CUTTY SARK
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Take me back to the CLYDE BUILT page please.
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Take me back to the INDEX page please.
Take me back
Work started on her in 1869 at the Scott and Linton shipyard in Dumbarton for retired captain, 'Old White Hat' John Willis.
The 963-ton, 216ft long ship was finished by Denny's shipbuilders after Scott and Linton went bust.
She was the finest and fastest of all the clipper class vessels operating on the China tea-run, but the opening of the Suez Canal in the same year gave the edge to the steamers.
No longer economical on the tea-run by 1877, she became a tramp vessel but by the 1880's she gained fame on the wool-run from Australia, beating even the fastest steamers.
In 1895, Willis sold the ship to a Portuguese firm.
Re-named Ferreira, she sailed between Portugal, South America and East Africa.
In 1916 a storm forced major repairs and she was re-rigged as a barquentine.
Four years on, she was again sold, and re-named Maria do Amparo.
In the mid 1920's she was sold to Captain Wilfred Dowman, who gave her back her original name and rigging.
In 1954 she became a maritime museum exhibit docked at Greenwich, London.
