The wooden paddle frigate Christophe Colomb, 1,500 tons, was built for the French Navy at Brest and launched on 15 March 1843. Measuring 226 feet in length with a 39 foot beam, her paddle wheel machinery was driven by side-lever engines and she could make 9 knots at full steam. Used mainly for transport duties between France and Algeria, she was one of four such paddlers which, in 1847, were loaned by the French government to the Compagnie Generale des Paquebots Transatlantiques in order to establish a passenger steamship service on the North Atlantic. Renamed Philadelphie, her first civilian voyage to New York took a very sluggish 18 days and when the other paddlers turned in equally slow passages, it became obvious that the vessels were unsuited to the route and the company was wound up within a year. The four paddle frigates were returned to duty with the navy, each reverted to her original name and Christophe Colomb served until 1868 when she was laid up prior to being scrapped at Toulon in 1878.