Duchess Cecilie

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Four-masted barque Duchess Cecilie
Patroness Crown Princess Cecilie, Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin

The Duchess Cecilie was a famous German four-masted barque and a freight sailing training ship , the fastest of its time. The namesake was the seafaring enthusiastic German Crown Princess Cecilie, Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin (1886–1954) and wife of Wilhelm of Prussia .

description

The Duchess Cecilie was built in 1902 at the Rickmers Schiffbau AG shipyard in Geestemünde for the North German Lloyd Bremen (NDL) as a freight sailing training ship to train the shipping company's offspring. The Grand Duke of Mecklenburg Friedrich Franz IV. , His uncle Johann Albrecht zu Mecklenburg , the namesake Cecilie Duchess of Mecklenburg-Schwerin and the General Director Dr. Heinrich Wiegand of Norddeutscher Lloyd were present when the ship was launched on April 22, 1902. In accordance with the shipping tradition of the NDL (and the school ship tradition of this time), the hull and superstructure of the ship were in bright white, the underwater hull with water pass was in red, which underlined the elegant lines of the outstanding sailor - in contrast to the black, white and red Laeisz sailors and the green-red Rickmers ships. She had a short forecastle , as a training ship an extra-long poop reaching to the aft edge of the midship bridge, so that one could almost speak of a two-island ship. She drove a modern standard rig as a four-masted barque: steel masts with mars and bram racks, split mars and bram sails , royal sails , mizzen mast with poles and two gaffs . For a large four-masted barque (3,242 GRT) she had a considerable sail area of ​​4,400 m² (4,181 m²), which contributed to her speed. The Duchess Cecilie was one of the fastest sailors of her time (1931: 20.75 kts measured with a chronometer between two lighthouses, and 19.75 kts with a patent log - a value with which she could have rivaled the fast clipper James Baines - only it was much bigger) and could easily compete with most of the ships of the shipping company F. Laeisz . The route from Portland ( Oregon ) to Lizard ( England ), her return journey from her maiden voyage to Astoria, Oregon, was completed on August 19, 1903 in just 106 days. However, it was once overtaken by the great Prussia , which was the fastest deep water sailor of its time in the world merchant fleet. The Duchess Cecilie was famous worldwide for her appearance and her sailing characteristics and was known by her nickname "The Duchess", French "la Duchesse", Spanish "la Duquesa").

to travel

First trips

The maiden voyage under Captain Max Dietrich left for Astoria , OR , via Cape Horn on June 25, 1902 . Before the Horn broke three Rah racks , which is why the ship on August 22 for repair Montevideo need to start. After completion of the work on October 9, it continued its journey unhindered to the American west coast and reached its destination on December 13 after 65 days. Like many other tall ships of the time, it was mainly, but not exclusively, used in the saltpetre voyage from Chile to Europe, but also early on in the wheat voyage from Australia to Europe. In 1908, Captain Otto Walther took over the ship, which was replaced by Captain Dietrich Ballehr in 1913.

After the beginning of the First World War , the ship was interned in Chile on July 25, 1914 after unloading the coal load in the Herradura Bay north of Valparaíso , and since November 1918 after being moved to Coquimbo, temporarily by the Navy (Armada de Chile ) | Chilean Navy]] used. Some cadets fled to Norway with the Chilean barque Tinto in November 1916 , together with interned crew members of the small cruiser SMS Dresden and the steamer Göttingen , where they arrived on March 31, 1917 and before returning to Germany.

After six years of absence, the ship left with 3,900  tn.l. Saltpeter entered the saltpeter port of Caleta Coloso near Antofagasta on October 1, 1920 and reached Falmouth after 82 days on December 23 , from where it was directed to Ostend to unload the cargo . On New Year's Eve 1920, the ship was back in its home port of Bremen.

