Jaager

Some random thoughts:
 
I am guessing that something is done to turn this wood black. A quick Google does not produce an answer.
 
Get a supply of inexpensive hard hardwood.  White Oak, Hard Maple, to practice on. Get more practice than you think you need.
Black Hornbeam is too rare over here to waste.
The Oak output will be mostly worthless for ship modeling.  The Maple will very useful.
But maybe buy a framing 2x4, cross cut it into 35 cm sections for initial practice.
 
A 9" benchtop bandsaw has a very limited choice of blades.  What you have to use will probably have teeth with a significant set.
The slices will have a rough and scared surface.  This is where a thickness sander function is difficult to substitute for.
A drum in a shop size drill press can do it with a lot of manipulation.
These saws are not engineered for resawning thick billets of dense hardwood.  Blade tracking has minimal control.  The blades are narrow.  Because of the work that it is doing, the blade may wander no matter what you do. Getting something useful from a wedge shaped slice - with  the degree of wedge being different along the length?  It is difficult and the waste often exceeds 50%.
 
In an ideal world, you would find someone nearby with a big boy bandsaw,  who will do this for you.  He would have a Wood Slicer resaw blade - slight set and narrow blade thickness, or Resaw King carbide, or Lenox bimetal.  Your stock is small enough that the risk of it breaking a blade that runs from $50 to $200 is pretty low.  With the right sort of bribe, you may have a way to get modeling stock of proper domestic wood, at a reasonable cost and near limitless availability.
 
It is difficult to find the sweet spot for the thickness of the bandsaw slices.  How much additional thickness is needed to remove the blade scars from both faces and get a 220 grit perfect face on both sides with the desired final thickness?
 
As for the slice orientation, you must back calculate. What do you want the outside face of the wale to look like?
If the resaw stock slice is the thickness of the wale, and the 4" tablesaw slice is the vertical width, then the look of the face of the slice will be what the wale shows.
Your stock looks to be quarter sawn.  A slice parallel to the grain may show as a single color with zero figure.
A slice perpendicular to the grain will show two colors and probably some figure.
With Maple, a resaw of a large plane cut plank can be different from slice to slice.  The end grain will be a series of concentric rings. A slice across this can hit these rings from 45 degrees or more to horizontal and back to 45 degrees.   The look can go from clear to flame, to fleck.  Each is different.  With quarter sawn, it will be something, but each one will be pretty much the same.

The supposition that nothing is known about Sea Witch is totally false.
These ships were not subjects for mass production and keeping secrete a new and successful design was not done.  John W. Griffiths was all about reputation and accolades about his skill as a naval architect. To quote Chapelle  in SSUS:
"Sea Witch is the only named clipper ship whose offsets he published, and her lines and sail plan are one of three designs of his clippers that he retained.  These are now in the Museum of History and Technology...."
HIC drafted these plans for publication. Copies of these plan are available for purchase from S.I.   The Mariner's also sells plans from a different draftsman that are not near as good.
There is a serious question about the location of the bowsprit relative to the foredeck.  There is a paper that explores this in the NRJ.  No citation, and I am not sure whether it is CD 1 or CD 2.  Anyone serious about this field, should either own both CDs or have the physical volumes.  I go with the new ideas presented in the paper.
 
The facts about what constitutes a valid historically important model as opposed to being decoration are inconvenient and uncomfortable.  For most kits, being the former is not realistic.  But when scratch building a subject that does not otherwise exist, it is important not to mislead posterity. It should be clear where speculation, reconstruction and fantasy are used.  Specious hyperbole will not refute this.

As far as the standardization of rigging, I see the following as factors:
Ship's crew could often be from a wide range of countries.
The skill level would vary. 
Some may have a marginal intelligence.
Middle of the night, very dark, wet and pitching deck, a bad storm right on you.
Guessing which rope does what seems like a very bad idea to me.

