''Ariel'' was a clipper ship famous for making fast voyages between China and England in the late 1860s. She is most famous for almost winning The Great Tea Race of 1866, an unofficial race between Fuzhou, China and

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

with the first tea crop of the 1866 season.

Description

''Ariel'' was a

full-rigged ship A full-rigged ship or fully rigged ship is a sailing vessel's sail plan with three or more masts, all of them square-rigged. A full-rigged ship is said to have a ship rig or be ship-rigged. Such vessels also have each mast stepped in three s ...

of 853

ton Ton is the name of any one of several units of measure. It has a long history and has acquired several meanings and uses. Mainly it describes units of weight. Confusion can arise because ''ton'' can mean * the long ton, which is 2,240 pounds ...

s net register, measuring x 33.9 feet x . She was built in 1865 by Robert Steele & Company, Greenock for Shaw, Lowther & Maxton of

. Like the majority of tea clippers launched after 1864, she was composite built, of timber planking over iron frames.

Great Tea Race of 1866

A premium was paid for the first consignment of tea to reach London in each season. The clipper ''Fiery Cross'' left Fuzhou on 29 May and ''Ariel'', '' Taeping'' and ''Serica'' on the 30th. On 6 September '' Taeping'' docked twenty minutes ahead of ''Ariel'', and about two hours ahead of ''Serica''. ''Fiery Cross'' and ''

Taitsing ''Taitsing'' was a famous British tea clipper. Tea Clipper Taitsing ''Taitsing'' was a full-rigged, composite-built clipper ship, measuring in length, with a beam of and a draught of . She was built in 1865 by Charles Connell & Co, Glasgow ...

'' arrived two days later. Taeping and Ariel

After 99 days and almost the leaders were still tied and raced within sight of each other the full length of the English Channel and into the Thames. '' Taeping'', under Captain McKinnon, drew less water and was able to tie up in the London docks twenty minutes ahead of ''Ariel'', under Captain Keay. '' Taeping'' divided her winnings of 10 shillings per ton with the owners of ''Ariel'' and Captain McKinnon divided the captain's £100 with Captain Keay, who hailed from Anstruther. With the completion of the Suez Canal the tea trade was taken over by steamships and most of the clippers transferred to the Australian trade, carrying general cargo to either Sydney or

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

, and returning with wool — for which a premium price was also paid on the first shipments of the season.

Loss of the ship

''Ariel'' sailed from London for Sydney on 31 January 1872, but failed to arrive. She is assumed by most who knew her to have been fatally pooped (i.e, had a wave break over the stern) - her fine lines always made her at risk of this. Around August 1872 the remains of a teak-built ship's life-boat carrying a

brass Brass is an alloy of copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn), in proportions which can be varied to achieve different mechanical, electrical, and chemical properties. It is a substitutional alloy: atoms of the two constituents may replace each other wit ...

fitting with the gothic-script letter ''A'' were found on King Island in Bass Strait. It was believed to have come from the missing vessel, which, if the assumption was correct, probably foundered in the

Southern Ocean The Southern Ocean, also known as the Antarctic Ocean, comprises the southernmost waters of the World Ocean, generally taken to be south of 60° S latitude and encircling Antarctica. With a size of , it is regarded as the second-small ...

after rounding the Cape of Good Hope.

References

Notes

Bibliography

Basil Lubbock Alfred Basil Lubbock MC (9 September 1876 – 3 September 1944 at Monks Orchard, Seaford) was a British historian, sailor and soldier. He was a prolific writer on the last generation of commercial sailing vessels in the Age of Sail. He was an e ...

, ''The Tea Clippers'', Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow *Graeme Broxam & Michael Nash, ''Tasmanian Shipwrecks, Volume I, 1797-1899'', Navarine Publishing, Canberra, 1999
Captain Alexander Rodger of Cellardyke

External links

* {{1872 shipwrecks Tea clippers Individual sailing vessels Tall ships of the United Kingdom Ships built on the River Clyde 1865 ships Maritime incidents in 1872