SS Great Britain

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Brunel's S.S. Great Britain in dry dock in Bristol
Career (England)
Name:	ss Great Britain
Owner:	Great Western Steamship Company
Builder:	William Patterson
Laid down:	1839
Launched:	1843
Completed:	1844
Maiden voyage:	26 July 1845
Homeport:	Bristol
General characteristics
Tonnage:	1016 gross register tonnage
Displacement:	3,675 tons load draught
Length:	322 ft (98.15 m)
Beam:	50 ft 6 in (15.39 m)
Installed power:	steam powered
Propulsion:	screw-propelled
Sail plan:	6 masts
Speed:	Max. 12.5 knots without assistance of sails
Capacity:	360, increased later to 730
Complement:	130 officers and crew (as completed)

The SS Great Britain was an advanced Atlantic liner designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel for the Great Western Steamship Company's Bristol-New York service. While other ships had been built of iron or had been equipped with a screw propeller, Great Britain was the first to combine these features in a large ocean-going ship. When launched in 1843, she was the largest vessel afloat. However her protracted construction and high cost left her owners in a difficult financial position, and they were forced out of business in 1846 when the Great Britain was stranded by a navigational error. Sold for salvage and repaired, she carried thousands of immigrants to Australia until converted to sail in 1881. Three years later, Great Britain was retired to the Falkland Islands where she was a warehouse and coal hulk until she was scuttled in 1937.^[1]

In 1970, the ss Great Britain was returned to the Bristol dry dock where she was first built. Brunel's ss Great Britain, listed as part of the National Historic Fleet, Core Collection, is now an award-winning visitor attraction and museum ship in Bristol Harbour, with between 150,000-170,000 visitors annually.

Contents 1 Development 2 Launch 3 Service history 4 Recovery and restoration 4.1 Awards 5 In fiction 6 Dimensions 7 See also 8 References 9 Further reading 10 External links

[edit] Development

After the initial success of its first liner, the SS Great Western of 1838, the Great Western Steamship Company collected materials for a sister ship, tentatively named the City of New York.^[1] The company's chief engineer, Isambard Brunel convinced the directors to build an entirely different ship, an iron-hulled steamer of unusually large dimensions designed by Brunel, Thomas Guppy, Christopher Claxton and William Patterson. Construction proceeded in a specially adapted dry dock in Bristol, England.^[2]

[edit] Launch

The launching or, more accurately, the "floating out" took place on 19 July 1843. Conditions were generally favourable but diarists recorded that, after a dull start, the weather brightened later on with only a few intermittent showers. The atmosphere of the day can best be gauged from a report published the following day in the Bristol Mirror. The reporter recorded that "large crowds started to gather early in the day including many people who had travelled to Bristol to see the spectacle. There was a general atmosphere of anticipation as the Royal Emblem was unfurled. The processional route had been cleaned and Temple Street decorated with flags, banners, flowers and ribbons. Boys of the City School and girls of Red Maids were stationed in a neat orderly formation down the entire length of the Exchange. The route was a mass of colour and everybody was out on the streets as it was a public holiday. The atmosphere of gaiety even allowed thoughts to drift away from the problems of political dissension in London."^[3] Prince Albert arrived at 10am at the Great Western Railway Terminus. The royal train, conducted by Brunel himself, had taken two hours and forty minutes from London. There was a guard of honour, consisting of members of the police force, soldiers and dragoons and, as the Prince stepped from the train, the band of the Life Guards played works by Labitsky and a selection from the "Ballet of Alma". Two sections of the terminus platform were boarded off for the reception and it was noted by the Bristol Mirror that parts were covered with carpets from the Council House. The Prince Consort, dressed as a private gentleman, was accompanied by his equerry in waiting, personal secretary, the Marquis of Exeter, and Lords Warncliffe, Liverpool, Lincoln and Wellesley.^[3]

Introductions were made, followed by the "Address to His Royal Highness the Prince Albert", by the town clerk, D.Burgess. Honours were then bestowed on him by the Society of Merchant Venturers, and there were speeches from members of the Bristol clergy. The royal party then had breakfast and, after twenty minutes, reappeared to board horse-drawn carriages.^[3]

At noon, the Prince arrived at the Great Western Steamship yard only to find the ship already "launched" and waiting for the royal inspection. Prince Albert boarded the ship, took refreshments in the elegantly decorated lounge and then commenced his tour of inspection. He was then received in the ship's banqueting room where all the local dignitaries and their ladies were gathered.^[3]

