Peter Rickmers (ship)

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The Peter Rickmers in a painting

The Peter Rickmers was a large freighter flying the flag of Rickmers Reismühlen, Rhederei und Schiffbau A.-G. ; she was the only one on all masts skysegel leading four-masted full ship in the world merchant fleet and the only ever for a German shipping company built four-masted full-rigged ship.

description

On 18 October 1889, the steel hull ran the four-masted full ship at the shipyard of Russell & Co. , Port Glasgow , Scotland , for the Rickmers rice mills, Rhederei- and shipbuilding AG , Bremerhaven , from the stack August, christened Peter Rickmers (* 8 1838, † December 15, 1902), the company owner and son of Rickmer Clasen Rickmers . The ship was built as a three-island ship for trips to Southeast Asia. In addition to the back and poop , there was a third high deck amidships above the main deck, which extended from one side to the other. This midship bridge (midship island) is also known as the "Liverpool House" because sailing ships from Liverpool were first equipped with this structure. The strikingly slender hull was painted green (surface hull) and red ( changeable aisle and underwater hull) in the shipping tradition, and the outer walls of the forecastle, high deck and poop in white according to the shipping company colors "green - red - white". On the foredeck between the high deck and the forecastle there was another deckhouse with the steam engine for the steam winches. Four lifeboats in davits were mounted in pairs behind the fore and aft mast, with a hatch in front of each mast. The bow anchors, which weighed tons, were lashed to the forecastle, with the large capstan in the middle. A helm was installed both near the stern on the poop and on the high deck. The steel masts consisted of three segments (lower mast, Mars and Bramstenge (the latter with Royal and Skystenge as one piece)). The masts were called: foremast , main mast , aft mast (main mast), cross mast . She led double Mars sails , slab sails and royals , plus as the only four-masted full ship ever built, Skysails on all four masts. Under the 19.5 m long bowsprit (bowsprit and jib boom made from one piece), a representation of the company owner and namesake Peter Rickmers in sailor clothing adorned the bow as a figurehead. It is preserved in a local museum . According to tradition, the sailors of the figure put a stuffed tobacco pipe in their mouths when the ship entered a port. It was removed again when the anchor was lifted.

The Peter Rickmers already had excellent sailing properties in light winds (so-called light winds) and achieved economic success for her shipowner with mostly fast voyages. Constructed for the sea area of ​​East Asia, from which she predominantly transported rice for the company's own Rickmers Reismühlen GmbH, she also had two voyages around the world, both from west to east around Cape Horn (1901, 1902). She was considered by many marine authors, German (Jochen Brennecke, Otto Höver ) and international (Basil Lubbock), as the most beautiful square sailor of her time.

One often finds that the Peter Rickmers was the only four-masted full ship under the German flag, which is incorrect. It is correct, however, that the fast sailor Peter Rickmers was the only four-masted full ship that was built for German accounts and therefore sailed exclusively under the German flag from the start. While the type was very common in Great Britain, a four-masted full ship was never built at a German shipyard, and there were very few of these rigs under the German flag, all of which came from England, Northern Ireland or Scotland: Frieda ex County of Edinburgh (1885), 1901-1914 sailed under the flag of A. Witte, Bremen (after Basil Lubbock, however, re-rigged as a four-masted barque, after H.-J. Furrer not), furthermore H. Bischoff ex Dampfer Ville de Paris (1865) of the “Compagnie Générale Transatlantique “, Converted in Blyth in 1889 into a four-masted full ship for the shipping company H. Bischof & Co., Bremen, and run under their flag from 1889–1900 or Christel Vinnen ex Alster ex California , built in 1890 by Harland & Wolff . The Peter Rickmers was also the only four-masted full ship ever built in the world merchant fleet (and thus also the only sailing ship) with sky sails on all (four) masts - that is (with divided Mars and Bramsail) seven square sails on each mast.

On the jib top the ship carried the host country flag (USA, Australia, Japan etc.), in the large top the shipping company flag (green-red-white with white R), in the eight-top (main top) the red-framed ship pennant with the ship's name. The home port of Bremen was set in the cross top. The home country flag waved on the Besangaffel, including the signal flags of the differentiation signal. In European-Anglo-Saxon literature, the Peter Rickmers is often referred to as a “four-masted barque”, which completely contradicts the facts. A very nice model (scale 1: 100) with many details about the original can be seen on "Bernd Jochams Schiffseiten". The Hamburg marine painter Johannes Holst (October 22, 1880 - July 3, 1965) depicted Peter Rickmers several times in his more than 1,500 paintings .

history

Georeferencing Map with all coordinates of the history section : OSM


The Peter Rickmers was after a 720 GRT wooden barque (1867-1884; sold to Finland and renamed Widja ) the second sailing ship of this name. The ship's voyages mainly led to Far Eastern ports (e.g. Rangoon , Singapore , Olehele ( Sumatra ), Hong Kong , Hiogo ( Kobe )) to transport rice for their own mills and wheat , but also to the west coast of the USA ( Portland , Astoria ). When leaving the country, the freight consisted of coal, crates of kerosene and other bulk goods .

