Who do I believe?

Don Case

Don Case

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I'm building the Discovery1789. Capt George Vancouver's ship that he used to explore the Pacific Northwest coast. I'm trying to determine what kind of ships boats they had. They had a lot of boats as they would anchor the Discovery and then explore the coast in the small boats. There was four, maybe five, boats on the Discovery, a launch, a yawl a large cutter and a small cutter and sometimes they referred to the "small boat". Her escort, the Chatham. had another three or more. I got this info from Vancouver's journal. I also read Archibald Menzies( ships botanist and surgeon) journal and six officers logs. Pretty dry stuff. Anyway the problem comes with the yawl. Vancouver talks about using the yawl but never mentions a pinnace. Everyone else talks about using the pinnace but never mentions a yawl. They all mention the launch and the cutters. Fortunately they refer to the boats as the "Discovery's cutter" or the "Chatham's cutter" so I was able to keep them separate in my counting. So do I build a pinnace or a yawl? It was George's ship, you would think he would know what kind of boats he had. But at the same time you would think that six officers would know a launch from a yawl(I haven't figured it out yet). I'll leave the botanist/surgeon out of it.
There is one possibility. Vancouver's journal was edited for the book by his brother after Vancouver's death. Maybe he substituted yawl for pinnace for some strange reason.

Should I side with the captain or his crew?
 
Don Case said:
I'm building the Discovery1789. Capt George Vancouver's ship that he used to explore the Pacific Northwest coast. I'm trying to determine what kind of ships boats they had. They had a lot of boats as they would anchor the Discovery and then explore the coast in the small boats. There was four, maybe five, boats on the Discovery, a launch, a yawl a large cutter and a small cutter and sometimes they referred to the "small boat". Her escort, the Chatham. had another three or more. I got this info from Vancouver's journal. I also read Archibald Menzies( ships botanist and surgeon) journal and six officers logs. Pretty dry stuff. Anyway the problem comes with the yawl. Vancouver talks about using the yawl but never mentions a pinnace. Everyone else talks about using the pinnace but never mentions a yawl. They all mention the launch and the cutters. Fortunately they refer to the boats as the "Discovery's cutter" or the "Chatham's cutter" so I was able to keep them separate in my counting. So do I build a pinnace or a yawl? It was George's ship, you would think he would know what kind of boats he had. But at the same time you would think that six officers would know a launch from a yawl(I haven't figured it out yet). I'll leave the botanist/surgeon out of it.
There is one possibility. Vancouver's journal was edited for the book by his brother after Vancouver's death. Maybe he substituted yawl for pinnace for some strange reason.

Should I side with the captain or his crew?
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When I was a Sgt. in the army and needed some info I always asked the enlisted men for their opinion. They were generally more accurate than the info I got from Officers. Officers will never give you a straight answer because they don't want you to know as much or more than they do. Ha! True story.
 
Norgale said:
When I was a Sgt. in the army and needed some info I always asked the enlisted men for their opinion. They were generally more accurate than the info I got from Officers. Officers will never give you a straight answer because they don't want you to know as much or more than they do. Ha! True story.
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In other words; "If I told you, you'd be as wise as I am";)
 
You could say it that way and still be correct but you still wouldn't know the answer to your question. In hindsight the officer is correct. If he's going to march you into battle then it's better if you don't know where your going until you get there. Then you shoot or be shot and that's what they want so you'll fight.
 
Sorry, I had to look up the difference. Would a Pinnace make more sense with its oars and sails? Do Yawls have oars?
 
Getting back to the reason for this post I'd ,"believe the Captain." If he is wrong then he bears full responsibility and if he's right he gets all the honor. Also if he doesn't know what kind of boat he's on then who the heck does?
 
Paulpk said:
Sorry, I had to look up the difference. Would a Pinnace make more sense with its oars and sails? Do Yawls have oars?
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This is the second half of this question. Does it matter? I've done a little looking at boat plans at NMM and I can't see the difference in any of the ships boats other than cutters and most yawls are clinker built. I have May's book and to me it seems that the name is mostly when, not what. A very confusing subject. I would guess that 99.99% of the people looking at the ship wouldn't know a pinnace from a yawl anyway so maybe I'm over thinking again.
I do still think it's odd that George says yawl and everyone else says pinnace. Just doesn't seem right.
One other possibility is that the officers logs all read almost exactly the same. I guess that seems logical as they were all on the same boat but I would have thought that they would be working different shifts and would therefore have noted different things. These logs actually sound like they all sat at the same table and wrote their logs. Like "What do you have for Sept 3 1792?" That sounds like a conspiracy theory. Actually I guess it is.
There may be some truth in it though as Vancouver was ordered to confiscate all logs on the trip home from Capetown. Of course that may be the reason that all these logs are available. I dunno. Fun stuff history :)
 
This would be a good place for someone knowledgeable in boats to post pictures of a longboat, pinnacle, and describe the basic differences between them in terms of construction and function. That would benefit all of us modelers! Any takers?
 
I would love to see that. May's book is good but doesn't quite cover that part. He does mention that sometimes when someone ordered, say, a yawl, that the boat builder would substitute a pinnace and call it a yawl. I can see a lot of bar fights being caused by this. NMM has a gazilion plans of various boats but it's hard to get a feeling for size looking at plans. These ships boats ranged from 16 to 30 feet and more.
 
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