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NH 75826 Drag with oil-bag, rigged to schooner OUNALASKA, which carried Lieutenant George M. Stoney to Hotham Inlet, 1884.

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Title: Drag with oil-bag, rigged to schooner OUNALASKA, which carried Lieutenant George M. Stoney to Hotham Inlet, 1884.

Caption: Lieutenant Stoney's explanation: 'A triangular sail with a drop of six feet was lashed to the steam cutter's mast, and a seventy pound anchor was hung by a short line to the opposite end of the sail. From the three corners of the sail, lines were led, forming a bridle, and to this bridle a four inch hawser was made fast. A regulation canvas bag three-fourths filled with lard-oil was slung by a span from the end of the mast, so as to ride opposite the center of the spar. The mouth of the bag was sewed up, the sides were irregularly punched with numerous sail-needle holes, the whole apparatus was put over the weather bow and sixty-five fathoms of line were veered to it. It trended three points off the bow and kept the schooner within three or four points of the wind. The motion of the waves, working the bag, caused the oil to squirt out of the needle holes, and it so smoothed the heaviest combing seas that they reached the vessel more like ground swells than the waves of a heavy gale.'

Description: Copied from Vol. XXV, No. 3, Sept. 1899, "Proceedings of the United States Naval Institute."

Catalog #: NH 75826

Original Creator:

After this Year: 1880

Before this Year: 1889

Original Medium: BW Photo, Illustration

Naval History and Heritage Command

NH 75826 Drag with oil-bag, rigged to schooner OUNALASKA, which carried Lieutenant George M. Stoney to Hotham Inlet, 1884.