Date: c. 1902.
Technique: Oil on canvas
The County of Edinburgh was built for Robert J. Craig by Barclay Curle & Company at Whiteinch, Edinburgh and launched June, 1885. The 285 feet long, iron hulled, four-masted vessel of 2,159 tons gross had been in trouble before. On the eve of departure for her third voyage on 21st December 1887 she was detained in Alfred Dock, Liverpool having been reported as being over-loaded with 3,150 tons of salt bound for Calcutta, causing her freeboard to be just 5 feet. She was forbidden from sailing pending a Board of Trade enquiry. After much argument over fractions of an inch, her owner was ordered to reduce the load until her freeboard increased to 5 feet 9 inches. It is interesting to note that her first two voyages took a total of 18 months - Cardiff to Bombay (coal), to Calcutta (salt), to Dundee (jute) and Penarth, Wales to Bombay (coal), to Calcutta (salt), to London (jute & grain). She sailed under the same owners until 1904 when she was renamed "Frieda" by her new German owners. She was sold again in 1914 to Swedish owners, ending her days wrecked at South Rock, County Down, Ireland on 7th November 1917.
The image shows County of Edinburgh stranded on the beach at Manasquan close to Point Pleasant, New Jersey, USA, having run aground on the evening of 12th February 1900 whilst en route from Cape Town to New York. She was driven ashore at high tide by strong winds that then turned her broadside. Fortunately the winds shifted to off-shore so that she was in no immediate danger of destruction. She was re-floated on the especially high-tide of 14th February having suffered no ill effects apart from the acute embarrassment of her master, Captain I. Webster. Jacobsen probably drafted the later painted image from a contemporary press photograph of the event.
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