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The Bermuda sloop is a historical type of fore-and-aft rigged single-masted sailing vessel developed on the islands of
Bermuda ) , anthem = "God Save the King" , song_type = National song , song = " Hail to Bermuda" , image_map = , map_caption = , image_map2 = , mapsize2 = , map_caption2 = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = , e ...
in the 17th century. Such vessels originally had
gaff rig Gaff rig is a sailing rig (configuration of sails, mast and stays) in which the sail is four-cornered, fore-and-aft rigged, controlled at its peak and, usually, its entire head by a spar (pole) called the ''gaff''. Because of the size and shape ...
s with quadrilateral sails, but evolved to use the
Bermuda rig A Bermuda rig, Bermudian rig, or Marconi rig is a configuration of Mast (sailing), mast and rigging for a type of sailboat and is the typical configuration for most modern sailboats. This configuration was developed in Bermuda in the 1600s; the t ...
with triangular sails. Although the Bermuda sloop is often described as a development of the narrower-beamed
Jamaica Jamaica (; ) is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean (after Cuba and Hispaniola). Jamaica lies about south of Cuba, and west of His ...
sloop, which dates from the 1670s, the high, raked masts and triangular sails of the Bermuda rig are rooted in a tradition of Bermudian boat design dating from the earliest decades of the 17th century. It is distinguished from other vessels with the triangular Bermuda rig, which may have multiple masts or may not have evolved in hull form from the traditional designs.


History

Jamaica was the locus of building fast single-masted vessels that became the model for small cruisers of the Royal Navy. Building of this type of vessel had become more active in Bermuda by the start of 18th century. Bermuda shipbuilders constructed sloops and other vessels, starting in the mid 17th century. Their sloops were gaff-rigged. The first triangular mainsails, characteristic of the
Bermuda rig A Bermuda rig, Bermudian rig, or Marconi rig is a configuration of Mast (sailing), mast and rigging for a type of sailboat and is the typical configuration for most modern sailboats. This configuration was developed in Bermuda in the 1600s; the t ...
, were introduced on coastal vessels by the 1620s, but most sea-going vessels were gaff-rigged until the 1820s. The sloops were constructed in a range of sizes up to . The most prevalent size for such sloops was in the range of on deck with a long
bowsprit The bowsprit of a sailing vessel is a spar extending forward from the vessel's prow. The bowsprit is typically held down by a bobstay that counteracts the forces from the forestays. The word ''bowsprit'' is thought to originate from the Middle L ...
. Jamaican sloops had beams that were narrower than ocean-going Bermuda sloops, and could attain a speed of around 12
knots A knot is a fastening in rope or interwoven lines. Knot may also refer to: Places * Knot, Nancowry, a village in India Archaeology * Knot of Isis (tyet), symbol of welfare/life. * Minoan snake goddess figurines#Sacral knot Arts, entertainme ...
. They carried gaff rig, whereas in modern usage, a Bermuda sloop excludes any gaff rig. Jamaican sloops were built usually out of
cedar Cedar may refer to: Trees and plants *''Cedrus'', common English name cedar, an Old-World genus of coniferous trees in the plant family Pinaceae *Cedar (plant), a list of trees and plants known as cedar Places United States * Cedar, Arizona * ...
trees, for much the same reasons that Bermudian shipwrights favoured
Bermuda cedar ''Juniperus bermudiana'' is a species of juniper endemic to Bermuda. This species is most commonly known as Bermuda cedar, but is also referred to as Bermuda juniper (Bermudians refer to it simply as ''cedar''). Historically, this tree formed wo ...
: these were very resistant to rot, grew very fast and tall, and had a taste displeasing to marine borers.Evans, Amanda M. 2007. Defining Jamaica Sloops: A Preliminary Model for Identifying an Abstract Concept. ''Journal of Maritime Archaeology'', 2 (2) (October): 83–92. Cedar was favoured over oak as the latter would rot in about 10 years, while cedar would last for nigh on 30 years and was considerably lighter than oak. When the ships needed to be de-fouled from seaweed and barnacles, pirates needed a safe haven on which to careen the ship. Sloops were well suited for this because they were able to sail in shallow areas where larger ships would either run aground or be unable to sail through at all. These shallow waters also provided protection from ships of the British
Royal Navy The Royal Navy (RN) is the United Kingdom's naval warfare force. Although warships were used by English and Scottish kings from the early medieval period, the first major maritime engagements were fought in the Hundred Years' War against F ...
, which tended to be larger and required deep water to sail safely. Later in the 19th century, the design of Bermudian vessels had largely dispensed with square topsails and gaff rig, replacing them with triangular main sails and jibs. The Bermuda rig had traditionally been used on vessels with two or more masts, with the gaff rig favoured for single-masted vessels. The reason for this was the increased height necessary for a single mast, which led to too much canvas. The solid wooden masts at that height were also too heavy, and not sufficiently strong. Single-masted sloops quickly became the norm in Bermudian racing, with the introduction of hollow masts and other refinements.''Boats, Boffins and Bowlines: The Stories of Sailing Inventors and Innovations'', by George Drower. The History Press. 1 May 2011. The colony's lightweight
Bermuda cedar ''Juniperus bermudiana'' is a species of juniper endemic to Bermuda. This species is most commonly known as Bermuda cedar, but is also referred to as Bermuda juniper (Bermudians refer to it simply as ''cedar''). Historically, this tree formed wo ...
vessels were widely prized for their agility and speed, especially upwind. The high, raked masts and long bowsprits and booms favoured in Bermuda allowed its vessels of all sizes to carry vast areas of sail when running down-wind with spinnakers and multiple jibs, allowing great speeds to be reached. Bermudian work boats, mostly small sloops, were ubiquitous on the archipelago's waters in the 19th century, moving freight, people, and everything else about. The rig was eventually adopted almost universally on small sailing craft in the 20th Century, although as seen on most modern vessels it is very much less extreme than on traditional Bermudian designs, with lower, vertical masts, shorter booms, omitted bowsprits, and much less area of canvas.


