The New Zealand
sailing scow
(revised March 2008)
The scow form of
construction was introduced to N.Z. in the 1870s by shipowners
and builders with knowledge of Canadian and American Great Lakes shipping. The
North American form underwent further development to suit the climatic and
tidal conditions of northern New
Zealand as recognised by the leading
American maritime historian Howard I. Chapelle.
The predominant
form of New Zealand
sailing scow was designed to carry all cargo on deck although a minority were
built with holds. They were generally completely flat-bottomed and hard-chined with athwartships
bottom-planking obviating the need for floors. The sides were constructed of
heavy timbers on edge, through-bolted. Longitudinal partitions consisting of
either solid through-bolted timbers or “post-and-rail” (essentially box girder)
construction supported the deck beams, the central partition forming one side
of the centre-board case. Only a few had a conventional keel. Almost all had
centreboards but a few early ones had lee-boards. Early N.Z. scows were
square-bowed (the predominant North American form) but sharp-bowed forms
quickly developed to suit squally coastal sailing conditions. Almost all were
ketch or schooner rigged with the largest ones having three masts. Large
mizzens relative to the mainsail seem to have been characteristic. A number of
local non-powered barges employed some of the same elements of construction.
Between 130 and
140 N.Z. sailing scows were built between 1873 and 1925 depending on which of
the marginal hybrids you count. A small number continued trading into the
1960’s as powered vessels or auxiliaries. A few still exist or are under
restoration. An auxiliary passenger-carrying replica (the Ted Ashby) operates from the N.Z.
National Maritime
Museum (Auckland). The hulks of a number of others
are still sufficiently intact to be able to provide further details of
variation in construction method.
A number of
well-known published books and less well-known publications deal at length with
N.Z. scows. Those by Ashby and Eaddy contain the most substantial accounts
based on crewing aboard them. Ashby’s book also draws on substantial experience
of reconstructing them. The most prolific technical writer about them is Cliff
Hawkins who has drawn most of the available plans and construction diagrams.
Refer to Scow Bibliography.
There is still
much that can be done to more fully exploit Marine Department archives, to
improve the existing documentation and even to document surviving hulk remains.
International connections
The Great Lakes precedents of N.Z. scows are a matter of contemporary record – there were specific
references to the origin in the local press at the time and several were given
the names of one of the Great Lakes. However,
little is known locally about exactly how similar the construction styles were
in the 1870s. The first N.Z. scow was built in 1873 for George Spencer “a
seafarer (?Captain) from North America”
who was apparently the decisive link as the Meiklejohns
who built the first and several other early N.Z. scows were from Nova Scotia with
no prior Great Lakes’ shipbuilding link that I know about. Further information
about Spencer’s experience would also be valuable. Septimus
Meiklejohn is recorded as the builder of the Lake Erie, the
first NZ scow, in 1873 but several older members of the family state that the
actual builder was John Meiklejohn (refer http://www.meiklejohn.org/index.php?id=9,31,0,0,1,0
).
The Chicago link:*
The second N.Z. scow was built in 1875 by George Callan
Sharp born in Chicago about 1822 to a shipwright father of the same name. He
migrated to New Zealand
some time before 1866, the year in which he married and built his first local
ship. The family oral tradition is that he learned his trade from his father in
Chicago, did further shipbuilding in Maine and then moved to Nova Scotia.** Here, apparently,
is a definite direct Great Lakes builder
connection. However, extensive attempts about 1990 to obtain further
information failed to find conclusive American records for Sharp, father or
son.***
He has not been located in the Cook County (Illinois)
censuses of 1840 or 1850**** or the Maine
censuses of 1830, 1840 or 1850. Family oral tradition refers to seeing an early
photograph of Chicago showing the George Callan Sharp shipyard sign in a documentary film during
World War II but the Chicago
city directories for 1853 to 1871 list no shipbuilder of the name. Possibly the
Chicago yard
was carried on later by a family member who did not migrate to N.Z. and any
surviving photograph may relate to that.
