The Potosi , built at the Tecklenborg shipyard in Bremerhaven , was a German five-masted barque and when it was commissioned in 1895 - after the France and the auxiliary sailor Maria Rickmers - it was the third sailing ship with this rigging, which had only been built six times . It was later renamed Flora under the Chilean flag . In the years between her commissioning and the completion of the five - masted full ship Preussen in 1902, she was the largest sailing ship in the world.
According to the custom of the shipping company F. Laeisz since 1875 , the ship was given a name beginning with "P", in this case that of the Bolivian mining town of Potosí , which is why it is counted among the Flying P-Liner . Like the other tall ships of the shipping company, she was designed as a modern three-island ship and cargo ship, with a 7.9 m long poop , 20.5 m long midship bridge and 12.5 m long forecastle . Below the main deck, the ship had another steel deck that ran lengthways. Since the Potosi was to be used in the saltpetre voyage from Chile to Germany from the start , the holds were set up to hold saltpetre in sacks. In the Laeisz tradition, the hull was black with a white water pass and the underwater hull painted red. She was a fast ship, but with a full load and severe heeling it took over a lot of water. Like all Laeisz sailors, the ship had no auxiliary drive and, for safety reasons, was brought upstream to the port of Hamburg with tug assistance on arrival in Cuxhaven .
to travel
The first skipper of the Potosi was Robert Hilgendorf , who, with his experience as a sailing ship captain , made a significant contribution to the ship's construction right from the start. He then achieved several voyage records with this ship. (Record Etmal 345 nautical miles, highest average voyage 16.5 knots ) In total, the large ship completed 27 round trips under five captains up to its internment on September 23, 1914 in Valparaíso , Chile. During the internment period 1914–1920, it was sold in 1917 to the Bremen shipping company F. A. Vinnen and in 1920 it was delivered to France as a reparation payment . From there she went to Buenos Aires ( Argentina ), a short time later to Chile to the shipping company González, Soffia & Cía. sold in Valparaíso. In Flora renamed it made under the former Laeisz Captain August Oetzmann with a cargo of saltpetre even a trip to the former home port Hamburg.
From there she sailed back to Mejillones (Chile) via Cardiff in 1925 , taking over a load of compressed coal . It later caught fire off the Patagonian coast. Certain circumstances of the course of the fire and the attempts to extinguish the fire gave cause at the time to suspect an arson. After being lowered and a huge explosion that tore open both steel decks and blew the entire rig down to the foremast, the ship burned on the beach for days. After later swimming again and driverless drifting, which caused quite a stir there, the burned-out wreck was found days later and off Comodoro Rivadavia from the Argentine cruiser Patria at 46 ° S 66 ° W Coordinates: 46 ° 0 ′ 0 ″ S , 66 ° 0 ′ 0 ″ W sunk.
-46 -66
fore, main, mizzen, jigger, spanker (English standard term)
Ship data
Construction : steel - hull as (Construction # 133). Three island ship ; Masts (lower masts and Mars stanchions one piece) made of steel; Bramstengen, royal frame made of wood
Fritz Brustat-Naval: The Cape Horn Saga. On sailing ships at the end of the world . Ullstein Taschenbuch-Vlg., Frankfurt / M. / Berlin 1987, ISBN 3-548-20831-2
Hans Jörg Furrer: The four- and five-mast square sailors in the world . Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, Herford 1984, ISBN 3-7822-0341-0 , p. 168
Jochen Brennecke: Windjammer. The great report on the development, travels and fate of the "Queens of the Seven Seas" . 3. Edition. Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, Herford 1984, ISBN 3-7822-0009-8 , chap. XXII - The largest of the sailing ships in the world, p. 298.
Hans Blöss: The splendor and fate of the "Potosi" and "Prussians", Hamburg's and the world's greatest sailors . Schmidt et al. Klaunig Verlag, Kiel 1960
Hans Georg Prager: F. Laeisz: From Freight Sailors to Bulk Carriers . Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, Herford 1974, ISBN 3-7822-0096-9
Hermann Ostermann: Potosi - pride of the German sailing ship fleet . In: Das Logbuch , 31st year 1995, issue 4, pp. 184-189, Brilon-Gudenhagen
Hans Georg Prager: Shipping company F. Laeisz - From tall ships to container travel . Koehlers Verlagsgesellschaft, Hamburg 2004, ISBN 3-7822-0880-3
Peter Klingbeil: The Flying P-Liner. The sailing ships of the shipping company F. Laeisz . Verlag "Die Hanse", Hamburg 1998/2000 , ISBN 3-434-52562-9
Manfred Prager: Comparison between the five-masted full ship “Preussen” and the five-masted barque “Potosi” on voyages to the west coast of South America and back . In: Annals of Hydrography and Maritime Meteorology - Journal for Seafaring and Oceanography, Hamburg / Berlin 1908; ISSN 0174-8114
^ Hans Georg Prager: Shipping company F. Laeisz . 4th edition. Koehler, Hamburg 2004, ISBN 3-7822-0880-3 , pp.214 (according to the Meteorological Journal on board the POTOSI, 8th voyage 1900, Deutscher Wetterdienst Hamburg, captain Robert Hilgendorf (May 10/11) quoted on the cover page in the front cover: "Greatest distance (376 nm), which the POTOSI has done so far, we could only have steered better, then it would have been a little more. ").
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