Merchant and privateering use

The Bermuda sloop became the predominant type of sailing vessel both in the Bermudian colony and among sloop rigs worldwide as Bermudian traders visited foreign nations. Soon, shipbuilding became one of the primary trades on the island and ships were exported throughout the English colonies on the American seaboard, in the
West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...
, and eventually to
Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
. Bermudians, largely slaves, built roughly a thousand ships during the 18th century. Although many of these were sold abroad, the colony maintained its own large merchant fleet which, thanks partly to the domination of trade in many American seaboard ports by branches of wealthy Bermudian families and partly to the suitability and availability of Bermudian vessels, carried much of the produce exported from the American south to Bermuda and to the West Indies aboard Bermudian mostly slave-manned vessels sailed southwest (more-or-less upwind) to the Turk Islands, where salt was harvested. This salt was carried to North American ports and sold at high profits. Bermudian vessels also developed a trade in moving goods such as grain, cocoa, brandy, wine and more from the
Atlantic seaboard The East Coast of the United States, also known as the Eastern Seaboard, the Atlantic Coast, and the Atlantic Seaboard, is the coastline along which the Eastern United States meets the North Atlantic Ocean. The eastern seaboard contains the coa ...
colonies to the
West Indies The West Indies is a subregion of North America, surrounded by the North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea that includes 13 independent island countries and 18 dependencies and other territories in three major archipelagos: the Greater A ...
. The threat of
piracy Piracy is an act of robbery or criminal violence by ship or boat-borne attackers upon another ship or a coastal area, typically with the goal of stealing cargo and other valuable goods. Those who conduct acts of piracy are called pirates, v ...
and
privateering A privateer is a private person or ship that engages in maritime warfare under a commission of war. Since robbery under arms was a common aspect of seaborne trade, until the early 19th century all merchant ships carried arms. A sovereign or deleg ...
was a large problem for mariners of all nations during the 17th and 18th centuries, but it was also as widely popular an enterprise. During wartime, much of Bermuda's merchant fleet turned to more lucrative labors: privateering. The evasive capabilities highly prized by merchantmen also made Bermuda sloops the ship of choice for the pirates themselves, earlier in the 18th century, as well as for smugglers. They often carried sufficient crew out to return with several prizes, and these extra crew were useful both as movable ballast, and in handling the labor-intensive sloops. The shape of the ship enabled Bermudian mariners to excel. The same abilities allowed Bermuda sloops to escape from better-armed privateers and even larger
Man-of-war The man-of-war (also man-o'-war, or simply man) was a Royal Navy expression for a powerful warship or frigate from the 16th to the 19th century. Although the term never acquired a specific meaning, it was usually reserved for a ship armed wi ...
British naval ships which, with their
square rig Square rig is a generic type of sail and rigging arrangement in which the primary driving sails are carried on horizontal spars which are perpendicular, or square, to the keel of the vessel and to the masts. These spars are called ''yards'' and ...
s, could not sail as closely to windward. The ability of the sloop rig in general to sail upwind meant a Bermuda sloop could outrun most other sailing ships by simply turning upwind and leaving its pursuers floundering in its wake. Despite Bermudian privateers preying heavily on American shipping during the
American War of Independence The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
, some historians credit the large number of Bermuda sloops (reckoned at well over a thousand) built in Bermuda as privateers and sold illegally to the Americans as enabling the rebellious colonies to win their independence.


