lights on clipper ships?

[paul ron]

im building the flying fish clipper 1851. my plans, and after searching, i cant find any references to lights used on these ships. im sure they must have had bow n stern lanterns as well as other lanterns on deck. 

 

anyone have any pictures or ideas for these lights?

[Keith Black]

Funny you should ask, Paul.

 

 

[BANYAN]

Hi Keith, I may need a reminder, but I had to research this a little for the Victoria also.  If I remember, I will send you something by PM next week as I am up to my neck in alligators at the moment and away for the long weekend.  Basically, there were some Rules and Regs introduced by Trinity House (London) in and around the mid-19th century WRT to safety, including lighting in steam-powered ships.  Whether, the US ships adopted these I do not know.  Effectively from about 1858 (I think) steam-powered vessels were required to show various lights at night and in poor visibility - basically the forerunner of today's colregs.  Initially, I believe these were simple light boards or just lanterns hoisted into the mast tops, or lashed to the shrouds.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Keith Black]

Pat, right you are. Stern lamp, Masthead lamp, Port and Starboard lamps were all required on all US steam ships traveling at night from the 1855/60ish time period onward. I'm not sure about the poor visibility lighting requirements and if that applied to all sailing vessels. I'm sure I read the requirements regarding such but that's been more than five minutes ago.

 

 Hey, don't you have a walkabout stick that you can use to beat some of those gators off? 

Edited March 8 by Keith Black

[paul ron]

16 hours ago, Keith Black said:

Funny you should ask, Paul.

 

 

thanks! thats what i was looking for. ive seen antique dealers selling lamps but cant find any references to being used on clipper ships... my prints or manuals make no reference to lanterns used in 1851 either. 

 

steam ship are always adorned with fancy lanterns because they were built to be ornate.

 

 

[Keith Black]

6 hours ago, paul ron said:

steam ship are always adorned with fancy lanterns because they were built to be ornate.

 Paul, not all ships that used steam were ornate. Navies of the world once committed to the use of steam didn't produce what I'd call 'ornate' ships. The work ethic and pride of one's work of that time period produced a vessel far more pleasing to the eye compared to todays ships, IMHO. 

Edited March 8 by Keith Black

[allanyed]

23 hours ago, paul ron said:

im building the flying fish clipper 1851. my plans, and after searching, i cant find any references to lights used on these ships

 

Just saw this post string and it brings up a terminology question as it was confusing in the first post.  On English ships of the 17th century and into the 19th century (maybe earlier and later??) lights at the galleries and stern are the windows, not lamps or lanterns.   Did this change circa 1855 as Pat mentions above such that the lanterns and lanterns on clipper and other ships were then called lights and the lights became known as windows or some other term such as bullseyes and portholes?  Not a major thing, just curious. Tx

Allan

Edited March 8 by allanyed

[paul ron]

allanyed... lets not split hairs... im talking about lanterns as in devices that emitt light. 

 

now for the final Jeopardy question... since the lanterns of 1850 were oil lamps... how were they mounted on rocking n rolling ships at sea? .. were they gimballed, just suspended or sealed some how to prevent the oil from spilling? 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 8 by paul ron

[Keith Black]

Paul, the Starboard and Port lanterns were tied to the shrouds as Pat stated in his post. The Masthead lantern was hoisted into position forward of the Foremast on a four point contact. The Stern lantern could have been gimbaled or tied in a fixed position. Because of the way lantern burners were designed oil spillage was most unlikely and if it did it would have been contained inside the lantern body. 

Edited March 9 by Keith Black

[allanyed]

2 hours ago, paul ron said:

lets not split hairs...

Hi Paul,

😀Not splitting hairs at all, just genuinely curious about the origins of terminology in the various eras and how, why and when some terms changed.  

Cheers

Allan

[Keith Black]

 Paul, if you go to post #848 in my build log you'll see a Tung Woo lantern I purchased and a breakdown of the lantern and burner.

 

 

Edited March 9 by Keith Black

[Roger Pellett]

Definitely not splitting hairs, apples and oranges!  Allan refers to sailing warships of the 17th and 18th Centuries.  These vessels had large permanent lanterns affixed to the transom; one to three depending on the status of the ship.  Samual Pepys bragged that one on the Royal Sovereign was large enough that he kissed a woman while standing inside of it!  The main purpose of these lanterns was to allow formation station keeping at night.

 

Much later in the Nineteenth Century, maritime nations developed “Rules of the Road” in an attempt to eliminate collisions at sea.  These would not work at night if the vessel’s could not see each other.  This lead to the legal requirement for vessels to carry navigation lights, specifically red (port) and green (starboard).  These would have been attached to the lower mast shrouds on sailing ships.  Exactly when did this happen?  I don’t know.

 

Roger

Edited March 9 by Roger Pellett

[wefalck]

It would be interesting to know what insurers said about this and when. There may be also records of cases in front of the various maritime boards that could indicate from when on navigation lights were use and from when on they became compulsory - ploughing through such records would be tedious though.

 

Everything mechanical or that moves on a ship and that is exposed to the elements is prone to get stuck sooner or later. It will also require extra maintenance. I have never seen any gimballing or simialr device on ship's navigation lights. Their way of fixture and hoisting was as simple as possible.

 

For cabin lights the situation is different. It seems that petroleum lamps were often suspended in cardanic frames.

[Roger Pellett]

As Welfack points out these lights like much else aboard ship required maintenance.  They also had to be refilled with fuel (whale oil and later kerosene), and the wicks had to be trimmed.  Ships were therefore equipped with Lamp Rooms, an enclosed space where lamps could be worked on and stored out of the weather when not in use.

 

Roger

[BANYAN]

Eberhard, I think a lot of this can be deduced from the various issues of the 'rules' from Trinity house.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Keith Black]

1 hour ago, Roger Pellett said:

Ships were therefore equipped with Lamp Rooms, an enclosed space where lamps could be worked on and stored out of the weather when not in use.

 Roger, because the burners could be removed from the lanterns a simple box with rope or leather handle could have been used to gather and transport the burners to a 'Lamp' room for filling and maintenance. The room may also have been used for storage of whale oil/kerosene as well as spare lanterns and tools. Removing just the burners would have prevented the need to take all the complete lanterns to the Lamp room. Of course if a lantern needed glass replaced or other repairs it would have been taken to the Lamp room for repair. I'm sure they carried spare lanterns, how many spare replacements they carried is an interesting thought to ponder. 

Edited March 16 by Keith Black