The medium clipper Carrier Dove was built by James Abraham of Baltimore in 1855 and, from the moment of her launch, she was hailed as a particularly handsome ship. Owned by Montell & Co of Baltimore, she was registered at 1694 tons and 220 feet long, with a 42 foot beam. She cleared New York on her maiden voyage on 5 October 1855 but ran into a terrific hurricane on 13 October, losing her mainmast as well as her fore and mizzen topmasts. Despite being "a perfect wreck above deck"' Captain Conner decided to continue the passage and she limped into Rio on 9 December. Remaining there for two months for repairs, she eventually continued on her way and docked in San Francisco on 25 April 1856, 98 days out of Rio. In 1858, an advertisement in the 'New York Herald' claimed she had sailed from Liverpool to Melbourne in 73 days and thence around the world in ten months. Whatever the truth of these claims, she returned to her New York - San Francisco route until 1862 when she began a series of North Atlantic crossings. The next year she was driven ashore on the Irish Coast, near Valentia, but was salvaged and repaired. Unfortunately, the result of this episode was several rapid changes of ownership within a few years and, by 1875, she was being operated by John W. Elwell & Co of New York. On 3 March 1876, whilst en route from Liverpool to San Francisco, via Tybee, Philadelphia, she ran ashore on the Stone Horse Shoals (near Tybee) and became a total loss. It was a sad end for a very beautiful ship which had combined the graceful speed of a clipper with all the stowage capacity of the earlier packet boats.