The American tea clipper Staghound

Staghound was an 'extreme' clipper and the first such vessel to be built by the great Donald McKay in his yard at East Boston. Launched on 7^th December 1850, she was registered at 1,534 tons American (about 1,100 British measurement) and was 215 feet in length with a 40 foot beam. Owned by Upton & Tappan of Boston, her first voyage was to San Francisco from where she crossed the Pacific to China before beginning a regular tea run from Whampoa to New York. Exceptionally fast, her best day's run was 358 miles reported on her maiden voyage and she proved very profitable for her owners. On 2^nd August 1861, she left Sunderland with a cargo of coal bound for San Francisco; on 12^th October, when off Pernambuco, a fire was discovered at 1 o'clock which, by 6 o'clock the same evening, had burned the ship to the waterline and she foundered.