Savannah

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Savannah

Post by shipstamps » Mon Jul 07, 2008 2:43 pm

This USA stamp was issued to commemorate the 125th anniversary of one of the most famous voyages to Liverpool, that of the P.S. SAVANNAH. This paddle wheeler was the first steam propelled vessel to cross the Atlantic, when she sailed from her home port of Savannah, in 1819, for the Mersey.
She was originally intended to be a wooden sailing ship when her builders launched her in 1818. Shortly before her completion though she was bought by a new company, the Savannah Steam Ship Co., who had her fitted out as a paddle steamship.
She was given an auxiliary engine of 90 i.h.p., collapsible paddle-wheels, which could be folded up like a fan and stowed on deck when not required, and a stove-pipe funnel, which had an elbow on top that could be turned as necessary to direct smoke and sparks away from the ship’s sails.
Shortly after the Savannah was launched, trade depressions caused her owners to send her to Europe for sale. She left her home port on May 24th, 1819, for Liverpool but, after much advertising, she was unable to get any passengers. Steamships were an unknown quantity and people would not risk sailing on her. On June 17th, she was seen off the Irish coast and her smoke caused her to be reported as a ship on fire.
At Kinsale, she re-coaled. The 75 tons of coal she took on board at Savannah were used up in about four days. She arrived in Liverpool on June 20th 1819, after a voyage which lasted 27 days, 11 hours at a speed averaging six knots. The paddle wheels were only in use for about 85 hours.
She only made this one Atlantic trip and was lost on November 5th, 1821, while trading between Savannah and New York.
USA SG920
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aukepalmhof
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Re: Savannah

Post by aukepalmhof » Sun Mar 27, 2011 7:58 pm

The SAVANNAH was built as a wooden sailing ship by Samuel Ficket and William Crockett at Corlears Hook, N.Y, U.S.A. as a coastwise packet.
But before launching was she bought by the Savannah Steam Ship Company.
22 August 1818 launched under the name SAVANNAH.
Tonnage 320 gross, 170 net, dim. 110 x 25.10 x 13ft. (draught).
Fitted out as a full rigged sailing ship, coppered and sheathed, with a square stern, with a male bust as figurehead, did not have galleries.
The SAVANNAH had 32 staterooms with one berth in each. For relaxation and social activity there was a large cabin 24 feet long by about 12 feet.
The purchase price was USA$36,000.

After completing, on 26 October 1818 she sailed from New York to Elizabethtown, New Jersey to take on board the steam engine and boilers manufactured by Daniel Dod, Stephen Vail and James P. Allaire by the Speedwell Iron Works, Morristown, New Jersey.
The engine was not yet ready and on 28 December 1818 the SAVANNAH sailed back to New York to avoid the risk of damage by ice.
In February 1819 the engine were brought alongside, a one cylinder direct-acting steam engine of 90hp (most probably nominal horse power) the two boilers had been installed already by that time.
The two paddle wheels did have a diameter of 4.48m, with a working speed of 18 revolutions a minute.
The engine is believed to have cost USA$30,000.

The Savannah Steamship Company, of Savannah, Georgia, which had been formed by a consortium of which William Scarborough, the nominal owner of the SAVANNAH, was the principal shareholder.
From her earliest days the company stated that the SAVANNAH’s purpose was the establishment of a commercial transatlantic service by steam.
The company contracted Captain Moses Rogers to command the ship. Capt Rogers was or had been an associate of Colonel Stevens and Robert Fulton, and was stated to have been an experienced engineer.
Before he was in command of the steamship PHOENIX and CLERMONT.

The SAVANNAH underwent trials late February 1819, and advertisements stated that she would sail from New York for Savannah on 27 March, with cargo and passengers. But she did sail without either on 28 March, the passage took her 222 hours of which she 37½ hours was under steam.
The whole enterprise appears to have been one of speculation, in the sense that the ship was acquired and fitted out as a steamship with the sole intention of selling it at a profit, for it was for this end only that she was sent across the Atlantic.

In the middle of April she steamed to Charleston, South Carolina, mainly in the hope that President James Monroe would agree to travel on her from Charleston to Savannah, but he could not be persuaded.
On her return voyage she carried seven fare-paying passengers. After her return to Savannah advertisements appears in the newspapers in which was stated that she would make a trip to New York, but only three people booked and the voyage was cancelled.

On 11 May 1819 President Monroe visited Savannah, and her boarded the vessel on 07 a.m. for a trip to the forts and defences, but the hope that he would give instructions to buy the vessel for the United States Navy came to nothing.

One week later a local newspaper the Daily Georgian contained an advertisement stating that the SAVANNAH would sail on 20 may for Liverpool, and passengers and cargo could be booked. But not any passenger or cargo was offered, and she sailed from Savannah on 22 May at 09 a.m. She dropt anchor off Tybee Light and she left from there on 24 May at 05 a.m. Two newspapers stating that she sailed for St Petersburg and that the plan to sell her to Czar Alexander I of Russia.

She dropped anchor at Liverpool at 06 p.m. on 20 June 1819 after a voyage of 29 days 4 hours from Savannah, of the crossing time of a bout 700 hours only 100 hours approximately the paddles were used, spread over parts of 12 days.
Subsequently the SAVANNAH proceeded to Helsingor, Stockholm and St Petersburg where she remained a month. She returned to her homeport via Copenhagen and Arendal, Norway without any passengers and cargo.

