Scottish Maid Topsail Yard

[gthursby]

I'm rigging my model of SCOTTISH MAID with some sails, but not in full sail. I'm hoping to use the configuration shown in the attached  contemporary painting of her. The topsail yard seems to be on the mast but without a sail. There is no obvious furled sail on yard shown in the painting but would you expect to find one there? Also, would the yard in this state just be rigged with lifts and braces or would it also have ropes connecting it to the lower foresail yard?

Thanks, Graham

[popeye2sea]

The yard you are asking about is the topgallant. The topsail is set on it's yard.

The topgallant yard will have a halliard, lifts,  and braces. That is what holds the yard up there.  If there is no sail bent on to the yard sometimes the sheet and clew were toggled or seized together.

Unless I am mistaken, there does appear to be a sail furled on the topgallant yard. You can see the additional bulk on top of the yard and the clews of the sail hanging down towards the topsail yard.

 

For later square riggers there was sometimes rigged a downhaul that connected the upper and lower topsail yards, but that would not be the case here. I know of no other lines that would run between the two yards.

 

Regards,

Henry

[gthursby]

Thanks very much for your detailed reply, Popeye2sea

[Dr PR]

On smaller topsail schooners the topgallant yard often just had a halliard, or a halliard and lifts. The clews of the topgallant sail were fastened to the topsail yard arms (end of the yard), and the topgallant followed the angle of the topsail as it was set with the topsail yard braces.

 

The topgallant sail was often lashed to the yard on deck and then hauled aloft where a crewman released the sail and attached the clews to the topsail yardarms. The arrangement shown in your drawing is interesting in that the topgallant yard is aloft but no sail is attached. It is possible that the sail was brought out of the sail locker when needed and hauled aloft to be attached to the topgallant yard.

 

With the topgallant set the vessel was pretty "lively" and susceptible to capsizing if a strong squall hit it broadside. There are numerous accounts of this happening. So the topgallant was used only in light winds when necessary to get more speed, and it had a simple rig so the yard and sail could be dropped to the deck very quickly when the wind stiffened. Even the topsail posed this hazard in really strong winds on some vessels.

 

The British considered American topsail schooners to be over rigged and used a smaller sail area on their schooners, until they observed that the American vessels (often smugglers or privateers) could run away from them with ease with all their canvas set. The Brits eventually came around to "over rigging" their topsail schooners to get more speed. And they lost several of them in high winds.

[gthursby]

Thanks for the very detailed reply, Phil.

[gthursby]

Where would the topgallant yard be kept when not required? Somewhere on the deck or kept atop the mast with no sail or with a furled sail?