* With acknowledgment to Glen Bernard and an
unpublished manuscript by C.S. Sharp compiled in 1991.
** There was group migration from Nova Scotia to New Zealand
via South Australia
in 1851, the exact connection of which with Sharp appears to me to be still
unclear.
*** Many records were lost in the Chicago fire of 1871.
**** A household headed by a George Sharp
with sons of a consistent age is to be found in the 1830 census records of Peoria County
(which predated Cook
County) which may or may
not be connected.
Canadian and American scow registrations: There appears to be a job to be done simply establishing a basic
database of names, dates, sizes, fates etc to provide comparative information
for different regions and periods. If anyone has done this already it isn’t
well-known. Some preliminary comparisons
between the list in Olmsted’s book and San Francisco scow-sloops and
schooner-scows in the List of Merchant
Vessels of the United States suggest both (a) that Olmsted’s list is
incomplete and (b) that the labelling of particular vessels as scows in the List of Merchant Vessels of the United
States may be somewhat arbitrary and possibly able to be improved by
comparing the length:beam and beam:depth ratios of likely candidates with those
of confirmed candidates.
San Francisco scows have been
well-documented in Scow Schooners of San
Francisco Bay, Roger R. Olmsted, edited by Nancy Olmsted, California History
Center,
Local History Studies Volume 33, 1988. As far as N.Z. is concerned these scows
represent only a parallel alternative path of evolution (Olmsted even suggests
that the San Francisco scow may have evolved locally, from rigged barges and
lighters, p. 16). N.Z.
visitors to San Francisco should take the
opportunity to see the restored local scow Alma.
Texas Bay
scows: There is a project to rebuild a Texas Bay
scow (refer http://www.scowschooner.com/ ) although this is also only relevant to N.Z.
as an alternative parallel path of evolution. A plan of a Texas
scow sloop is on p. 335 of American Small
Sailing Craft, Howard I. Chapelle, Norton, New York,
1951.
Australian connections: I
know of very few references to scow construction in Australian documents. However, some of the same construction
methods are known to have been used there. The schooner Hazel Repton built in New
South Wales in 1915 had the local post-and-rail
partition construction to support the deck beams but these may have been added
during N.Z. reconstruction (Phantom
Fleet. The scows and scowmen of Auckland., Ted
Ashby, A.H. & A.W. Reed, 1975, p 35).
It would be very useful to confirm whether or not the Hazel Repton was originally built this
way and any other instances of the practice in Australia. Garry Kerr in The Tasmanian Trading Ketch (Mains’l
Books, Portland.
Victoria,
1987, pp 24, 28, 32-33) describes a number of the later Tasmanian sailing
barges as scows. There is insufficient information available to me to tell how
closely related the construction methods were but I doubt that they had the
same partition construction and to judge from the plans of the Enterprise (1904) they had more “shape”
to them. Garry Kerr (pers. comm.) advises that both the Enterprise
and the Kermandie were longitudinally
planked over conventional frames ie: not built like
most NZ scows. The Enterprise
has been preserved as a heritage vessel in Tasmania. There is a reference to a cutter
named “Scow” having a “scow bow”
(capable of multiple variations of meaning) in The Shipbuilders of Brisbane Water, Gwen Dundon,
East Gosford, 1997,
p. 173).
The second
largest N.Z. scow, the Cathkit ex Arrah na Pogue, spent most of its life in Tasmania and still existed there some ten
years ago but has apparently been broken up in the meantime. Detailed construction plans of the
largest N.Z. scow (the Zingara) exist
so it would be useful to compare any documentation or photographs of the
construction of the Cathkit existing
in Australia
that could indicate whether her construction differed from Zingara in any significant way. Garry Kerr advises that Cathkit had post-and-rail construction.
Update:March 2008:
I am terminally ill with a limited
prognosis and am losing the use of my hands.
If you have information to share about NZ
scows and scows internationally please contact Peter McCurdy of Auckland who will take
over my scow material. Contact him at McCurdy-Mason@xtra.co.nz
Click here for Scow Bibliography
To return to main Maritime menu click here