King Charles XIV of Sweden offered to trade USA$100,000 worth of hemp and iron for the SAVANNAH, delivered free of charge in the U.S.A.
The Czar of Russia offered Captain Rogers the exclusive rights of steam navigation in the Baltic and Black Sea if he would remain with his ship. Captain Rogers turned both offers down, and to understand this, most probably other expenses may well have doubled the total of the building cost of the SAVANNAH.

30 November 1819 she returned at Savannah, she did see the familiar Tybee Light at 05.00 a.m., and the pilot boarded her at 9 am and an hour later the SAVANNAH dropt anchor in the Savannah River. When the flood-tide was coming up she was heaving her anchor and under steam she sailed to Savannah, where she anchored off the town.
From Arendal she did make the passage to Savannah in 25 days of which she was 19 days steaming.

After arrival Captain Rogers made his report to the investors and they decided to send the SAVANNAH to Washington, no time was wasted, not any new coal or wood was taken on board, a minimum of supplies was purchased. The Savannah Steam Ship Company, for with the exception of about two dozen passengers taken on the round trip to Charleston the previous April, there had not been no income in the company’s brief lifetime and bills were mounting.
After four nights in port on 3 December she got underway bound for Washington, on the 16th she was in Washington, after an encounter of probably the worst storm of her career.

After arrival laid up and put up for sale, and at least at an auction she was sold to Captain Nathan H. Holdrige of New York City. Her certificate sale date was 25 August 1820.

On 1 September 1820 under command of the buyer she hoisted her anchor bound for New York under sail. She docked at the Jones Wharf, New York where her steam engine at an auction was bought by James P. Allaire for USA$1600 he was one of the manufactures of the engine. He put an identifying plate on it and exhibited it as a treasure relic.
During her stay at New York for one and a half month, her engine and boilers were removed; a tweendeck was built in, making her a two deck ship.
Tonnage is now given as 291½ tons, depth 12.11ft.
Under command of Captain Holdridge she sailed from New York on 26 October with a full cargo and about 24 passengers. She was a fast packet, her passage time to Savannah was 90 hours, she arrived there on 31 October.
From the beginning as a sailing packet she was a good money earner.
From her short life as a sailing packet of 376 days, no log books have located, but from newspapers we know that the return voyage to New York took 19 days. On the 2 December she berthed again at New York. She left again on the 5th fully loaded with cargo and passengers.

Late in 1820, the trading house of Sturges & Burroughs bought into the Holdridge Savannah property, a new certificate was issued at Savannah, and the ships homeport was changed from New York to Savannah.

She completed eight roundtrips between New York and Savannah under command of Captain Holdridge during 1821, before beginning on her last voyage, sailing from Savannah on 24 October under command of Captain Holdridge, with a cargo of 250 bales of cotton and at least 3 passengers bound for New York. By crossing the weather was very bad and Captain Holdridge was forced to navigate on dead reckoning always a tricky business. On Monday 5 November 1821 the SAVANNAH ran on a sandbar opposite Fire Place, a little Long Island community at three o’clock in the morning. The position many more miles to the north than Captain Holdridge did reckon the vessel should be.

The next morning the passengers were brought on shore, and salvage operations began as soon the tide fell making it easier to reach the ship. On Friday we know from newspapers that she was driven further on, probably that she was forced over the outer bar.
On Monday the 12th all hope of saving the vessel was abandoned, the heavy pounding she got from the sea, split her hull open, and the hold got flooded. Most of the cargo of cotton was brought ashore; maybe some did have water damage. Thereafter tides and sea slowly buried the ship in the sand.

Antigua 1998 $1.75 sg2679, scott?
Benin 1995 300f sgMS1291, scott754.
Equatorial Guinea 1975? 0.85 sg?, scott?
Paraguay 1976 4g sg?, scott1667
Sierra Leone 1998 300le sg2913, scott? and 2008 Le 4000 sg?, scott?
St Thomas & Prince 1984 15.50d sg?, scott756a
United States of America 1944 3c sg 920, scott923
Zambia 1997 1000k sg?, scott688c.
St Maarten 2013 125c sg?, scott?

Source: Wikipedia. SS Savannah by Braynard.
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Last edited by aukepalmhof on Wed Aug 08, 2018 9:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Arturo
Posts: 723
Joined: Mon Feb 13, 2012 8:11 pm

Re: Savannah

Post by Arturo » Wed Apr 23, 2014 5:08 pm

Savannah

Paraguay, 1976, S.G.?, Scott; 1667.
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Arturo
Posts: 723
Joined: Mon Feb 13, 2012 8:11 pm

Re: Savannah

Post by Arturo » Sat Apr 26, 2014 8:29 am

Savannah

Lesotho, 1999, S.G.?, Scott; 1213b.
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Anatol
Posts: 1037
Joined: Sun Apr 12, 2009 2:13 pm

Re: Savannah

Post by Anatol » Sun Nov 16, 2014 10:27 pm

Togo1999;1000f;SG? Eynhallow(Holy Island Scotland)40,0 Antigua,Barbuda1998;1,75d;SG2679.
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D. v. Nieuwenhuijzen
Posts: 871
Joined: Fri Sep 24, 2010 7:46 pm

Re: Savannah

Post by D. v. Nieuwenhuijzen » Sat Jul 29, 2017 2:22 pm

Nederlandse Antillen 2003, 65 c. StG.?
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