Undaunted

Date

2008

Authors

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

Texas Tech University Libraries

Abstract

Ship Name: Undaunted; Sailed: 1921-1931; Type: Wood 5-masted schooner; Built by: Hoquiam, Washington, Matthews Shipbuilding; Dimensions: 268' x 45' x 24'; Tonnage: 2266 tons.

Description

Five-masted schooners were relatively rare in the world of the sailing ship, and this photograph of Undaunted is unfortunate in that only the bow appears. As such schooners go, Undaunted was large—even for a 5-master. This fact derives from the use of a Ferris steamer hull adapted to sail. When the United States joined its allies in World War I, one of the greatest needs perceived by all was logistical: how do the troops, foodstuffs, raw materials, etc., get from the USA to France and the United Kingdom? The idea of a “bridge of ships” developed both metaphorically and literally as the answer. Clearly, the preference was for modern steel steamships. However, the shipbuilding capacity on both sides of the Atlantic was insufficient for the building of steel steam alone. Therefore, planners imagined, designed and then built wooden steam and even concrete (steel-reinforced) steamships. Part of the U.S. Shipping Board was the Emergency Fleet Corporation the chief designer of which was Theodore E. Ferris, noted New York naval architect. He designed a standard hull form, the “Ferris ship,” a wooden steamer, which yards on both coasts built. When steam power plants were in short supply, shipbuilders employed Ferris hulls as sailing ships because of the great need for carrying hulls. Many of these were built on the West coast during the War, and continued briefly after the war. Undaunted was one of the latter cases, and the dimensions only approximate other Ferris hulls because much latitude was taken by individual shipbuilders. In fact, the Ferris design was so slab-sided and straight-forward that shipbuilders could easily add some frames here, or delete some there. I have not found any two Ferris hulls with identical tonnage or dimensions. The photograph shows the bow of Undaunted, sometime in the 1920s, with modern stockless anchors, and its steamer-like straight stem. There was a collapse in freight rates about the time Undaunted hit the water for the first time, so some of these Ferris-built sailing ships had short working lives (they were all schooners and barkentines with some barges thrown in at the last just to finish off already-on-the-stocks hulls). Sold to Peruvian owners in 1927, Undaunted sailed until 1931 when the schooner piled up on the Peruvian coast.

Keywords

Ships, Undaunted (Ship), Merchant Ships, Schooners

Citation