SS Sirius (1837)

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
For other ships with the same name, see SS Sirius.

History
United KingdomUnited Kingdom
NameSirius
OperatorSaint George Steam Packet Co, Cork, Ireland
BuilderRobert Menzies & Sons, Leith, Scotland
In service1837
FateWrecked and sunk off Ballycotton, Ireland, 16 January 1847
General characteristics
TypePaddle steamer
Tonnage703 GRT
Displacement1,995 tons
Length178 ft 4 in (54.4 m)
Beam25 ft 8 in (7.8 m)
Draught15 ft (4.6 m)
Depth18 ft 3 in (5.6 m)
Installed power500 ihp (370 kW)
Propulsion
Speed12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph)
Range2,897 nmi (5,365 km; 3,334 mi) at 6.7 knots (12.4 km/h; 7.7 mph)
Capacity40 passengers
Crew36

SS Sirius was a wooden-

Saint George Steam Packet Company.[1][2] The next year, she opened transatlantic steam passenger service when she was chartered for two voyages by the British and American Steam Navigation Company.[3] By arriving in New York a day ahead of the Great Western, she is usually listed as the first holder of the Blue Riband, although the term was not used until decades later.[4]

Description

Sirius was 178 feet 4 inches (54.4 m) long from

tons burthen and a gross register tonnage of 703 tons.[5]

The ship had a two-cylinder

boilers provided steam to the engine at a working pressure of about 5 psi (30 kPa; 0.4 kgf/cm2). The engine produced a total of 500 indicated horsepower (370 kW) and the ship had a maximum speed of 12 knots (22 km/h; 14 mph). The ship could carry a maximum of 450 long tons (460 t) of coal, enough to steam 2,897 nautical miles (5,365 km; 3,334 mi) at an average speed of 6.7 knots (12.4 km/h; 7.7 mph).[6]

Sirius was one of the first steamships built with a condenser that enabled her to use fresh water, avoiding the need to periodically shut down her boilers at sea for cleaning. Unfortunately, this also resulted in high coal consumption.[1]

Service

Sirius, the largest of the St George company's steamers, was designed for their prestige Cork-London service, on which she began in August 1837.[2]

At the time Sirius was completed, two other companies were building steamships for proposed

Around the World in Eighty Days.[9] However, in reality the crew were able to manage and conserve the stocks of coal by burning four barrels of resin instead, and still had 15 tons of coal left on arrival in New York.[10] Great Western departed Avonmouth four days after Sirius and still came within a day of overtaking her.[3] Because Sirius was clearly too small for the Cork-New York crossing, she completed only one additional round trip before she was returned to her owners and, after a voyage to Saint Petersburg, resumed her regular St George company service, though on the Cork-Glasgow route.[2]

In 1839, the

British Admiralty released bids for transatlantic mail service to Halifax. The St. George Steam Packet Company bid 45,000 pounds for a monthly Cork-Halifax service including Sirius[11] and 65,000 pounds for a monthly Cork-Halifax-New York service.[12] Great Western also bid a monthly Bristol-Halifax-New York service.[13] However, the Admiralty rejected both bids because neither company offered fortnightly service in their bid response and the contract was finally awarded to Cunard.[12]

In late 1840 Sirius was sent to Gibson's Dry Dock at Hull for new boilers, but remained there over two years as the dry dock had to be specially lengthened.[2] In the face of financial difficulties, the St George company was refinanced in 1844 and took the style City of Cork Steam Ship Company, with which Sirius continued her regular employment on the Irish Sea.[7][2]

Figurehead of Sirius (dogstar) salvaged from the wreck and now in Hull Maritime Museum

Loss

Sirius was wrecked in 1847. On 16 January, on a voyage to Cork from Glasgow via Dublin with cargo and passengers, she struck rocks in dense fog in

Ballycotton lighthouse, on Ballycotton Island, was constructed over the following years and lit in 1851.[15]

Paddle shaft of Sirius salvaged from the wreck and on display beside the Cork cross-harbour ferry near Passage West, home town of Capt Roberts.

References

  1. ^ a b c Gibbs, Charles Robert Vernon (1957). Passenger Liners of the Western Ocean: A Record of Atlantic Steam and Motor Passenger Vessels from 1838 to the Present Day. John De Graff. pp. 38–39.
  2. ^
    ISBN 0-905617-762
    .
  3. ^ a b c American Heritage (1991). The Annihilation of Time and Space.
  4. ISBN 0-905824-04-0
    .
  5. ^ Sheppard, pp. 86, 91
  6. ^ Sheppard, pp. 87–88
  7. ^ a b c Kludas, Arnold (1999). Record breakers of the North Atlantic, Blue Riband Liners 1838–1953. London: Chatham.
  8. ^ Pond, Edgar LeRoy (1927). Janius Smith.
  9. ^ Corlett, Ewan (1975). The Iron Ship: the Story of Brunel's ss Great Britain. Conway.
  10. ^ Rolt, L. T. C. (1989). Isambard Kingdom Brunel (Second ed.). London: Penguin. p. 257.
  11. ^ Body, Geoffey (1971). British Paddle Steamers. Newton Abbot.
  12. ^ a b Bacon, Edwin M. (1911). Manual of Ship Subsidies. Chicago, A. C. McClurg.
  13. ^ Fox, Stephen. Transatlantic: Samuel Cunard, Isambard Brunel and the Great Atlantic Streamships.
  14. ^ Hocking, Charles (1969). Dictionary of Disasters at Sea During the Age of Steam. London: Lloyd's Register of Shipping.
  15. ^ Commissioners of Irish Lights. "Ballycotton". www.irishlights.ie. Retrieved 12 August 2018.

Bibliography

External links

Media related to Sirius (ship, 1837) at Wikimedia Commons

Records
Preceded by
None
 Holder of the Blue Riband (Westbound)
1838 		Succeeded by
Holder of the Blue Riband (Eastbound)
1838
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