Slavery and the Bermuda sloop

The commercial success of the Bermuda sloop must be credited to the contribution of Bermuda's free and enslaved Blacks. For most of the 17th century, Bermuda's agricultural economy was reliant on indentured servants. This meant that slavery did not play the same role as in many other colonies, though privateers based in Bermuda often brought enslaved blacks and Native Americans who had been captured along with ships of enemy nations. The first large influx of blacks was of free men who came as indentured servants in the middle of the century from former Spanish colonies in the West Indies (the increasing numbers of black, Spanish-speaking probable-Catholics alarmed the white Protestant majority, who were also alarmed by native Irish sent to Bermuda to be sold into servitude after the
Cromwellian conquest of Ireland The Cromwellian conquest of Ireland or Cromwellian war in Ireland (1649–1653) was the re-conquest of Ireland by the forces of the English Parliament, led by Oliver Cromwell, during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms. Cromwell invaded Ireland wi ...
, and measures were taken to discourage black immigration and to ban the importation of Irish). After 1684, Bermuda turned wholesale to a maritime economy, and slaves, black, Amerindian, and Irish (the various minorities merged into a single demographic group, known as ''coloured'', which included anyone who was not defined as entirely of European extraction), played an increasing role in this.
Black Bermudian Black Bermudians, African Bermudians, Afro-Bermudians or Bermudians of African descent, are Bermudians with any appreciable Black African ancestry (though some individuals may have a degree of admixture of African, European and Native American anc ...
s became highly skilled shipwrights, blacksmiths and joiners. Many of the shipwrights who helped to develop shipbuilding in the American South, especially on the
Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...
shore of the
Chesapeake Chesapeake often refers to: *Chesapeake people, a Native American tribe also known as the Chesepian * The Chesapeake, a.k.a. Chesapeake Bay *Delmarva Peninsula, also known as the Chesapeake Peninsula Chesapeake may also refer to: Populated plac ...
(Bermuda, also known as ''Virgineola'', had once been part of Virginia, and had maintained close connections ever since), were black Bermudian slaves, and the design and success of the area's schooners owes something to them, also. Due to the large number of white Bermudian men who were away at sea at any one time (and possibly due as much to fear of the larger number of enslaved black Bermudian men left behind) it was mandated that blacks must make up a percentage of the crew of every Bermudian vessel. By the American War of Independence, the use of many able black slaves as sailors added considerably to the power of the Bermudian merchant fleet due to their highly needed skill set, and these included the crews of Bermudian privateers. When the Americans captured the Bermudian privateer ''Regulator'', they discovered that virtually all of her crew were black slaves. Authorities in Boston offered these men their freedom, but nearly all of the 70 captives elected to be treated as
prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held Captivity, captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold priso ...
, claiming slavery was all they knew and out of fear for their families who were still in Bermuda. Sent to New York on the sloop ''Duxbury'', those who were left seized the vessel and sailed it back to Bermuda. Slavery was not abolished in Bermuda until ordered by the British Government in 1834, the Royal Navy had already made frequent use of Bermuda sloops in suppressing the trans-Atlantic slave trade (having formed the
West Africa Squadron The West Africa Squadron, also known as the Preventative Squadron, was a squadron of the British Royal Navy whose goal was to suppress the Atlantic slave trade by patrolling the coast of West Africa. Formed in 1808 after the British Parliame ...
to this end in 1808, following passage of the
Slave Trade Act 1807 The Slave Trade Act 1807, officially An Act for the Abolition of the Slave Trade, was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom prohibiting the slave trade in the British Empire. Although it did not abolish the practice of slavery, it ...
).


