Caledonia (1817) Boulton & Watt

[rheintrutz]

As i wrote in the "Introduce Yourself" Section i'm interested in the History
of navigation on the river Rhine.
I am also a Member of the German skitelsclub Kallboys.
"Kalle" is the German word for the gutter
next to the bowling Alley and has nothing to do with the similar
word that's written with "C".

On our homepage www.kallboys.de we wanted to show our visitors
our Hometown "Mondorf" on the River Rhine. For that we show Videos
and Stories (about the history of the Village) around Mondorf.

Since over a year we offer also paper crafts of Buildings and Vehicles
of Mondorf for free download. So we have our Church, our Fire station,
a Castle, some Rhineships, a Ferry, a Tram and a Bus.
Every absolutely free Paper craft contains a manual, a short History
and Pictures.
Each Model that we offer has a reference to our Hometown.

In an article about Steamships on the River Rhine I have seen, that
the first Steamship that passed Mondorf on the Rhine in 1817 was the "Caledonia"
of Boulton and Watt.
(Compare: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Murdoch#The_Caledonia_paddle_steamer)
The first Paddle Steamer on the Rhine, the Concordia) only came up to Cologne,
because the strong flow of the Rhine.

Now i wanted to produce a paper craft of this vessel.
"The first paddlesteamer that passed Mondorf"

I found some plans of this ship on the webpage of the
Institution of Mechanical Engineers
http://picturegallery.imeche.org/SearchResults.aspx?so=0&st=END+23%2f1
This will be work for constructing the model.
But i found nothing about the coloring of the vessel.

I also emailed this question to heritagesteamers.co.uk and to
the naval Museum in London.
They was very nice, but unfortunately they was not able to help, because
they had no records for that ship.

So I wanted to ask if someone here in the Forum can help me
with the coloring of the"Caledonia".
Who have any documentation about that vessel?
Maybe there was usual colours for Steamships in this decade?

I want to reiterate that the Paper crafts are made available free of
charge and we have no financial interests.
You are welcome to have a look at the models that are already available
http://www.kallboys.de/mondorfer-bastelboegen

I thank you in advance for your efforts.

Many greetings from the River Rhine.

Holger

[Harold H. Duncan]

Hi Holger,
Sorry, I can't help with your request, I live at the other side of the world, but sure that one of the other members will be able to help.
Just visited your web-site, and must say what a brilliant way to bring your town to life.
You are to be congratulated on some very well executed models there, and an excellent web-site.
Well done
kiwi

[rheintrutz]

Thank you Kiwi, for your nice words about our Homepage.

Well, maybe there  is some informations about the early
Steampaddlers here in the Forum. 
As i wrote, perhaps it is possibe to  draw connections back
because the painting of other early ships.

The only other Picture of that Vessel i found is here:
http://www.lwl.org/LWL/Kultur/fremde-impulse/die_impulse/Impuls-Ruhrort-Haniel

Greetz
Holger

[PeeWee]

Hi Holger and welcome to paddleducks.

I have looked through a few of my books, though i do not have too many.  the caledonia is mentioned in a couple but only in reference to the event and James Watt and nothing about the colour scheme .

i did find something very strange though, the picture here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Caledonia_-_first_Danish_steamship.jpg  same picture though the hull seems to show different details such as windows compared to your link  http://www.lwl.org/LWL/Kultur/fremde-impulse/die_impulse/Impuls-Ruhrort-Haniel   

[rheintrutz]

Cool - how did you find this?
Its a little bit strange that it should be the first Danish Steamboat?!
But it could fit. In this Artikle they wrote that it was bought 1819 from England:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1819_in_Denmark
That was after the Rhine Journey.

If i hink over it, also the Flags fits better to denmark than to England.
For England the Backgrond shoud be white and the St. Georges cross Red
In an Ink Drawing they would use black for the St. Georges cross.
But on the Picture the Background is Black - so it fits better to Denmark.
Also the Union Jack was the official Flag since 1801.
So if the Pic should represent the english ship there has to be the Union Jack i think.

On your pic it looks like a merchant Vessel in the classic
Black/White combination....

Could this be?

[djcf]

Hi,
All I can find is...