On her first voyage under Captain Hans Andresen, after commissioning on November 6, 1889, she sailed from Glasgow through the Bristol Channel around the Cape of Good Hope to Rangoon with a load of coal to take over rice in sacks, which she brought to Bremerhaven (20. July 1890). Further trips took the ship to Hong Kong, Nagasaki , Hiogo (Kobe). On the first of the two world voyages, which lasted a little more than a year, she sailed on April 18, 1900 from New York to Hong Kong, around Australia and New Zealand to the North American west coast to Portland (Oregon) (141 days) and around Cape Horn to Falmouth (July 24, 1901 for instructions, then to Antwerp). The second voyage around the world, lasting over two years, took the ship from Antwerp across the Atlantic to Philadelphia on September 19, 1901 , and from there on December 8, 1901 far (500 nm , ice sighting) around the Cape of Good Hope on April 14 Hiogo, from there in 30 days (July 20 - August 19, 1902) to Astoria, from there on October 1 with wheat around Cape Horn back to Falmouth (January 22, 1903) and Antwerp.

On July 29, 1905, more than 50 tall ships at 41 ° N 32 ° W in the Atlantic got into a day-long slack in the Rossbreiten , including Germany's most famous full ships, the five-master Prussia loaded with saltpeter on the voyage home from Iquique and the four-master Peter Rickmers from a long journey from Burma with a cargo of rice. Both fast ships were excellent idlers. When they approached within shouting distance, the Rickmers captain signaled Bandelin “ Scurvy on board”. Captain Boye Richard Petersen, the commander of the huge Laeisz sailor, had potatoes and vegetables brought on board the Peter Rickmers and stayed near the Rickmers ship for a few days until the wind picked up on August 6 and the voyage home could be continued.

Excerpt from the travels of Peter Rickmers

  • 1889/90: Glasgow (coal) - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1890/90: Cardiff (coal) - Olehele (North Sumatra ) - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1891/91: Cardiff (coal) - Singapore - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • ...
  • 1894/94: Cardiff (coal) - Singapore - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1895/95: Cardiff (coal) - Singapore - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1896/96: Cardiff (coal) - Singapore - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • ...
  • 1898/99: New York (118,916 crates of petroleum) - Hiogo (Kobe) - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1899/00: New York (117,716 crates of petroleum) - Hong Kong - Yangon - Dover (rice)
  • 1900/01: New York (117,700 crates of petroleum) - Hong Kong - Portland, Oregon - Antwerp (wheat)
  • 1901/03: Antwerp - Philadelphia ( crate oil ) - Hiogo - Astoria, Oregon - Falmouth - Antwerp (wheat)
  • 1903/04: Barry (coal) - Nagasaki - Singapore - Rangoon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1905/05: New York (117,734 crates of petroleum) - Singapore - Yangon - Bremen (rice)
  • 1905/06: Bremerhaven - New York (117,800 crates of petroleum) - Singapore - Rangoon - Bremerhaven (rice)

Shortly after 5:00 a.m. on October 29, 1906, the fast four-masted full-rigged ship, led by Captain Heinrich Plate, on the voyage from Singapore and Rangoon with a cargo of rice coming from WSW, on the Bremen course, rammed into the exit of the English Channel (51 ° 02 " 50 'N, 1 ° 21 "54' E ) off Dover with 9 to 10 kn, through no fault of its own, the 2,243 GRT and 27-year-old cargo steamer Hermann (call sign QFVM) of the Bremen steamship company Argo, which at 7 kn on the opposite course in front of the bow of the faster Wanted to cruise. He sank after a short time with the captain and 19 men, four could be rescued. The four- master started at Vlissingen in the Netherlands , where it was repaired and brought to Bremerhaven. The Maritime Administration negotiation found no fault on the part of the Peter Rickmers ship's command, as the good visibility of the tall ship's position lights could also be checked without any doubt, which could have been a possible complicity.

On April 30, 1908, the ship ran aground after leaving New York Harbor , breaking the towline and drifting northeast onto the sandbanks near Fire Island . She was en route from Perth Amboy, New Jersey , to Rangoon ( Burma ) with a cargo of petroleum in 119,000 boxes. The cause was the incapacity of the skipper, who could have prevented the accident. All rescue attempts failed, all crew members survived. Almost three weeks later, on May 19, 1908, the wreck, still laden with 95,000 crates of petroleum, burned down. A theory at the time blamed the oystercatchers as the arsonists who wanted to prevent an oil spill on the mussel and oyster banks. There was also talk of spontaneous combustion, because some beach residents had stocked up on the Peter Rickmers' fuel , which was so easily ignitable that some of the supplies and storage shed burned down. Something similar may have happened on the wreck. It is now sunk meters deep in the sand.

The maritime office negotiation of June 15, 1908 in Bremen made Captain Georg Bachmann solely responsible for the accident. According to the negotiation protocol Strandungsstelle lay south of the western end of Fire Iceland, near the position of 40 ° 36 '  N , 73 ° 17'  W . There are other stranding locations mentioned in the literature, such as the one one mile east of the Jones Inlet ( 40 ° 35 ′  N , 73 ° 33 ′  W , Jones Inlet) or near Short Beach. You can also find the information 40 ° 35 '  N , 70 ° 31'  W , which corresponds to a position southwest of Nantucket Island, which is certainly wrong.

Ship data

See also

List of the largest sailing ships in the world

literature

  • Hans-Jörg Furrer: The four- and five-masted square sailors in the world . Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, Herford , 1984, pp. 117 and 164, ISBN 3-7822-0341-0
  • Basil Lubbock: The Last of the Windjammers . Vol. 2. Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow 1929, 1948 and 1976 (reprint)

Web links

Commons : Peter Rickmers  - Collection of images, videos and audio files


Coordinates: 40 ° 35 ′ 2 "  N , 73 ° 31 ′ 16"  W.