NAUTICAL RESEARCH JOURNAL 271

Figure 1. Scottish Maid. Model and photographs by the author.

The English Merchant Schooner
Scottish Maid
. . . . .
by John G. Heard, M.D.
The schooner evolved as a dominant force
in British merchant shipping during the
early nineteenth century. The British devel-
oped the topsail schooner, setting square
sails from yards on the foretopmast, which
allowed better response to the varying wind
direction in local waters than was possible
with fore and aft rigs. The schooners were
built economically in small ports, and were
quite seaworthy, allowing both coastal trade
and long ocean passages. Because of the
ships relatively small size, shallow draft,
and excellent speed, they were very well
suited to the fruit trade that developed
between Britain and the Azores, supplying
oranges and other perishables to home
ports. These ships were beautiful and sport-
ed wonderful names such as Geisha and, my
favorite, Fruit Girl. The schooners were also
well suited to the packet trade, moving pas-
sengers and valuable cargo to and from
London, bypassing the rough roads and cut-
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272
ting travel time.
I have found that model ship builders
gradually adopt styles and methods of con-
struction over the course of the years, and
become focused in specific areas of expert-
ise. I began with kit construction on a card
table in a closet as a method of relaxation
during my medical training. A pivotal event
in my development occurred when I read
Harold Underhills two volume work, Plank
On Frame Models, and followed his teach-
ing in the construction of a scratch built
model of Leon. Over the next years I
became interested in English merchant
schooners, and have finished several models
of these ships. There is a great pleasure in
having all of your effort and experience
focused on one type of ship, and for me this
culminated in Scottish Maid.
Scottish Maid was built in Aberdeen,
Scotland, in 1839 by Alexander Hall & Sons
as a packet schooner for the London trade.
This was the first schooner designed with
the Aberdeen bow, a heavily forward raked
stem designed to gain unmeasured cargo
space under the new measurement rules
instituted by the government in 1836. The
new bow increased speed and improved sail-
ing characteristics. The Halls subsequently
built many ships based on the design,
including Elissa, launched in 1877 and still
sailing out of the Texas Seaport Museum in
Galveston, Texas.
Figure 2. Scottish Maid deck view.
Figure 3. Port side bow view.
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273
The Halls used a builders half model
to construct Scottish Maid, which David R.
MacGregor later used to produce complete
lines, deck, and sail plans. I used these
plans in creating this model, which is con-
structed to Class A scratch built standards.
All parts of the model except the rigging line
were made from scratch. The hull and
frames are cherry and the decking is lemon-
wood. The smaller partssuch as rigging
blocks, the anchor, gratings, and the ships
boatrequired the use of fine grain box-
wood. Most of the metal parts were made of
blackened brass. The model is made in
Admiralty style with exposed frames below
the waterline. The frames are replicas of the
actual frames, made of mutually supporting
pairs with butting of five to seven parts in
each frame. The planking follows Lloyds
Registration Rules for overlap of joints. The
scale is 1:96, suggesting that one must build
everything one can see with the naked eye
one hundred feet away from the actual ship.
The model was constructed on a -
inch plywood board with blocks to locate the
position of the keel and vertical brackets at
either end to grip the keel, stem, and count-
er. This allows the model to be constructed
in a controlled vertical plane similar to the
actual ship construction method, and the
hull can be removed from the jig at any time
during construction for detailed work. Each
frame was lifted from the lines plan, allow-
ing for planking thickness and the bevel of
the outside edge of the frame. Construction
began with fixing the midship frame to the
keel and progressed forward to the stem and
aft to a special built up counter. A template
board was used to hold the upper part of the
frames in proper position during construc-
Figure 4. Stern view.
Figure 5. Starboard side overhead view.
Figure 6. Starboard view.
Vol. 58, No 4 WINTER 2013
274
tion.
Dowels used for hull construction
and the planking treenails were made from
bamboo stakes, obtained from a local garden
shop, and drawn to correct size through a
jewelers draw plate. The stanchions were
inserted between frames in the real ship, but
I included them as extensions of the frames
to maintain the sweep and contour of the
hull in the model. The deck planking was
applied in single strips, blackened on the
edge with a #2 pencil to represent caulking.
Deck furniture was finished to scale, and
small metal parts were fabricated from
blackened brass using low temperature sol-
der with flux. One of the most delightful
items to build was the ships wheel, made
from a boxwood rim with bamboo spokes.
Just when I thought I had wrapped
up the deck, I remembered the ships boat,
which, to scale, measured about three inch-
es in length. There are several approaches to
building small boats, but I prefer the plank
on plug method. From the lines drawing of
the boat, a scale plug was carved from bass-
wood and coated with wax. A 1/32-inch box-
wood keel, stem piece, and sternpost with a
transom were inserted into a centerline
groove in the plug, which then was planked
over with boxwood. I added internal fittings
after the boats hull was removed from the
plug.
With the hull finished, masts and
spars were turned from cherry on a lathe
and small metal parts and lines were added.
Single and double rigging blocks were made
from boxwood in the correct sizes. Deadeyes
for the main rigging were made to scale
from cherry. Belaying pins were made from
bent, soldered, and shaped brass wire. The
rigging was taken from MacGregors sail
plan with few changes.
It took me one and a half years to
research and build this model from scratch.
One must ask oneself if it was worth all that
time. The answer lies in the reward the
builder finds in each element of the process,
and his or her focus on each part of the puz-
zle. Harold Underhill said it best: For me
the real pleasure is in the work of building
rather than the model when complete.
John G. Heard, M.D. practiced radiology and
nuclear medicine for many years. After
retirement from medicine, he switched from
X-ray to the visible spectrum and worked in
stage lighting design. A long time interest in
sailing was channeled by the writings of
Harold Underhill into scratch building
model merchant ships, and these efforts are
aided by his participation in the Gulf Coast
Ship Modelers Society.
References:
Greenhill, Basil, The Merchant Schooners, 2 vol-
umes. London: Conway Maritime Press, 1988.
Hamby, D., Scottish Maid, Model Shipwright 94
(December 1995), 60-66.
Lloyds Survey Report no. 560, National Maritime
Museum, Greenwich, England
MacGregor, David R., Fast Sailing Ships: Their
Design and Construction, 1775-1875. Lymington:
Nautical Publishing Co., 1973.
-Scottish Maid Lines, Deck, and Sail Plan.
David MacGregor Plans.
Underhill, Harold, Plank On Frame Models, 2 vol-
umes. Glasgow: Brown, Son, & Ferguson, 1974.
Figure 7. Port side view.