The Peking is a steel-hulled four-masted barque – the sister ship to the Passat and Padua (today Kruzenshtern). A so-called Flying P-Liner of the German company F. Laeisz, it was one of the last generation of windjammers used in the nitrate trade and wheat trade around the often treacherous Cape Horn.

Eking out meager existence on routes difficult to serve by steam ships that required vast amounts of coal, these tall ships and the sailors sailing them were the last of their breed. Sailed in the traditional way with few labor saving devices or safety features, her sailors worked four hours on and four hours off 24 hours a day for the entire length of the voyage, sometime for more than a hundred days in a row.

• Southern Manhattan with Peking in front and Wavertree in the background, seen from Staten Island ferry © Someone35

  http://yachting.my-home24.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Southern_Manhattan_with_Peking_from_Staten_Island_ferry-Someone35.jpg

  Southern Manhattan with Peking in front and Wavertree in the background, seen from Staten Island ferry © Someone35

• © Jim.henderson

  http://yachting.my-home24.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Peking-P-Liner-Jim.henderson.jpg

  © Jim.henderson

• © Marc G. McDonald

  http://yachting.my-home24.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Peking-Marc_G_McDonald.jpg

  © Marc G. McDonald

• © Jim.henderson

  http://yachting.my-home24.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Peking-Jim.henderson.jpg

  © Jim.henderson

• © Dietmar Kruschel

  http://yachting.my-home24.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Peking-Dietmar_Kruschel.jpg

  © Dietmar Kruschel

• Ship steering wheel © Dietmar Kruschel

  http://yachting.my-home24.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/Peking_Schiff_Steuer-Dietmar_Kruschel.jpg

  Ship steering wheel © Dietmar Kruschel

In 1932, she was sold for £6,250 to Shaftesbury Homes. She was first towed to Greenhithe, renamed Arethusa II and moored alongside the existing Arethusa I. In July 1933, she was moved to her new permanent mooring off Upnor on the River Medway,where she worked as a children’s home and training school. She was officially “opened” by HRH Prince George on 25 July 1933. During World War II she served in the Royal Navy as HMS Peking.

The Peking was retired in 1975 and sold to Jack Aron, for the South Street Seaport Museum in New York City, where she is still moored. In need of extensive repairs, the ship will return to Hamburg no later than May 6, 2012, as a gift from the city of New York. It will be transported aboard another vessel to the Maritime Museum there.



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