Steel-Hulled Four-Masted Barque PEKING Rounding Cape Horn, c. 1912

oil on canvas, 28" x 30"

$35,000

Peking is a steel-hulled four-masted barque, a so-called Flying P-Liner of the German company F. Laeisz, it was one of the last generation of cargo-carrying iron-hulled sailing ships used in the nitrate trade and wheat trade between Europe and Chile. In this painting, Artist A.D. Blake shows her traveling East to West off Cape Horn. Peking was launched in February 1911 and left Hamburg for her maiden voyage to Valparaiso in May of the same year. After the outbreak of World War I she was interned at Valparaiso and remained in Chile for the duration of the war. Awarded to the Kingdom of Italy as war reparations, she was sold back to her original owners, the Laeisz brothers, in January, 1923. She remained in the nitrate trade until traffic through the Panama Canal proved quicker and more economical.

From 1974 to 2016 the PEKING was the prize exhibit of The South Street Seaport Museum in New York City. She now resides in her original homeport of Hamburg, Germany.