External Reference

Date March 2009

Event ID 887453

Category Documentary Reference

Type External Reference

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/event/887453

(Location of the base of the funnel cited as (WGS-84) N55 58.0780 W4 47.1998 [NS 26177 78503]). This vessel was built by J and G Thomson on the Clyde in 1855, and rapidly achieved as a fast and well-appointed passenger vessel operating on the Clyde (mainly on the ‘Royal route’ between Glasgow and Ardrishaig, Loch Fyne) for David Hutcheson and Co. She was purchased, probably by Mr D McNutt, for service as a blockade runner to the Confederate States in the American Civil War, and was converted for this purpose. While leaving the Clyde at the start of the first transatlantic crossing, she was in collision and sank.

Known informally as the ‘Queen of the Clyde’ this vessel is significant as an early and famous example of the Clyde passenger steamers that developed in the later 19th century. She is also significant as an excellent example of the advanced ship design and marine engineering practice that was developing on the Clyde at that time, and as an example of the British ships that served as blockade-runners to the Confederate States between 1861 and 1865.

The ship was originally known as the Iona, but is commonly termed the Iona I to avoid confusion with her successor vessels, the Iona II and Iona III. Iona II lies wrecked in the Bristol Channel and is recorded by English Heritage [NMR, Swindon]

UKHO chart the vessel as a wreck dangerous to navigation (no. 4155) at (WGS-84) N55 58.076 W4 47.194 [NGR NS 26183 78499] and at depth 22.5m in a general depth of 27m [below MLWOST]. This location lies approximately 100m SE of the Whiteforland Buoy, off Greenock and Gourock.

The wreck has been the subject on survey on numerous occasions, including sonar survey by HMSML Gleaner (in 1993) and Clydeport (in 2009). It has been dived on numerous occasions by both commercial and recreational divers, although this has been largely constrained by its situation within a major shipping channel. It has been the subject of a degree of artifact extraction or ‘casual salvage’; a builder’s plate survives in private possession. Some commercial salvage was carried out in the 1950’s, while anchor damage may also have occurred.

Diving investigation by Wessex Archaeology on 1-5 March 2009 revealed that the vessel lies on a silty seabed in about 30m depth of water. The vessel survives partially intact, is oriented NE-SW, and lies upright, on an even keel. The definable area forms an elongated oval measuring about 56m from NE-SW by up to 15m transversely. A mound of coal survives to the SW of the wreck, and a debris field of indeterminate extent lies around it.

The central portion of the vessel (measuring 25m in length) is in the best condition, and survives to upper deck height; the boilers, crankshafts and (probably) engines remain in situ, as do coherent fragments and debris from the paddlewheels and possibly the paddleboxes. Elsewhere, the vessel is less well preserved, and does not survive to deck height, being largely collapsed and partly buried. The NE end survives in slightly better condition, and is tentatively identified as the bow.

The wreck was seen to be ‘fairly rich’ in marine life, the exposed ferrous surfaces being covered with marine growth in the form of ‘short turf.’ The predominant current threat to the wreck is considered to be that of deterioration through natural processes, most significantly corrosion.

A model of what is apparently this vessel is held in the Glasgpw Museum of Transport under accession number [GAGM] 1888.44.

[Section 5: site description and detailed survey, noting survival of specific items, and ecology.

Section 6: interpretation (including identification) and post-wrecking event site history.

Section 10: [comprehensive] bibliography, archive and internet references.

App. III: context index [artifacts].

App. IV: list of artifacts recovered.

App. VI, VII and VIII: history and archive].

MS/5899.