Scale: 1:96. A highly detailed exhibition full hull model of the composite ship ‘Sir Lancelot’ (1865). The hull of the model is copper sheathed and fully rigged with the yards braced round, the whole of which is mounted in its original glazed case.

The ‘Sir Lancelot’ was built by R. Steele of Greenock, Scotland, and launched in 1865. Measuring 197 feet in length by 33 feet in the beam, the composite construction of wooden planking on iron frames was ideally suited for the punishing voyages she encountered whilst employed on the China tea trade. On its second trip in 1866, it was dismasted off Ushant and a year later, was converted to a barque rig.

After 1883 the ‘Sir Lancelot’ traded mainly between Bombay, Calcutta and Port Louis. In 1895 it was lost in a cyclone off Sand Heads at the mouth of the River Hooghly while on passage from the Red Sea to Calcutta with a cargo of salt.