to great prominence. In designing 

 the Sunny South Steers had followed the basic model 

 he had used so successfully in his fast schooners and 



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