Some random thoughts:
 
I am guessing that something is done to turn this wood black. A quick Google does not produce an answer.
 
Get a supply of inexpensive hard hardwood.  White Oak, Hard Maple, to practice on. Get more practice than you think you need.
Black Hornbeam is too rare over here to waste.
The Oak output will be mostly worthless for ship modeling.  The Maple will very useful.
But maybe buy a framing 2x4, cross cut it into 35 cm sections for initial practice.
 
A 9" benchtop bandsaw has a very limited choice of blades.  What you have to use will probably have teeth with a significant set.
The slices will have a rough and scared surface.  This is where a thickness sander function is difficult to substitute for.
A drum in a shop size drill press can do it with a lot of manipulation.
These saws are not engineered for resawning thick billets of dense hardwood.  Blade tracking has minimal control.  The blades are narrow.  Because of the work that it is doing, the blade may wander no matter what you do. Getting something useful from a wedge shaped slice - with  the degree of wedge being different along the length?  It is difficult and the waste often exceeds 50%.
 
In an ideal world, you would find someone nearby with a big boy bandsaw,  who will do this for you.  He would have a Wood Slicer resaw blade - slight set and narrow blade thickness, or Resaw King carbide, or Lenox bimetal.  Your stock is small enough that the risk of it breaking a blade that runs from $50 to $200 is pretty low.  With the right sort of bribe, you may have a way to get modeling stock of proper domestic wood, at a reasonable cost and near limitless availability.
 
It is difficult to find the sweet spot for the thickness of the bandsaw slices.  How much additional thickness is needed to remove the blade scars from both faces and get a 220 grit perfect face on both sides with the desired final thickness?
 
As for the slice orientation, you must back calculate. What do you want the outside face of the wale to look like?
If the resaw stock slice is the thickness of the wale, and the 4" tablesaw slice is the vertical width, then the look of the face of the slice will be what the wale shows.
Your stock looks to be quarter sawn.  A slice parallel to the grain may show as a single color with zero figure.
A slice perpendicular to the grain will show two colors and probably some figure.
With Maple, a resaw of a large plane cut plank can be different from slice to slice.  The end grain will be a series of concentric rings. A slice across this can hit these rings from 45 degrees or more to horizontal and back to 45 degrees.   The look can go from clear to flame, to fleck.  Each is different.  With quarter sawn, it will be something, but each one will be pretty much the same.

To stir a bit of controversy into this pot:
 
Tanganica does not show up in the Wood Database - not a good sign - a Google comes up with Anigre - This is probably a close approximation of its color.  I would proceed with the concept that Tanganica is an umbrella name for several similar species and the exact species depends on what the wood cutters dropped off on that day.  It might be more open grain than is desired.
 
African Walnut is not really a Walnut.  It has a similar range of color, so the name is for marketing, and not forestry or botany.
It is sort of a Mahogany so the pore and grain structure could be better.  Even Black Walnut, as beautiful as it is, has a troublesome open pore structure. Anything other than Juglans nigra that is called Walnut, is actually a poser.
 
Mayflower is very late 16th or early 17th century.  It is a merchantman.  Any scantlings are difficult to find.  Any models are based on plans that are pure conjecture.  The properties of wood are the same over the entire  time of wooden hull vessels.  The goal would be to use planking that is thick enough to sustain the size hull of the vessel but no thicker.  With this in mind, using tables of scantlings from a much later time and looking up the acceptable planking thickness vs vessel size would a yield a realistic result as far as minimum plank thickness.  If the vessel did not sink soon after launch, it sort of had to be close.  Even with official planking dimensions there were two very different planking thickness ranges.  If a Softwood was used (~Pine) it would be an inch or two thicker than if a Hardwood (~Oak) was used.  This is a complete PITA for us.
 
