Joseph Heard - The Merchant Brig Rimac In Two Positions

The Merchant brig Rimac in two positions off Cape Horn, with another of Brocklebank's brigs in view. Rimac, identified from her masthead Watson`s Code flags for 268 (= Rimac ), was one of a class of twenty-one standard wooden brigs built for Brocklebanks' of Liverpool between 1822 and 1845. Launched from Brocklebank`s own yard at Whitehaven in 1834, she was registered at 215 tons and measured 90 feet in length with a 23 foot beam. Ordered specifically for the company`s Peru route, she spent much of her life sailing to the many ports on the western coast of South America and rounded the Horn´ no less than fifty-six times, a remarkable achievement for any sailing vessel, particularly a tiny brig. After a long and trouble-free career, she was inbound for Dundee with a cargo of guano on 28th February 1862 when she was driven aground near Kilrush, in the south-west of Ireland. Although successfully refloated, she had suffered some hull damage and, perhaps for this reason, Brocklebanks' sold her to Nuttall & Co. of Liverpool in 1864. Ten years later, on 12th December 1874, by which date she was owned by W. Hayes of Blythe, she was wrecked near North Somercotes, south of Grimsby.