Name Peggy

What is the vessel’s ability to demonstrate history in her physical fabric?

PEGGY is a clinker-built open vessel built in 1789. She is a small pleasure boat with six oar holes, and the surviving ironwork fittings and spars indicate that she was schooner rigged with a bowsprit. Extensive early alterations were made to her structure in 1802. An additional strake, topped with a new gunwale, was fitted. The six oar-ports were plugged and the original thwarts removed and replaced with three new ones in different positions at a higher level to suit the extra strake. Clear marks on the planking still indicate where the original thwarts and thwart knees were fitted.  The transom was altered and increased in height but the letters of her name, PEGGY, are still visible on the historic paintwork and match the earlier, shallower transom. Alterations were also made to frames and floors, with most of the original cross-beams for the floor boards surviving in the stern. The combination of alterations turned a relatively light, fast, pulling boat into a heavier, sailing one. Originally fitted with three ‘sliding keels’, the forerunners of the now widely used centreboard, she was one of the first vessels to use that technology. The sliding keel were removed in the 1802 renovation.  The majority of her original structure has survived. While her present keel is not original, and is not formed to have sliding keels, the original keel, with three sliding keel slots, has survived and is stored alongside her. Further structural repair work was carried out during the late 1940s when PEGGY was repaired by local craftsmen. This involved replacement of the keel, stem post and two planks, all of which were damaged when she lay on her starboard side. She was placed in a support cradle in advance of the museum opening to the public in 1951. She is currently equipped with eight cannon - six 1 foot long, mounted three a side and two slightly longer as stern chasers, as there is evidence that at one stage she was armed.  Her mainmast indicates the iron collar fitted at original thwart height and the gooseneck, but this and her other surviving spars may never have been used in the vessel’s later configuration.

What are the vessel’s associational links for which there is no physical evidence?

PEGGY is principally associated with the Isle of Man. She was built for Captain George Quayle (1751-1835) of Castletown, who was a member of the House of Keys for 51 years and, as such, was a prominent politician and businessman. There is a historical connection to Lake Windermere where in 1796 she raced in a regatta, possibly against the yacht MARGARET currently displayed at the Windermere Jetty.  Quayle corresponded with Captain (later Admiral) Shank, the inventor of sliding keels who used her as an experimental craft for his design. She was discovered in Castletown in 1935 in a walled-up cellar, where she had lain for more than 150 years. She was measured and her plans drawn by naval architect P.J. Oke, on behalf of the Society of Nautical Research, as part of a general survey of British working boats and small craft. In 1941 Bridge House was sold by the Quayle family and PEGGY was presented to the Manx Museum together with the boathouse. PEGGY and all related documents were examined in 1967 by Dr Basil Greenhill, including analysis of surviving correspondence detailing the Quayle family and their boats. Being under 33 feet in length she is listed on the National Small Boat Register rather than the National Register of Historic Vessels. However, her details are retained by NHS-UK as she is listed as a member of the National Historic Fleet as she meets all criteria for inclusion other than length overall. She is the last remaining intact shallop and the world’s oldest surviving schooner.

How does the vessel’s shape or form combine and contribute to her function?

PEGGY is one of very few surviving 18th century wooden boats and is a unique source of information relating to small vessel structure and form of the period. Her form and rig were perfectly suited to her intended use for pleasure and communication in Manx waters and the Irish Sea. However, she was a little narrow for her length and her freeboard was low, making her rather wet to sail, as is documented on her return from Lake Windermere in 1796.  The structural changes made to her included adding an additional strake, which lessened her original aesthetic appeal but would have improved her seaworthiness.  She is a rare example of everyday vessels of the time, providing a unique representation of small wooden boat-building at the beginning of the industrial revolution. Her shape is typical of other craft in use in the late eighteenth century as documented in the Irish Sea and America, on coasts north of Boston.  She remains in the geographical area where she once operated, stabilised and conserved by Manx National Heritage.

Sources:

1. Norman J. Brouwer, International Register of Historic Ships. Second edition, 1993. Oswestry, Shropshire: Anthony Nelson, 114.