CUTTY SARK.  http://www.cuttysark.org.uk/index.html   info@cuttysark.org.uk 

Full Rigged Clipper.

Principal Dimensions.
Length Overall: 280 ft.
Length Between Perpendiculars: 212.5 ft.
Beam, 36 ft.
Depth, (Moulded) 22.5 ft.
Gross tonnage, 963 tons.
Net tonnage, 921 tons.
Displacement at 20ft draught, 2100 tons
Sail area 32,000 sq ft.
Main mast 150ft
Main yard 80ft.

Under full sail with Stuntsails and spanker 34.With all sails set the spread equalled 3/4 of an acre and achieved under this rig when driven, 17 - 17.5 knots = a force of engines, 3000 HP.

Signal Flags: Cutty Sark's letters in the International Code:J. K. W. S.
The largest cargo she ever carried was 1290 tons of scrap iron from London
to Shanghai in 1886. Drew 21 ft and though low in the water, deeply laden she
still sailed over 1000 miles in 3 days.

In the Tea Trade from China for which she was designed, she took no records
at all & never took the Blue Riband of The Sea for the first season's tea
home in the China Tea Races.

However, in the Wool Trade, for ten years she was unbeatable and every year
beat her old Tea Race rival Thermopylae & made record voyages. Her best:
1885 taking only 67 days from Sydney to Ushant & 73 days to the Downs;
1887-8 Newcastle NSW to the Lizard, 69 days.

In the famed race with Thermopylae in 1872, evidence suggests the Cutty Sark
having loaded tea in China, was 400 miles ahead of her rival when she lost
her Rudder in the Indian Ocean. The Ship's carpenter, Henry Henderson, made a
jury rudder and shipped it in 6 days of heavy gales, a remarkable
achievement and act of seamanship. She had lost too much time and the
Thermopylae arrived home a week ahead of her. Time home from Shanghai to
Portland 120 days. The previous year 1871, loaded with tea, Shanghai to North
Foreland 107 days. When sailing in later years under the flag of Portugal she was to lose her rudder again twice and was dismasted in 1925.

In 1880 when sailing in the Wool Trade from Melbourne to New York her sail
plan was cut down, with shortened lower masts, proportionately reduced yards
and her Skysail & Stuntsails were removed.
After being sold to to Portugal in 1895-6 to the Ferreira brothers she was
renamed Ferreira and around 1915 was rerigged as a Barquentine. In 1920 she
was sold again to a Lisbon Company, who altered her name to Maria do Amparo.

Captain Wilfred Dowman purchased her ca 1922 and her name was restored to 
Cutty Sark. He had served his apprenticeship in the Hawksdale and had
fallen in love with the Cutty Sark when it sailed past him in the Hawksdale
in what was described as "at a rate of knots in no mean fashion."

Based on facts taken from,
TheCutty Sark, ( Handbook) by Frank G.G.Carr.1971. Originally sold aboard
by the Cutty Sark Society. SBN 853372 079 7 371/15

As a matter of interest, her rival, Thermopylae, was given a Great Honour, A Naval Military Burial, being ceremonially towed out to sea and then sunk by gunfire from warships.