After the banquet and the toasts, His Royal Highness left for the naming ceremony. It had already been decided that the actual christening would be performed by Mrs Miles, mother of Bristol's MP and a local company director. When the appropriate time came, she stepped forward, grasped the champagne bottle and swung it towards the bows. Unfortunately the steam packet Avon had started to tow the ship into the harbour and the bottle fell about 10 feet (3.0 m) short of its target and dropped unbroken into the water. A second bottle was rapidly obtained and the Prince himself hurled this against the iron hull of the Great Britain. In her haste, the Avon had also started her work before the shore warps had been released. The tow rope snapped and, due to the resultant delay, the Prince was obliged to return to the railway station and miss the end of the programme.^[3]

The size of the new lock at the Floating Harbour caused problems when she was launched. She was being towed away from her builders to have her engines and interior fitted out on the River Thames but was fractionally too big to go through. The ship was moored in the Floating Harbour for a year or more before proceeding into Cumberland Basin in December 1844. After proceeding successfully through the first set of lock gates, she jammed on her passage through the second set which led to the River Avon. It was only the seamanship of Captain Claxton that enabled her to be pulled back and severe structural damage avoided. The following night, an army of workmen, under the supervision of Brunel, took advantage of the slightly higher tide, removed coping stones and lock gate platforms from the Junction Lock and allowed the tug 'Sampson' to tow her safely into the River Avon.^[4]

[edit] Service history

At the time of her launch in 1843 she was by far the largest ship in the world, over 100 ft (30 m) longer than her rivals, and the first screw-propelled, ocean-going, wrought iron ship. On 26 July 1845, the ship undertook her maiden voyage to New York, a journey completed in 14 days.^[5]

In November 1846, the ship went aground on the sands of Dundrum Bay, Ireland and there was doubt as to whether she could be re-floated. Brunel himself advised that if anyone could rescue the ship, it was the naval engineer James Bremner. He was engaged and the SSGreat Britain was re-floated on 27 August 1847 with the assistance of HMS Birkenhead.^[6] However, the cost of the salvage bankrupted the Great Western Steamship Company, and the SS Great Britain was sold and turned into an emigration ship.

Originally intended as an Atlantic steamer, she made most of her working voyages from the United Kingdom to Australia. In 1852, she made her first voyage to Melbourne, Australia, carrying 630 emigrants. She excited great interest in Melbourne, with 4,000 people paying a shilling each to see over her. During her time, she was considered the most reliable of the emigrant ships between Britain and Australia. A source of 1862 ^[7] preserves some statistics of a typical trip during this period. The ship put out from Liverpool on 21 October 1861, carrying a crew of 143, 544 passengers (including the first English cricket team ever to visit Australia), a cow, 36 sheep, 140 pigs, 96 goats and a total of 1114 chickens, ducks, geese and turkeys. The journey to Melbourne (her ninth) occupied 64 days, during which the best day's run was 354 miles and the worst 108. The ship's rig was at this time entirely different from both the original and the present arrangement, consisting as it did of three tall square-rigged masts; with favourable winds the ship travelled under sail alone, the screw being withdrawn from the water. Three passengers died en route. The captain was John Gray, a Scot, who had held the post since before the Crimean war.

Between 1855 and 1858 she was used as a troopship, during the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny. In 1882, she was turned into a sailing ship to transport bulk coal but, after a fire on board in 1886, she was found on arrival at Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands to be damaged beyond repair. She was sold to the Falkland Islands Company and used, afloat, as a storage hulk (coal bunker) until 1937, when she was towed to Sparrow Cove, 3.5 miles from Port Stanley, scuttled and abandoned. In her role as coal bunker, she served to refuel the South Atlantic fleet that defeated Admiral Graf Maximilian von Spee's fleet, in the First World War Battle of the Falkland Islands. In the Second World War, some of her iron was scavenged to repair HMS Exeter, one of the Royal Navy ships that fought the Graf Spee and was badly damaged, in the Battle of the River Plate.

[edit] Recovery and restoration

Coordinates: 51°27′05″N 2°36′09″W / 51.45142°N 2.60256°W / 51.45142; -2.60256

SS Great Britain

The salvage operation, made possible by several large donations, including one from Sir Jack Hayward, and the late Sir Paul Getty, was organized by 'the ss Great Britain Project', a group chaired by Richard Goold-Adams. Ewan Corlett conducted a naval architect's survey on the ship, reporting that in his opinion the ship could be refloated. A submersible pontoon, Mulus III, was chartered in February 1970. A German tug, Varius II, was chartered, reaching Port Stanley on March 25. By April 13, after some concern about a crack in the hull, the ship was mounted successfully on the pontoon and the following day the tug, pontoon and the ss Great Britain sailed to Port Stanley harbour for preparations for the transatlantic voyage. The voyage (code name "Voyage 47") began on April 24, stopped in Montevideo from May 2 to May 6 for inspection, then across the Atlantic, arriving at Barry Docks, west of Cardiff on June 22. ("Voyage 47" was chosen as the code name because it was on her 47th voyage from Penarth, in 1886, during a tempest that S.S. Great Britain had sought for shelter in the Falklands.^[8]) Bristol-based tugs then took over and towed the ship, still on its pontoon, to Avonmouth Docks.

