Peking

A four-masted steel barque built in 1911 by Blohm & Voss, Hamburg, for F. Laeisz. Her dimensions are 98,22×14,40×8,08 meters [322'3×47'2×26'5] and with a tonnage of 3100 GRT and 2883 NRT. Rigged with royal sails over double top and topgallant sails.

Sister ship to the same owner's Passat built in the same year.

1911: Launched at the shipyard of Blohm & Voss, Hamburg, for F. Laeisz, Hamburg. To be used in the South American-Europe nitrate trade.
1911-1914: Her first master was Captain Hinrich Nissen late of the five-masted ship Preussen.
1912 November 30: Sailed from Hamburg to Valparaiso in 76 days [from the English Channel].
1912: Sailed from Hamburg to Valparaiso in 70 days [from the English Channel].
1913: Sailed from Hamburg to Valparaiso in 74 days [from the English Channel].
1914 August: Interned in Valparaiso for the duration of the First World War.
1920 October 6 — January 21: Sailed from Caleta Coloso to London in 107 days under command of Capt. Oellrich.
1921 May 10: Handed over to Italy as war damage compensation.
1923 January 11: Sold back to F. Laeisz for £ 8500.
1925: Sailed from Hamburg to Talcahuano in 74 days [from the English Channel] under command of Capt. Oellrich.
1926: Sailed from Hamburg to Talcahuano in 79 days [from the English Channel] under command of Capt. Piening.
1926: Re-built as a cargo carrying sail-training ship.
1928-31: Captain Jürgen Jürs.
1928: Sailed from Hamburg to Talcahuano in 77 days [from the English Channel] under command of Capt. Jürgen Jürs..
1929: Sailed from Hamburg to Talcahuano in 93 days.
1931/32: Sailed from Hamburg to Valparaiso in 59 days [from the English Channel] under command of Capt. Rohwer.
1932: Sailed from Taltal to Santander in 74 days under command of Capt. Rohwer.
1932 September: Sold to the Shaftesbury Homes and Arethusa Training Ship, London [?], for £ 6500 to be used as a staionary training ship. She was rebuilt for £ 40.000 and was renamed Arethusa. The mooring place was at Upnor on the River Medway.
1933 July 25: Officially opened by King George VI.
1940: Requisitioned by the Royal Navy and moved to Salcombe, Devonshire. For the duration of the war she was temporarily renamed HMS Peking as there already was an HMS Arethusa in the Royal Navy.
1945: Returned to her owners at the end of the war and given back her old name.
1974 October 31: Sold at auction for £ 70.000 to the J. Aron Charitable Foundation, New York, for the South Street Seaport Museum.
1975 July 5-22: Towed from Blackwall to New York by the Dutch seagoing tug Utrecht.
1976: South Street Seaport Museum, New York. Renamed Peking.

Presently preserved as a museum ship in New York.

References:

Four- and five masted ships, general references.
Burmester, Heinz: Lucie Woermann och saltpeterseglarna.
Longitude 11, Stockholm, 1976. pp 64-77, ill.
Deroko, Charles: A Job Well Done.
Seaport magazine, Fall 1996.
Johnson, Irving: Peking Battles the Horn.
Sea History Press, New York, 1977/1932. 12mo, (6), x, 182 pp, ill., 26 plates. A true account of a voyage around Cape Horn in the bark Peking in 1929-30; with a foreword by Peter Stanford, President of the National Maritime Historical Society, an afterword by Captain Johnson, and an appendix by Norman Brouwer, Ship Historian of South Street Seaport Museum, on the life and rebirth of the Peking.
Weightman, A.E.: The Continuing Saga of the Arethusa.
Sea Breezes Vol. 63, Liverpool, 1989. pp 414-420, ill.

Updated 1998-06-26 by Lars Bruzelius.

Sjöhistoriska Samfundet | The Maritime History Virtual Archives | Ships | Four-masted ships & barques | Search.