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Lot Essay
Designed by Bernard Waymouth, the Lloyd's surveyor whose genius produced the legendary Thermopylae the following year, Leander's lines were "amongst the sharpest of any tea clipper" [see David MacGregor's The Tea Clippers, 2nd edition, 1983]. Composite-built by J.G. Lawrie in Glasgow in 1867, she was registered at 886 tons gross (848 net) and measured 215 feet in length with a 35 foot beam. Ordered for Joseph Somes of London, her handsome profile and lavish appointments caused her to be known as 'Somes' yacht' amongst the professionals in the East India Docks and she was undoubtedly a very beautiful vessel. Many fine-lined ships only sported a small sail area but Leander was an exception and her topgallants "were especially deep".
Always fast, she turned in several notable passages during her years in the China tea trade and, for most of the 1870s, carried tea direct to New York rather than into London. Still managing to load tea as late as 1886, by which time most of the trade had been taken over by steamships, she was sold to R. Anderson that year and then to W. Ross & Co. in 1887. In 1892, after twenty-five years under the Red Ensign, she was sold to Ajum Goolam Ossen of Oman who renamed her Nusrool Mujeed and put her to work in Middle Eastern coastal waters. Re-rigged as a barque in 1897, she was later sold to Persian owners and finally broken up in 1901.
The most well-known portrait of Leander was executed by William Clark of Greenock to mark her departure from the Clyde upon completion in November 1867 (see A.S. Davidson's Marine Art & the Clyde, 100 Years of Sea, Sail & Steam, 2001, p.117, illustrated).
Always fast, she turned in several notable passages during her years in the China tea trade and, for most of the 1870s, carried tea direct to New York rather than into London. Still managing to load tea as late as 1886, by which time most of the trade had been taken over by steamships, she was sold to R. Anderson that year and then to W. Ross & Co. in 1887. In 1892, after twenty-five years under the Red Ensign, she was sold to Ajum Goolam Ossen of Oman who renamed her Nusrool Mujeed and put her to work in Middle Eastern coastal waters. Re-rigged as a barque in 1897, she was later sold to Persian owners and finally broken up in 1901.
The most well-known portrait of Leander was executed by William Clark of Greenock to mark her departure from the Clyde upon completion in November 1867 (see A.S. Davidson's Marine Art & the Clyde, 100 Years of Sea, Sail & Steam, 2001, p.117, illustrated).