Cutty Sark

About

Cutty Sark is a British clipper, launched on the River Leven at Dumbarton in November 1869 and one of the last tea clippers ever built. She is named after the witch in Robert Burns's poem Tam o' Shanter, who wore a short shift — a "cutty sark" in Scots.

She came too late for the trade she was built for. The Suez Canal opened the same month she was launched, and it gave steamships a short route to China that sailing ships could not use. She carried tea home from China for eight seasons, from 1870 to 1877, and in 1872 raced Thermopylae home from Shanghai, losing after her rudder was carried away. After that she carried general cargo, and then wool from Australia, where she was the fastest ship of her day.

In 1895 she was sold to a Portuguese firm and renamed Ferreira. She was bought back in 1922 and used as a training ship, and since 1954 she has stood in a dry dock at Greenwich, as a museum ship. She survived two fires there, in 2007 and 2014.

From Cutty Sark on Wikipedia.