...; transferred from the Ministerie van Marine (Department of the Navy), The Hague, to the museum, 1883

Object number: NG-MC-426

Part bracket and part frame half model of the starboard side of a single-masted vessel, mounted on a rectangular black, wooden backboard.

The side of the ship is planked on frames with most of the planks below the waterline left out to show the highly detailed interior. Along the full length of the hold runs a trough that is suspended from the deck beams. The trough is filled with faggots made from twigs. In the hold several bundles of straw are stowed upright. Several teardrop-shaped objects, representing bags with flammable liquid, hang from the deck beams. Behind the bulwarks, chained to the deck, are two boxes with metal spheres representing explosive charges. On the forecastle a chimney, a windlass and two brass chains are depicted. Eight lidded oarports are situated in the side. One small gun port is cut into the bow, a second port (most likely an escape hatch) is cut into the stern. The stempost is curved. The sheer rises towards both ends. Two wales and a sheer rail are indicated. The stern is round with a straight sternpost. The shape of the hull is that of a hooker, round and flat-bottomed. The position of a single mast is shown in a truncated form.

According to Obreen this vessel was built as or converted to a fireship in the year 1795.¹¹J.M. Obreen, Catalogus der verzameling modellen van het Departement van Marine, The Hague 1858, no. 426.

Scale unknown.

J.M. Obreen, Catalogus der verzameling modellen van het Departement van Marine, The Hague 1858, no. 426; P. Kirsch, Fireship: The Terror Weapon of the Age of Sail, Barnsley 2009; A.J. Hoving, Message in a Model: Stories from the Navy Model Room of the Rijksmuseum, Florence, OR 2013, pp. 104-07

J. van der Vliet, 2016, 'anonymous, Half Model of a Fireship, Netherlands, c. 1795', in J. van der Vliet and A. Lemmers (eds.), Navy Models in the Rijksmuseum, online coll. cat. Amsterdam: https://data.rijksmuseum.nl/20053730