If there were real plans and they were inside the planking, 
If two layer POB was in play,
The sum of the thicknesses of the two layers should be equal to the actual planking thickness.
If the POB moulds are scratch lofted, the planking thickness can be subtracted at the beginning and any thickness can be used.
With Mayflower, the actual hull size is a guess anyway, so most any thickness of veneer should do.  But just not so thick as to eatup too much of the depth of the keel. 
 
One option for you would be to pay a visit to a local WoodCraft store and examine their available veneer.  You might could break lucky and find a local Pa&Paw woodworkers store with a wide selection of veneers, but in the world that MBA's have left us (i.e short term profit is the whole of it) I doubt it is likely. 
 
Because of scale considerations, most species used for veneer are a poor choice.  Generally woodworkers want "interesting looking" veneer.  We want the exact opposite.  Open or closed pore does not matter to them.  It does matter to us.   This limits the number of appropriate veneer species.  Southeast US, the likely choices that meet our needs are Beech, Birch, Hard Maple, Black Cherry, Holly.  Checking the WoodCraft company locations, it seems that Hat Lanta is where your nearest store is.  The advantages of this are, seeing what is available before purchase, relatively low cost, easy to get more.  A wide sheet is fine.  The planks are easily and economically spilled.  A quality steel ruler, an exquisitely  sharp knife (violin makers knife) will free the planks from the sheet. Power tools are not needed. 
 
I viewed something here recently that near horrified me.  There are POB kits that have the wale(s) mounted as an extra layer of the same planking as the second layer.  This for vessels of a time when wales stood proud above the planking.  The wale(s) should be their own complete unit. They should be thicker ( twice or more) and go directly on the base layer. They should go on first.  The second outside plank strake should be the garboard.  The garboard needs to be pretty much spilled from a piece of wood that is twice the width of the widest regular planking - to get it to lay properly.  This defines the space where the rest of the planking lays.  It makes it possible to get the proper runs of strakes.
 

If you do a deep search into the vessel name, location and captain - you have a high probability of discovering that the vessel is not a clipper.
The time of the clippers was 20 years earlier.
The hull looks a bit short and small to be rigged as a clipper.
A combination of schooner and ship rig had become popular because a smaller crew was needed.
I would bet, the fore was square rigged and the mizzen was schooner rigged.  The main? Flip a coin, but I bet schooner.
Rather than directly use a commercial kit rigging plan, go to the same sources that they used.  There are several books on rigging that were published about that time.  There are books for modelers that extracted and made systematic the information from those original sources.  
For the large and cutthroat sailing ships, an age of ugliness in rigging was coming into use around 1874 = steel lines, chain, turnbuckles.  An actual clipper in 1874 probably was rigged using the new tech.   I am betting that the model that you have is a bit more prosaic.  The rigging was probably still natural fiber. Any further information is likely to provide an identification for the actual rig. 
A barque is easier to rig.

OK, well Allan has given you the initial part of it.
This mostly applies to the RN,  in the period around the time of Leopard. 
For a vessel that has not migrated into the "being popular and translated to derived plans" zone:
The plans for most vessels can be seen on the NMM site. Copies of most of them can be purchased from the site.  It is usually necessary for accuracy to bite the bullet and purchase the lines plan.  The full size rather than a less expensive reduced size costs more money, but saves on frustration and regret.  This is a "if I had it to do over" lesson.
The framing and decks are something that I choose to get by saving the large size JPEG from the site. Close enough is good enough.
In the past, the scantlings were from a copy of Steele,  right now they can be had more easily:
 
SCANTLINGS OF THE ROYAL NAVY 1719-1805
Comparisons of 1719, 1745 Establishments, Ship Builders Repository and Steel?s Elements and Practice
by Allan Yedlinsky  
SeaWatch Books
 
The RN made heavy use of filling frames.  North America and France most often did not use them. There was a lot more timber in both of these regions, so they did not have to cheat.   The RN tended to reduce the sided dimension of frame timbers serially the higher up they were.  North America and France generally did not.  I work from the premise that North America used RN scantlings for the floors and just kept them the same up to the tops - which may have been lighter - I plank over, so I ignore this.  France sometimes used lighter scantlings - their ships did not do much station keeping in dangerous seas for years on end.  It tended to irritate the RN when they captured such a ship and tried to use it.  The French were also less prone to reduce higher timbers or jog them.
 
