This is in reference to Downhauls on square yards on sailing ships. I'm familiar with the last stage of sailing ships, around 1880 to 1910, the era of iron and then steal hull construction and split topsails and split t'galents. In this last phase of sailing ship construction the Upper topsail yard had a pair of lines called Downhauls. The Downhauls pull the yard down to its lowered position when sails are being taken in and furled. I wonder about this bit of rigging. wouldn't the weight of the yard and all its gear be sufficient to bring the yard down if the halyard was eased? And I surmise that if this was not enough, the only force keeping the yard up when the halyard was eased would have to be friction on the parrel bucket or the force of the wind acting on the sail. But clearly they had a need for the line since it is there on all the later sailing ships.A very interesting question. Frank seems to have figured out much of the answer himself, but perhaps we could encapsulate the story as follows:But, I don't see downhauls (on square yards) on any of the ships from earlier times. Neither H.M.S. Victory or the U.S.S. Constitution had downhauls on the topsail yard. Nor did these ships have parel buckets but instead had the truss made of rope or parel trucks or beads. Turning it over in my mind, I imagine it would be possible to use the Clewlines as downhauls, if the Sheets were not eased, taking up on the Clewlines would have the effect of drawing the topsail yard downward. But was it designed to be used that way?
I don't have the engineering know-how to be able to judge the relative weights of the wooden yards of the Victory and Constitution Topsail and all the canvas of those huge sails on the one hand, verses the weight of a modern steel yard with heavier gear but with less canvas on the other. I suspect the weights would be close? if that's so, what am I not understanding about how the topsail yard was taken in aboard the older wooden ships? Can anyone shed some light on this bit of esoteric rigging? Also, can anyone tell me when Downhauls on square yards started to appear? For instance, did the Cutty Sark or other clippers have them? The Charls W. Morgan? I can't wait to hear what you modelers have to say about this!
One would think that the sheer weight of the yard would bring it down no matter what ...but because of wind in the sail, or because the vessel was rolling, there was an inherent tendency of the parrel (particularly the later tub-parrel) to 'hang', and a downhaul of some sort was necessary.
With single topsails and topgallants, the clew of the sail was hauled up to the bunt, and if the sheet were kept fast, hauling on the clewline encouraged the yard to slide down. This is reflected in the sequence of orders issued when shortening sail. For instance: Patrick Hourigan Manual of Seamanship for the Officer of the Deck, Baltimore, 1903, page 22:
Taking in the topgallant, he gives:
Let go lee sheet and halliards! Clew down! ...Let go the weather sheet! Clew up!and in reefing single topsails, we have:
Round in the weather braces! Semmttle away the topsail halliards! Clew down!In both cases, the clewlines are acting as downhauls.
With the advent of split topsails (Forbes 1841; Howes 1853), and later split topgallants, the sheet of the upper sail is kept fast and there are no clewlines, so a downhaul for upper topsail- and upper topgallantsail becomes necessary.
Harold Underhill Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean Carrier page 164, describes a single downhaul running from the lower topsail yard arm through a block at the upper topsail yardarm, but the commoner arrangement was to rig it a whip ...standing end secured to the upper yardarm, down through a block at the lower yardarm, and back up through a block under the upper yard arm. A photo of a vessel fitted with a single downhaul is found on page 146 of Seamanship in the Age of Sail; photos of a whip downhaul are to be seen on pages 39,76,77 and back dustjacket of Elton Hall's Sperm Whaling from New Bedford. See also page 18 of Volume 2 of Longridge's The Cutty Sark: The Last of the Famous Tea Clippers, the diagram on page 42 of John Leavitt's The Charles W Morgan (First Edition). Page 286 of F L Middendorf Bemastung u. Takelung der Schiffe diagrams whip downhauls on both upper topgallant and upper topsail yards.
The exception to the rule that single topsails were not fitted with downhauls, were Mediterranean vessels rigged 'polacre' (à pible) fashion. In these, the sheets remained fast to the lower yardarms, and there were no topsail clewlines, so downhauls were needed. These ran from the lower yard, about half way out, vertically up through blocks made fast to the topsail yard and down to deck. They can just be picked out in the engraving on page 85 of Ships and Seamanship: The Maritime Prints of J-J Baugean.
Footnote: Perhaps a German speaking subscriber can sort out for me an odd term used in this connection by Middendorf ....namely, "Ecken". It clearly means 'sticking' but I could not find it in any of my German dictionaries. On S. 300 in discussing the tub-parrel (Tonnenrack) he says:
"Zwischen Lederfutter u. Stenge muß ein Spielraum verbleiben, der aber nich allzu groß genommen werden darf, weil sonst leicht ein "Ecken" oder Festklemmen des Racks eintritt." ( There must be a little play between the leather lining of the parrel and the topmast, but this must not be too great otherwise an "Ecken" or sticking will occur.){John H Harland}
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