On June 20, 1921, the Duchess Cecilie was handed over to France as a reparation payment , which she sold in the same year to the Finnish shipping company Gustaf Erikson for only US $ 20,000. The new owner was downright in love with his new acquisition - it was the fastest and most beautiful ship he had ever had. Since he did not use it as a training ship, there were often passengers on board, for whom the thrifty shipowner hired a stewardess specially. The ship's home port was now Mariehamn on the Finnish Åland Islands at the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia in the Baltic Sea . From December 8, 1921 was Karl Reuben de Cloux (1884-1949), under the 1927/28 Alan Villiers hired. In 1929 Karl Reuben de Cloux was replaced by Hugo Donatus Karlsson (29 days) and from August 17, 1929 by Mathias Sven Erikson, a relative of the shipowner. The latter won a race with a British steamer, which he overtook at 18 knots on the South Atlantic, whereupon the captain lowered the flag three times and sounded the ship's horn as a sign of appreciation, which Captain Erikson responded with the same gesture of his Finnish trade flag as thanks.

Duchess Cecilie on the cliffs in front of Ham Stone Rock

Wheat ride

After the decline of the saltpeter journey , the Duchess Cecilie was successfully used in the Australian wheat journey by Gustaf Erikson. A total of eleven trips were made from the Australian west coast to Europe. On a trip from Australia to Denmark in 1927, she was stranded in the fog off the Danish Vorupør , but was released again. In the so-called wheat regattas , the Duchess Cecilie won a total of eight times, four times before 1921 and 1927 on the Port Lincoln - Queenstown route in 98 days, 1928 from Port Lincoln to Falmouth in 96 days, 1931 from Wallaroo in South Australia to Falmouth in 93 days and 1936 on the same Route in just 86 days (January 27th - April 23rd). For the numbered years from 1921 to 1949, she was the second fastest sailing ship on this route after the Parma . However, the Duchess Cecilie did not return to her home port after this last fast voyage. After a minor accident with the German fishing ship Rastede, she first went to Falmouth to pay the bail , which she left the following day. On the approach course to Ipswich , where the 4,295 tons of wheat cargo was to be unloaded, the Duchess Cecilie drove to the cliffs of Ham Stone Rock near Salcombe, South Hams , Devon in thick fog and rough seas on the morning of April 25, 1936 , and struck a leak. After some of the swollen wheat cargo had been dumped, the ship was made buoyant again, towed to Starhole Bay on the west coast of the Salcombe estuary in June 1936 and beached there, and not, as originally planned, to the port of Salcombe completely Emptying of the ship because of fear of diseases and environmental problems due to the rotting wheat. The latter measure would probably have saved the ship. In the period that followed, the rotting wheat was washed into the bay and mostly eaten by seagulls . Nevertheless, the foul-smelling digester gases polluted the air in the bay for a long time. The following July was Kiel the Duchess Cecilie already broken and the ship was gradually battered by the waves. Remnants of the wreck are still there today and are a popular diving destination. When the tide is low, a wreck buoy is set.

Ship data

Individual evidence

  • Hans-Jörg Furrer: The four- and five-masted square sailors in the world . Koehler, Herford 1984, p. 103; ISBN 3-7822-0341-0
  • Basil Greenhill & John Hackman: Duchess Cecilie - Life story of a four-masted barque . Edition Maritim, Hamburg 1993; ISBN 3-89225-269-6
  • Peter Pedersen & Joseph Conrad: stranding and shipwreck. With decisions of the maritime offices of the German Reich . Bechtermünz, Augsburg 1989; ISBN 3-86047-245-3
  • Fred Schmidt & Dietrich Reimer: Ships and Fates. Andrews & Steiner, Berlin 1942.
  • Alan Villiers: Falmouth for Orders - The Story of the Last Clipper Ship Race around Cape Horn . Patrick Stephens Publ., London 1972; ISBN 0-85059-100-7
  • Elisabeth Rogge-Ballehr: School of the Sea - four-masted barque Duchess Cecilie . Urbes, Graefelfing 1987; ISBN 3-924896-09-7 .
  • Otto Mielke : Escape over 12,000 miles. Sail training ship "Herzogin Cecilie" , Munich (Moewig Verlag) 1953 ( SOS - Fate of German Ships Volume 8).

Web links

Commons : Duchess Cecilie  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Footnotes

  1. ^ Wallaroo, South Australia in the English language Wikipedia

Coordinates: 50 ° 12 ′ 52.2 "  N , 3 ° 46 ′ 49"  W.