Caledonia, built by John & Charles Wood, Port Glasgow.
Launched 27 April 1815
Sailed briefly on the Clyde, then the Thames, not very successful.
Bought by Boulton & Watt April 1817, re-engined and re-boilered.
October 1817 sailed from Margate to Rotterdam, then up the Rhine to Cologne and Koblenz, and visited Antwerp on the Schelde before returning to the Thames in January 1818.
Changes were made to engines, and larger paddle wheels (10.5' to 13', 8 floats) were fitted in 1818. Also new funnel.
Sold 1819 to Danish owners, changes made to cabins. On occasion used as royal yacht.
Broken up 1843.
No idea about colours, but had lavish gilt decoration at stern, and figurehead of a woman at bow.

regards
Clark

[rheintrutz]

Thanks for the Information, Clark.
This helps in this way, that the drawings of the stern and the Bow on imeche actually belongs to this ship.

http://picturegallery.imeche.org/ViewLarger.aspx?PID=285&RAID=11


Cool - its like a jigsaw puzzle that slowly apears as a complete Picture 

[rheintrutz]

Forget something.
Has somebody informations about the dimensions?
Length and width?

[djcf]

Hi Holger,

Length 95'7" BP
Breadth (hull only not including sponsons) 15'6"
depth 8'6"
draught 4'6"
weight 94 tons

according to the book "From Comet to Caledonia" by Donald Watson

ISBN 0-85174-671-3

[rheintrutz]

Thanks a lot.
Also learned someting new!
Now i know what sponsons are (had to google this)

[rheintrutz]

I started to construct the papercraft.
To create the hull was not as easy, as i thought, because i had no body line plan.
So i used a plan of the "Graf von Paris" and adapt it to the Caledonia.

With the plans of Imece and your information i created this:





Now the difficult part begins. The colors.
Because there is no information about the colors i tried to
color the ship, in that way, that was "usual" in this Timeperiod.
The follwing three points i used for my considerations

1. The Caledonia was a"Glattdeckschiff" - a ship with no superstructures. And it was made from wood.
2. Also it was a British ship built around the year 1800
3. Solvent owners who planed to use the ship in salt water.

This leads me to the following assumptions:

1. The deck should be light wood - maybe Teak.
2. A black planking above the waterline (possibly yellow or white)
3. copper planking was since 1750 was customary.

And so it looks now:





Do you think, this is historical right?

Best Regards
Holger

[Spankbucket]

Hi Holger

Your progress on the model looks great...well done! I shall keep watching with interest.

With regard to your colour scheme, whilst I'm no expert, I have the impression that copper-bottoms were designed for use in tropical climates (to discourage marine growth and shipworm) and were very expensive (Hence for naval use). Is it likely this would have been applied for Rhine use? I would  personally copy the many wooden ship models of that period and do the bottom white?...but maybe some one here knows better.

Regards...Bernie

[rheintrutz]

Hello Bernie,

Well my first thought was also that copper was only against the woodworm. But copper also reduce
the growing of other "Sea Monsters" like shells and weed. So Copper plated boats was faster.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_sheathing (Scroll down and have a look on "Civilan use")

As i see the story, James Watt Jr. went on a kind of "Promotion Tour", when he came up the River Rhine, with
the intention to sell Steammachines.
So put in by Boulton and Watt, I would have used every possibility to make the boat faster and looking good.
It was also decorated with figures on the bow and stern and ornaments  on the side.
In my opinion - a very clever marketing 
Another point for the copperplates: maybe they planned a European tour. In that case they had to pass a lot of
salty seawater.

Makes this sense?

regards
Holger

[Harold H. Duncan]

Hi Holger,
Found a little time to have a further look at your references and work. Well done. Caledonia appears to be of similar construction to the 'Thames' barges, with modified bow and stern. Presumably to provide a flat mid-ship section to carry the boiler etc.
Like what you have done, and keep up the good work
kiwi

[AlistairD]

I have a  Danish book, Danske Dampskibe by Andreas Laursen, with a drawing oc Caledonia showing her painted with a white stripe along her hull and fake gun ports round the windows. She ran from Copenhagen to Kiel from 1819 to 1831 finding more success there than she had on the Clyde, Thames or Rhine.
Eduard Büngden's large KD book has a tiny drawing that may be her or may be Defiance, it is between the descriptions of each and has no caption.
It wasn't James Watt, but James Watt Jr., who captained her when she came to the Rhine.
Some publications have confused her with another Caledonia from 1814 which was built in Dundee for service at Hull, but she remained at Hull all her life