The ship was then taken off the pontoon, in preparation for her re-entry into Bristol, now truly afloat. On Saturday 5 July, amidst considerable media interest, the ship was towed up the River Avon to Bristol.^[9] Perhaps the most memorable moment for the crowds that lined the final few miles was her passage under the Clifton Suspension Bridge, another Brunel design. She then waited a further two weeks in the Cumberland Basin, until a high enough tide occurred that would get her back through the locks to Bristol's Floating Harbour, back to her birthplace, the dry dock in the Great Western Dockyard in which she had been built (now a grade II* listed building, it had been disused since bomb damage during World War II.^[10]).

The original intent was to restore her to her 1843 state. However, the philosophy of the project changed in recent years and the conservation of all surviving pre-1970 material became the aim.

By 1998, an extensive survey discovered that the hull was continuing to corrode in the humid atmosphere of the dock and estimates gave her 20 years before she corroded away.^[11] Extensive conservation work began which culminated in the installation of a glass plate across the dry dock at the level of her water line, with two dehumidifiers, keeping the space beneath at 22% relative humidity, sufficiently dry to preserve the surviving material of the hull.^[12][13] This was completed, the ship was "re-launched" in July 2005, and visitor access to the dry dock was restored.

[edit] Awards

The engineers Fenton Holloway won the IStructE Award for Heritage Buildings in 2006 for the restoration of the ss Great Britain. In May of that year the ship won the prestigious Gulbenkian Prize for museums and galleries, the chairman of the judging panel Professor Robert Winston commented,

ss Great Britain got our unanimous vote for being outstanding at every level. It combines a truly groundbreaking piece of conservation, remarkable engineering and fascinating social history plus a visually stunning ship above and below the water line. Most importantly, the ss Great Britain is accessible and highly engaging for people of all ages.^[14]

The project won the The Crown Estate Conservation Award in 2007.^[15] and the European Museum of the Year Award’s Micheletti Prize for 'Best Industrial or Technology Museum'.^[16] In 2008 the educational value of the project was honoured by the Sandford Award for Heritage Education.^[17]

[edit] In fiction

In Stephen Baxter's novel, Ring, the Great Britain still exists in AD 3953 and is carried aboard the GUT starship Great Northern throughout its unusual voyage. The ship is preserved under a layer of plastic that preserves and nourishes it.

[edit] Dimensions

• Length: 322 ft (98.15 m)
• Beam (width): 50 ft 6 in (15.39 m)
• Height (main deck to keel): 32 ft 6 in (9.91 m)
• Weight unladen: 1,930 long tons (2,161 short tons, 1,961 tonnes)
• Displacement: 3,018 long tons (3,380 short tons, 3,066 tonnes)

Engine

• Actual Rated Horse Power: 1,000 H.P
• Total weight: 340 tons
• Cylinders: 4 x inverted 'V' 88 inches (220 cm) diameter
• Stroke: 72 inches (180 cm)
• RPM: Max. 20 RPM
• Main Crankshaft: 17 feet (5.18 m) long and 28 inches (71 cm) diameter

Propeller

• Diameter: 15'6"
• Weight: 77 cwts (3,912 kg)
• Speed: 55 RPM

Other data

• Fuel capacity: 1,100 tons of coal
• Water capacity: 200 tons
• Cargo capacity: 1,200 tons
• Cost of construction: £117,295

[edit] See also

• SS Great Eastern
• SS Great Western

[edit] References

[edit] Further reading

• Ewan Corlett (1975; revised 1990, Conway Maritime Press). The Iron Ship: The Story of Brunel's SS Great Britain. London: Conway Maritime. ISBN 0-85177-531-4.. 

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: SS Great Britain

• Official website
• Panoramic pictures of the ship Look around the ss Great Britain
• Panoramic tour from the BBC
• YouTube video — stills from tour of ship.

Records
Preceded by President	World's largest passenger ship 1845 – 1853	Succeeded by SS Himalaya

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