3-011-379 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Colonel Lamb blockade-runner, built at Liverpool, 1864. Engraving from a drawing by Mr. William Woods. '...an exciting race took place...between the paddle-wheel steam-boat Douglas...and the Colonel Lamb, a paddle-wheel steam-ship, from the yard of Messrs. Jones, Quiggin, and Co..., the largest steel ship that has yet been built...[but] which had never been tried at sea...[Built of steel, she] was supposed to be much more fragile than an iron vessel, whilst her great steam power was considered likely to shake a few of her rivets. The result, however, has proved that the Colonel Lamb is a splendid sea-boat...there was an entire absence of the vibration that is frequently found in boats of her size and power...She will carry 2500 bales of cotton..."Full speed ahead!" was the order given...and the race continued for two hours and thirty-one minutes, during which time the Colonel Lamb gained on the Douglas about four miles. The engines of the Colonel Lamb are by Messrs. James Jack and Co., of the Victoria Engine Works Liverpool; they are a pair of oscillating engines, of 350-horse power, and have surface condensers...the ship ran sixteen knots and three-quarters, or about nineteen miles, an hour against a head wind and a heavy sea'. From "Illustrated London News", 1864.