The room and space - room from Steele - space from the plans.  The distance between the station lines and what the number or letter is, provides this information.  The physics of wood and the forces of the sea tended to keep the scantlings of timbers within a narrow range for the 250-300 year range that most of us are interested in.  The space was fad prone and idiosyncratic.  They were continuously running an experiment - without controls and with no useful way to evaluate the data - so it was all a hunch, a guess, unfounded opinion, "the king likes me more so my ideas count more" sort of thing.  with windshield wiper type results.

This site is owned by the NRG which has this mission statement:
The Guild is a non-profit educational organization whose mission is to “Advance Ship Modeling Through Research”. We provide support to our members in their efforts to raise the quality of their model ships.
 
What you are suggesting is pretty much the opposite of the Guild's mission.
This does not preclude you from having a build log here that involves doing this. 
It is important that there be no self delusion about the historical validity and value of this sort of product.  Were you to do this, you would likely be in the majority as far as real historical integrity in your product.  Most mass market kits seem to only have a passing acquaintance with what their purported subject actually was. 
It comes down to your personal goals.  But it does seem to be a waste of the effort involved in a scratch build by starting from a totally false plan.
 
Bob Cleek pretty much nailed what doing something like this means yesterday in post #22 in the thread:
Shop Notes, Ship Modeling Tips, Techniques and Research
Looking for plans for USS Hamilton - War of 1812
post #22
I can't figure out how to do this as a link.
 

If you do a deep search into the vessel name, location and captain - you have a high probability of discovering that the vessel is not a clipper.
The time of the clippers was 20 years earlier.
The hull looks a bit short and small to be rigged as a clipper.
A combination of schooner and ship rig had become popular because a smaller crew was needed.
I would bet, the fore was square rigged and the mizzen was schooner rigged.  The main? Flip a coin, but I bet schooner.
Rather than directly use a commercial kit rigging plan, go to the same sources that they used.  There are several books on rigging that were published about that time.  There are books for modelers that extracted and made systematic the information from those original sources.  
For the large and cutthroat sailing ships, an age of ugliness in rigging was coming into use around 1874 = steel lines, chain, turnbuckles.  An actual clipper in 1874 probably was rigged using the new tech.   I am betting that the model that you have is a bit more prosaic.  The rigging was probably still natural fiber. Any further information is likely to provide an identification for the actual rig. 
A barque is easier to rig.

I find lacquer thinner to be so awful, that I would not consider using it for anything except for where it is a requirement.  That is, with lacquer.
If isopropyl alcohol is an alternative to Tamiya thinner, then part of the problem with using lacquer thinner may be because it evaporates more quickly than Iso-OH.  Some of the paint may have gone on near dry.  It also may have done bad things to a primer, if one was there.  Organic lacquer thinner is so noxious, even the Green alternative, I do not use it for anything but brushing lacquer (on paper patterns).  It is bad enough to be around just from evaporation,  I would would not aerosol it mechanically unless it was in a glove box and the box was vented to the outside.
 
Here in the US, isopropanol can be had in several forms.  Maybe 50%, certainly 70%, and 91% and the difference is water.  I doubt that any of these will play nice with a paint solvent that does not crash when lacquer thinner is mixed with it.  Water and organic solvents are mostly incompatible.   100% (99.9%) Iso-OH is out there,  if not as easy to get. ... OK - Amazon sells it for about $40/gal.