Bermudian work boats

The term ''Bermuda sloop'' was also to describe the working boats historically used for moving freight about Bermuda's islands, for fishing, and other coastal activities, and today is used to designate any single-masted yacht with Bermuda rig. Motor vehicles were banned in Bermuda until after the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, and the roads were few and poor until the requirements of that war advanced their development. Boats, as a consequence, remained the primary method of moving people and materials around Bermuda well into the 20th century. Although such small sloops are rare today, the design was further scaled down to produce the
Bermuda Fitted Dinghy The Bermuda Fitted Dinghy is a type of racing-dedicated sail boat used for competitions between the yacht clubs of Bermuda. Although the class has only existed for about 130 years, the boats are a continuance of a tradition of boat and ship desi ...
, a class of racing vessel used in traditional competition between Bermudian yacht clubs. The term ''Bermuda sloop'' has come to be used outside Bermuda, today, to describe any single masted, Bermuda rigged boat, also known as ''Marconi sloops'', although most are far less extreme in their design than was once the norm in Bermuda, with bowsprits omitted, masts vertical and shortened, and booms similarly shortened. Spinnaker booms and multiple jibs are rarely seen. The reduced sail area makes modern boats much more manageable, especially for small or inexperienced crews.


References


Further reading

* ''Sailing in Bermuda: Sail Racing in the Nineteenth Century'', by J. C. Arnell, 1982. Published by the Royal Hamilton Amateur Dinghy Club. Printed by the University of Toronto Press. * ''The Andrew and the Onions: The Story of the Royal Navy in Bermuda, 1795–1975'', by Lt.-Cmdr. Ian Strannack, RN (Ret'd), Bermuda Maritime Museum Press. * ''Bermuda From Sail To Steam, 1784–1901'', by Henry Wilkinson. Oxford University Press. * ''The Naval War of 1812'', Edited by Robert Gardiner. Caxton Pictorial Histories (Chatham Publishing), in association with The National Maritime Museum. .


External links


Bermuda Sloop Foundation official website
Describing development of the
Baltimore clipper A Baltimore Clipper is a fast sailing ship historically built on the mid-Atlantic seaboard of the United States of America, especially at the port of Baltimore, Maryland. An early form of clipper, the name is most commonly applied to two-masted ...
(large chapter on Bermuda sloops and role of Bermudian boatbuilders).
POTSI: American War of 1812.
From ''The Andrew and the Onions'', by Lt. Cmdr. I. Strannack.

Comprehensive list of ''Ships of Bermuda''.

Admiralty publishes invitation for tenders for first two (extended to three) Bermuda sloops-of-war, 1795. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bermuda Sloop History of Bermuda History of the Royal Navy Military history of the United Kingdom Ship types Ships built in Bermuda