"Breaking up" wooden ships

[Stephen Tashiro]

In the wikipedia article on the USS Macedonian, it says that the ship was decomissioned and "broken up" in 1828. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Macedonian I wonder if "breaking up" a wooden ship was done mostly to salvage the specialty parts. Could the bulk of such a ship be reused?

[Dave Anderson NH]

My guess is that some of the planking and other wooden parts above the waterline were salvaged but that ribs and below the waterline materials (excepting copper sheathing) was not. Generally British men of war of the Napoleonic war period were built at least in part with lower quality timber since it was in short supply and so many ships were being built. American ships also used live oak for knees and oak for ribs and framing while the English rarely had that luxury. That would be one reason why she had only a 18 year life while US warships of the period typically served for 30+ years. It would be almost certain that any iron or steel hardware along with the ordinance was saved and reused since the Dahlgren guns were still years in the future.

Interesting weird fact: Up until 1900, more naval officers in the US Navy died in duels than were killed in combat. Legal prohibitions and Naval regulations against dueling not withstanding.

[Dave Richards]

I've read of some archaeological digs of old sailing vessels which were found to have been built of used timbers. There were holes, trunn'ls and other marks in the wrong places for the vessel they were looking at. I imagine that some of those timbers also got hauled off to be used for land-based structures like houses or barns.

[Kevin Bourque]

The wood from the hull was probably not a high priority. However, anything with metal was saved along with all the rigging, sails, masts, spars, doors, windows, weapons, etc.

[John McClanahan]

I have read about this too. When ships arrived in the new world with no plans on returning, they would be taken apart for most everything. With limited construction tools here, reusing planking and hardware for housing made sense.

John

[Roger Feeley]

If you read about the 'ghost fleet of Mallow Bay' they talk about how they built these ships that no one wanted for a navy that didn't need them. The salvage operation involved burning the ships to recover the metal parts.