OK, well Allan has given you the initial part of it.
This mostly applies to the RN,  in the period around the time of Leopard. 
For a vessel that has not migrated into the "being popular and translated to derived plans" zone:
The plans for most vessels can be seen on the NMM site. Copies of most of them can be purchased from the site.  It is usually necessary for accuracy to bite the bullet and purchase the lines plan.  The full size rather than a less expensive reduced size costs more money, but saves on frustration and regret.  This is a "if I had it to do over" lesson.
The framing and decks are something that I choose to get by saving the large size JPEG from the site. Close enough is good enough.
In the past, the scantlings were from a copy of Steele,  right now they can be had more easily:
 
SCANTLINGS OF THE ROYAL NAVY 1719-1805
Comparisons of 1719, 1745 Establishments, Ship Builders Repository and Steel?s Elements and Practice
by Allan Yedlinsky  
SeaWatch Books
 
The RN made heavy use of filling frames.  North America and France most often did not use them. There was a lot more timber in both of these regions, so they did not have to cheat.   The RN tended to reduce the sided dimension of frame timbers serially the higher up they were.  North America and France generally did not.  I work from the premise that North America used RN scantlings for the floors and just kept them the same up to the tops - which may have been lighter - I plank over, so I ignore this.  France sometimes used lighter scantlings - their ships did not do much station keeping in dangerous seas for years on end.  It tended to irritate the RN when they captured such a ship and tried to use it.  The French were also less prone to reduce higher timbers or jog them.
 
The room and space - room from Steele - space from the plans.  The distance between the station lines and what the number or letter is, provides this information.  The physics of wood and the forces of the sea tended to keep the scantlings of timbers within a narrow range for the 250-300 year range that most of us are interested in.  The space was fad prone and idiosyncratic.  They were continuously running an experiment - without controls and with no useful way to evaluate the data - so it was all a hunch, a guess, unfounded opinion, "the king likes me more so my ideas count more" sort of thing.  with windshield wiper type results.

Hazel -- from what I can find from the Wood Database - this looks to be a promising species
Pacific Dogwood - if it is similar to Cornus florida - our state flower - you have something special - great for carvings, delicate or strength wanted deck furniture - blocks, deadeyes - do not waste it on parts like frames, beams, planking - unless your supply of it is large and limitless.
Crab Apple -  most any fruit wood is more than excellent.  I consider Apple to be a king.  It is just difficult for me to source.
Yew  -  They do or did make a vary toxic chemo agent from this - I suggest that getting up close and personal with it is not a good idea
Viburnum  -  not a clue, I would have to see it.  But, I see arrow wood as a characteristic associated with it.  Was it  the Apache who used reeds?  Straight, light weight, and had hollow point characteristics on impact?   If it is pithy I would stay away.  For spars, dowels are subject to problems, I would be cautious with a rod that Nature made, no matter how straight.
Juniper - if it is similar to our Red Cedar - I would not use it.
 
Frame spacing -  there is no simple answer - there are no rules pf the sort that you are seeking.  It pretty much varied from ship to ship. There were fads, even with the RN.  It could be seriously different at 20 year intervals.  The RN was down right peculiar and obsessively detailed in their framing.  But not at all predictable from ship class to ship class in what those details were.
There is another factor in play: POF scratch modelers.  If a model has frames showing, unless it was a classroom engineering model or a tech demo model, there is a good chance that the framing is stylized.  It was probably built to show off the frames.  The actual frames were probably so close together that they would be quite unattractive to display.
 
From your questions, I am guessing that you are just now dipping your toe into all this.
Any sailing warship of the line is difficult slog for the most skilled of us.  HMS Leopard  is not as overwhelming  as Victory or Sovereign, but it is a huge bite. 
In your place, I would begin with something much smaller.  I would do POF, but totally plank the outside and the deck.  I would wait until I had a much deeper understanding of this complex subject and a lot of build experience before attempting to build a model showing the guts of the thing.
 
But to clarify where I am coming from:  I am much attracted to open framing below the wale - My favorite is the stylized 17th century Navy Board.
The framing above the wale is about as interesting to me as 2x4 house framing.  I think it mostly had the same utilitarian function. To me it is pug ugly.  I am also not all that enamored with omitting desk planking either.

