Agamemnon class (1865)

Agamemnon class

The Agamemnon

Ship data associated ships 3 Ship type General cargo steamer Shipyard Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company , Greenock Construction period 1864 to 1866 Cruising areas Worldwide trip

Ship dimensions and crew length 94.34 m ( Lpp ) width 11.73 m Side height 9.01 m measurement 2347 GRT

Machine system machine 1 × compound steam engine Machine performance 945 hp (695 kW) Top speed 10.5 kn (19 km / h) propeller 1 × fixed propeller

Others Classifications Lloyd's Register

The three units of the Agamemnon class of the Ocean Steam Ship Company were the first modern liner cargo ships.

details

After the previous conversion of his ship Cleator to a compound steam engine he had developed, Alfred Holt commissioned the Scotts Shipbuilding and Engineering Company in Greenock to build the three sister ships Agamemnon , Ajax and Achilles in 1864 for the newly founded Ocean Steam Ship Company . With the three new buildings worth a total of 156,000 pounds, the first steamship service to China was to be set up.

The type ship Agamemnon began its maiden voyage from Liverpool via Mauritius, Penang, Singapore and Hong Kong to Shanghai on April 19, 1865. The journey time was 77 days and the new steam engine had the desired low coal consumption of around 20 tons per day. In conjunction with other measures, such as the slim hull shape, which allowed the relatively high speed of ten knots, the three newbuildings on the long route to China made it possible for the first time to compete with the sailing ships that carried this traffic up to dominated at this point. In 1869, the ship took about 1141 tons from Hankau, the largest single load of tea ever transported in a ship on board; The freight of 28,087 pounds achieved with it was also a record at the time.

In 1897, after more than 30 years of service, the ship was transferred to the Dutch subsidiary Nederlandsche Stoomvaart Maatschappij "Oceaan" (NSMO), where it remained in service for two more years. In 1899 the Agamemnon was finally canceled in Italy. The two sister ships also stayed in service for a comparably long time, switching to NSMO at the end of their careers. The Achilles arrived in Genoa for demolition a year before the Agamemnon , the Ajax even stayed in service until 1900 before it was also scrapped in Genoa.

The ships

Agamemnon class

Ship name	Build number	Commissioning	Client shipping company	Later names and whereabouts
Agamemnon	-	1865	Ocean Steam Ship Company Blue Funnel Line	Scrapped in Italy in 1899
Ajax	-	1865	Ocean Steam Ship Company Blue Funnel Line	Sunk in 1868 during repair work in Shanghai, later lifted and back on the road, broken up in Genoa in 1900
Achilles	-	1866	Ocean Steam Ship Company Blue Funnel Line	Canceled in Genoa in 1898

literature

• Haws, Duncan: Blue Funnel Line . 1st edition. TCL Publications, Torquay 1984, ISBN 0-946378-01-0 .

Web links

• The rise of the cargo liner in Port Cities Southampton (English)

Individual evidence

1. ^ Martin Stopford: Maritime Economics . 2nd Edition. Routledge, Oxon, New York 1997, ISBN 0-415-15310-7 , pp. 19/20 .