Madeleine’s Daughter
The Mayor of Port Brique had long felt the need of personal transport, not
always wanting to impose on the French Squadron, and thus commissioned the
shipwrights to build him a vessel. His requirements were simple, speed,
agility, appropriate accomodations for the mayor, and provision for armament.
The shipwrights used the remnants of the old Spanish Barque System Maria to
produce the mayor’s new vessel. Though not traditionally fans of the schooner
rig, the recent success of the Bleusocière, combined with the mayor’s
requirements, made the fore-and-aft two masted rig the obvious choice for
the new vessel:
Christened Madeleine’s Daughter, the schooner was launched in April 1805. The Mayor’s long time captain, Fauchelevent, taking the helm (much to the envy of the onlooking Squadron captains) for the Maiden voyage.
The schooner rig enables the crew size to be kept to a minimum, convenient in such a small craft, particularly as the Mayor’s stateroom takes up a lot of space below.
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Thus far, the gunports were kept tightly closed, so speculation on
how she is armed continues.
| | Built on a narrow hull, with one centre section, the Daughter uses the standard invert slope + tall slope hull shaping (the original tall blue slopes were swapped with white recently - the tall blues being needed for the new Misérable which is currently under construction).
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Plate built masts are used rather than standard mast sections because it’s easier to achieve a reasonable rake with such masts, they allow for easy use of short ratlines (which I have difficulty using convincingly with standard masts and octagonal mast plates), and they are appropriately light for a small schooner such as this.
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| | The sails are paper. I’ve been there, done that, with stiffened calico, but I’ve decided the effort isn’t worth the reward. At the moment, the Daughter has white sails, but these will be swapped for ‘parchment’ type paper sails in due course. Parchment paper gives a proper canvas effect, but is easier to work with, cheaper, and holds its shape better, than stiffened calico.
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Cheers
Richie Dulin
Some more pics (click to enlarge):
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