I find lacquer thinner to be so awful, that I would not consider using it for anything except for where it is a requirement.  That is, with lacquer.
If isopropyl alcohol is an alternative to Tamiya thinner, then part of the problem with using lacquer thinner may be because it evaporates more quickly than Iso-OH.  Some of the paint may have gone on near dry.  It also may have done bad things to a primer, if one was there.  Organic lacquer thinner is so noxious, even the Green alternative, I do not use it for anything but brushing lacquer (on paper patterns).  It is bad enough to be around just from evaporation,  I would would not aerosol it mechanically unless it was in a glove box and the box was vented to the outside.
 
Here in the US, isopropanol can be had in several forms.  Maybe 50%, certainly 70%, and 91% and the difference is water.  I doubt that any of these will play nice with a paint solvent that does not crash when lacquer thinner is mixed with it.  Water and organic solvents are mostly incompatible.   100% (99.9%) Iso-OH is out there,  if not as easy to get. ... OK - Amazon sells it for about $40/gal.

Larry,
You might consider deleting your email address from open view and use a PM instead.  Web crawlers ... Nigerian princes ... phishing attacks ... bad actors

When the site screen is a display for the whole of it, there is a column of links on the lower right.  One of them is for Sea Watch Books.
I just clicked the link and the entire series is still available.   I would not depend on that being a long term situation.  As I wrote in a parallel thread. 
my reading of the tea leaves,  of signs and portents suggests that if you ever want any of the book listed there,  sooner rather than later would be when you should
place your order.   I generally would purchase each year's new editions as a single order, so a large order is not unheard of there.

I find lacquer thinner to be so awful, that I would not consider using it for anything except for where it is a requirement.  That is, with lacquer.
If isopropyl alcohol is an alternative to Tamiya thinner, then part of the problem with using lacquer thinner may be because it evaporates more quickly than Iso-OH.  Some of the paint may have gone on near dry.  It also may have done bad things to a primer, if one was there.  Organic lacquer thinner is so noxious, even the Green alternative, I do not use it for anything but brushing lacquer (on paper patterns).  It is bad enough to be around just from evaporation,  I would would not aerosol it mechanically unless it was in a glove box and the box was vented to the outside.
 
Here in the US, isopropanol can be had in several forms.  Maybe 50%, certainly 70%, and 91% and the difference is water.  I doubt that any of these will play nice with a paint solvent that does not crash when lacquer thinner is mixed with it.  Water and organic solvents are mostly incompatible.   100% (99.9%) Iso-OH is out there,  if not as easy to get. ... OK - Amazon sells it for about $40/gal.

Black Cherry  is the common name for Prunus serotina.  I see that you are west coast US.  The growing range for the tree is, I think eastern US.  It grows tall, straight and can have a fairly thick trunk.
 It is sort of pinkish when cut - or darker.  Components (I think poly phenols) oxidize over time to a dark red.  It is prized as a furniture wood.  The fruit is not eaten often -small and mostly seed.  The bark was/is used to make wild cherry syrup - an old time vehicle for liquid medicines compounded in local pharmacies.  Birds do eat the fruit and spread the seeds.  It often grows as a volunteer in fence rows.  
The tree that grows commercial cherries is usually too small to make it worth harvest as timber.  I tree that I harvested - way back when, was similar to Black Cherry in texture and hardness, but it was yellow green and did not darken.  It would serve our uses as far as its physical properties, but not yield the distinctive color of Black Cherry.
 
So, to answer your question,  it is likely that any hardwood lumber listed as Cherry is indeed Black Cherry.  The seller that lists it as simply "Cherry" is missing a free selling point by omitting the "Black".  
 
As much as I like Black Cherry, to be fair,  Pear (Pyrus  communis) is a step above for our uses. The color is similar but I think less intense.  The grain is less obvious.  It does not have the very dark inclusions that are common in Black Cherry.  It is my impression that this Pear has fruit that is only of interest to wild critters.  It is primarily a European citizen that it is often a weed.  And here in the US it is used as root stock for commercial Pear varieties.  This keeps it short and likely smallish in diameter.

I find lacquer thinner to be so awful, that I would not consider using it for anything except for where it is a requirement.  That is, with lacquer.
If isopropyl alcohol is an alternative to Tamiya thinner, then part of the problem with using lacquer thinner may be because it evaporates more quickly than Iso-OH.  Some of the paint may have gone on near dry.  It also may have done bad things to a primer, if one was there.  Organic lacquer thinner is so noxious, even the Green alternative, I do not use it for anything but brushing lacquer (on paper patterns).  It is bad enough to be around just from evaporation,  I would would not aerosol it mechanically unless it was in a glove box and the box was vented to the outside.
 
Here in the US, isopropanol can be had in several forms.  Maybe 50%, certainly 70%, and 91% and the difference is water.  I doubt that any of these will play nice with a paint solvent that does not crash when lacquer thinner is mixed with it.  Water and organic solvents are mostly incompatible.   100% (99.9%) Iso-OH is out there,  if not as easy to get. ... OK - Amazon sells it for about $40/gal.

Mike, 
 
I have no problem at all with you disagreeing about this. 
You are offering an alternative to becoming a solo sawmill for Europe.   I have the hope that by waving the home sawmill red flag,  a similar alternative for North America will make an appearance and refute me. This is an often asked question, here.  I do not recall reading an easy answer to it.  I am expressing what I feel is a realistic view of what is involved with scratch POF - at least here in North America.  I totally support the ambition for scratch POF.  I wish the that the barrier into it was a low one.  I find the wiederholen Sie das , (or singing Kathlene over the ship's intercom) aspect of kits to be ....wearing.  
 
The whole solo sawmill option is really a distraction from our primary goal.   The advantages are an increase in the number of species of wood that can be used and that after several hulls, the investment in tools is recovered -  as long as you leave your man hours expended out of the equation. It also offers some comfort to those of us who are driven to be as self sufficient as is possible.  But, it is impossible to be compensated at an hourly rate that is commensurate with that for the necessary skill level to do this.  Including that factor would probably keep any recouping of expenditure impossible.  But, since the alternative use of that time would not likely be a money making activity, it probably should be excluded.
 
You have access to one of the first line species and in a form that is readily usable.  From some build logs  it seems that Pear is not difficult to source in Europe.  I trust that you appreciate your good fortune with that.  And also value those who do the work to mill it for you.  In North America, it is fast becoming a situation where it is rare to source any milled stock other than the totally awful Balsa or the merely terrible Basswood.  Its cousin Linden/Lime is about 100% better, but that is not really available here.  Pear in any form is difficult to find and the price is prohibitive.  

There is one factor with a single planked hull - kit or scratch - the structure that supports the planking must be close enough together to support a smooth run of planking with a secure bond.
 
If a a double planked POB hull is supplied with the proper filling material between the moulds, a single layer of planking will do  -  if proper attention is shown to the scantlings.
If a builder is lofting a scratch POB hull [emoticon with a painful wince]  and if the complete lower hull is to be coppered  - with proper lofting and filling between the moulds - no planking is needed below the waterline.  The coppering can be laid directly on the support.  It just must take the planking thickness into account.  Many older plans for solid carved or laminated carved hull construction have this feature.

Black Cherry  is the common name for Prunus serotina.  I see that you are west coast US.  The growing range for the tree is, I think eastern US.  It grows tall, straight and can have a fairly thick trunk.
 It is sort of pinkish when cut - or darker.  Components (I think poly phenols) oxidize over time to a dark red.  It is prized as a furniture wood.  The fruit is not eaten often -small and mostly seed.  The bark was/is used to make wild cherry syrup - an old time vehicle for liquid medicines compounded in local pharmacies.  Birds do eat the fruit and spread the seeds.  It often grows as a volunteer in fence rows.  
The tree that grows commercial cherries is usually too small to make it worth harvest as timber.  I tree that I harvested - way back when, was similar to Black Cherry in texture and hardness, but it was yellow green and did not darken.  It would serve our uses as far as its physical properties, but not yield the distinctive color of Black Cherry.
 
So, to answer your question,  it is likely that any hardwood lumber listed as Cherry is indeed Black Cherry.  The seller that lists it as simply "Cherry" is missing a free selling point by omitting the "Black".  
 
As much as I like Black Cherry, to be fair,  Pear (Pyrus  communis) is a step above for our uses. The color is similar but I think less intense.  The grain is less obvious.  It does not have the very dark inclusions that are common in Black Cherry.  It is my impression that this Pear has fruit that is only of interest to wild critters.  It is primarily a European citizen that it is often a weed.  And here in the US it is used as root stock for commercial Pear varieties.  This keeps it short and likely smallish in diameter.

There is one factor with a single planked hull - kit or scratch - the structure that supports the planking must be close enough together to support a smooth run of planking with a secure bond.
 
If a a double planked POB hull is supplied with the proper filling material between the moulds, a single layer of planking will do  -  if proper attention is shown to the scantlings.
If a builder is lofting a scratch POB hull [emoticon with a painful wince]  and if the complete lower hull is to be coppered  - with proper lofting and filling between the moulds - no planking is needed below the waterline.  The coppering can be laid directly on the support.  It just must take the planking thickness into account.  Many older plans for solid carved or laminated carved hull construction have this feature.

Well, Hard Maple and Black Cherry are among the species that are right for scratch building wooden sailing ship models.  Maple can be a bit interesting in what figure is on display.  It is low contrast and is generally only obvious up close.  It can be controlled by paying attention to the orientation of the stock to the resaw blade.  I see it as adding character, so it does not bother me. 
But it not one of Bob's "three or four now-exotic (over-harvested) species".  It does not seem to rate as a species to be bragged about or score points in some informal contest here.  It does however preform quite well when used for most any component of a scratch built POF ship model.   By all means burn the Oak. Go ahead and burn any soft Maple species - even though the BTU of it is fairly low.  Please burn any Sycamore - even though it probably stinks.  Sassafras and soft Elm are not so good.   But consider storing under cover any Cherry and Maple that is clear enough to be useful.

Larry,
You might consider deleting your email address from open view and use a PM instead.  Web crawlers ... Nigerian princes ... phishing attacks ... bad actors

If you are US, explore the Hard Maple and Black Cherry that Wood Craft has available.  Or, if you want a wood that is easy to hand fret saw, Yellow Poplar.  The color... well it is used in furniture, but hidden or painted - it tends to be variegated  in color.  you can  pick and choose the sections if you can stand the waste.  It is very low cost as far as hardwood goes.
To answer your first question:  too soft, crushes too easily, poor at holding an edge, too fuzzy.  If you switch to a better species, you will experience the difference, very likely.
 
Boxwood is our unicorn.  It is the ultimate wood that was used _ with Pear - in the original 17th century Navy Board models.  For our purposes, it is essentially extinct.  It is almost imperative that you harvest your trunk.  I suspect that the varieties of Boxwood used  for timber were taller, with long straight trunks.  
For your boat, it may be worth considering as frame timber.  But it would be sort of overkill.  For a ship model, the frames involve a significant portion going to waste.  A small supply of Boxwood is better used to make the parts that stick out, are curved, are prone to being broken off.  I would save it for those parts and for blocks and deadeyes.  It is too good and not easily substituted for, it use it on high volume parts that other wood will serve to accomplish.  Another factor: I have a piece of Boxwood that was originally a foundation/ border plant.  The grain is really tight and too close together for a frame timber.  In scale for a block.