The Flying P-Liners were the sailing ships of the German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 shipping company F. Laeisz of Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

.

The company was founded in 1824 by Ferdinand Laeisz as a hat manufacturing company. He was quite successful and distributed his hats even in South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

. In 1839, he had the three-masted wooden brig

Brig

A brig is a sailing vessel with two square-rigged masts. During the Age of Sail, brigs were seen as fast and manoeuvrable and were used as both naval warships and merchant vessels. They were especially popular in the 18th and early 19th centuries...

 Carl (named after his son) built and entered the shipping business, but lack of success made him sell the ship a short five years later.

Ferdinand's son Carl Laeisz entered the business in 1852. It was he who turned the F. Laeisz company into a shipping business. In 1857, they ordered a barque

Barque

A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts.- History of the term :The word barque appears to have come from the Greek word baris, a term for an Egyptian boat. This entered Latin as barca, which gave rise to the Italian barca, Spanish barco, and the French barge and...

 which they named Pudel (which was the nickname of Carl's wife Sophie), and from the mid 1880s on, all their ships had names starting with "P" and they became known as "the P-line". The last ship without a "P-name" was the wooden barque Henriette Behn which was stranded on the Mexican coast in 1885.

The Laeisz company specialized in the South America

South America

South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...

n nitrate

Sodium nitrate

Sodium nitrate is the chemical compound with the formula NaNO3. This salt, also known as Chile saltpeter or Peru saltpeter to distinguish it from ordinary saltpeter, potassium nitrate, is a white solid which is very soluble in water...

 trade. Their ships were built for speed, and they soon acquired an excellent reputation for timeliness and reliability, which gave rise to the nickname "the Flying P-Line". The five-masted barque Potosi made the voyage from Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

 to England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 around Cape Horn

Cape Horn

Cape Horn is the southernmost headland of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago of southern Chile, and is located on the small Hornos Island...

 in 1904 in just 57 days, which was a record at the time.

The Laeisz company had some of the largest sailing ships ever built. They experimented with steel

Steel

Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...

-hulled five-masters, first the barque

Barque

A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts.- History of the term :The word barque appears to have come from the Greek word baris, a term for an Egyptian boat. This entered Latin as barca, which gave rise to the Italian barca, Spanish barco, and the French barge and...

 Potosi (1895) and in 1902 the huge full rigged ship

Full rigged ship

A full rigged ship or fully rigged ship is a sailing vessel with three or more masts, all of them square rigged. A full rigged ship is said to have a ship rig....

 Preussen with a length of 147 m, 5.081 GRT, and over 7.800 tons dead weight. She could sail faster than 18 knots and her best 24-hour distance was 392 sm in 1908 on her voyage to Yokohama. However, these ships turned out to be too big: their crews didn't like them, and it became increasingly difficult to achieve a satisfactory utilization on the outbound leg from Europe to Chile. The later ships, such as the Peking or the Passat, returned to being smaller four-masted barques.

During World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, many of Laeisz' ships were blocked in Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

an ports and had to be handed over as war reparations

War reparations

War reparations are payments intended to cover damage or injury during a war. Generally, the term war reparations refers to money or goods changing hands, rather than such property transfers as the annexation of land.- History :...

. However, the Laeisz company was able to re-acquire many ships after the war and put them into service again.

Towards the end of the 1920s, the company began pulling out of the nitrate trade and increasingly started transporting other goods, e.g. banana

Banana

Banana is the common name for herbaceous plants of the genus Musa and for the fruit they produce. Bananas come in a variety of sizes and colors when ripe, including yellow, purple, and red....

s. They also sold some of their older ships, for instance the Pamir

Pamir (ship)

Pamir was one of the famous Flying P-Liner sailing ships of the German shipping company F. Laeisz. She was the last commercial sailing ship to round Cape Horn, in 1949...

to Gustav Erikson in Finland

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

 who already had acquired the former Norddeutscher Lloyd-ship Herzogin Cecilie

Herzogin Cecilie

Herzogin Cecilie was a German four-mast barque , named after German Crown Princess Duchess Cecilie of Mecklenburg-Schwerin , spouse of Crown Prince Wilhelm of Prussia .- History :...

. The last sailing ship ordered by the Laeisz company was the Padua in 1926. Subsequently, the Laeisz company only ordered steam ships.
Four of the Flying P-Liners still exist today:

• the Pommern
  Pommern (ship)
  The Pommern, formerly the Mneme , is a windjammer. She is a four-masted barque that was built in 1903 in Glasgow at the J. Reid & Co shipyard....
  
  is a museum ship
  Museum ship
  A museum ship, or sometimes memorial ship, is a ship that has been preserved and converted into a museum open to the public, for educational or memorial purposes...
  
   in Mariehamn
  Mariehamn
  Mariehamn is the capital of Åland, an autonomous territory under Finnish sovereignty. Mariehamn is the seat of the Government and Parliament of Åland, and 40% of the population of Åland live in the city...
  
  , Finland
  Finland
  Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
  
  .
• the Peking
  Peking (ship)
  The Peking is a steel-hulled four-masted barque — the sister ship to the Passat. A so-called Flying P-Liner of the German company F...
  
  is a museum ship in New York City
  New York City
  New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
  
   (South Street Seaport
  South Street Seaport
  The South Street Seaport is a historic area in the New York City borough of Manhattan, located where Fulton Street meets the East River, and adjacent to the Financial District. The Seaport is a designated historic district, distinct from the neighboring Financial District...
  
  ).
• the Passat
  Passat (ship)
  Passat is a German four-masted steel barque and one of the Flying P-Liners, the famous sailing ships of the German shipping company F. Laeisz. The name "Passat" means trade wind in German. She is one of the last surviving windjammers.-History:...
  
  is a museum ship in Lübeck
  Lübeck
  The Hanseatic City of Lübeck is the second-largest city in Schleswig-Holstein, in northern Germany, and one of the major ports of Germany. It was for several centuries the "capital" of the Hanseatic League and, because of its Brick Gothic architectural heritage, is listed by UNESCO as a World...
  
  's sea resort Travemünde
  Travemünde
  Travemünde is a borough of Lübeck, Germany, located at the mouth of the river Trave in Lübeck Bay. It began life as a fortress built by Henry the Lion, Duke of Saxony, in the 12th century to guard the mouth of the Trave, and the Danes subsequently strengthened it. It became a town in 1317 and in...
  
  , Germany
  Germany
  Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
  
  .
• the Padua is the only ship still active: she is today a school ship and sails as the Kruzenshtern
  Kruzenshtern (ship)
  The Kruzenshtern or Krusenstern is a four masted barque and tall ship that was built in 1926 at Geestemünde in Bremerhaven, Germany as the Padua . She was surrendered to the USSR in 1946 as war reparation and renamed after the early 19th century Baltic German explorer in Russian service, Adam...
  
  under Russia
  Russia
  Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
  
  n flag.

Other famous Flying P-Liners were the five-masters

• Potosi
  Potosi (ship)
  The Potosi was a five-masted steel barque built in 1895 by the German sailing ship company F. Laeisz as a trading vessel. As its shipping route was between Germany and Chile, it was designed to be capable of withstanding the rough weather encountered around Cape Horn.1895: The ultimate of the...
  
  , built 1895, sold 1923, caught fire and sunk off Argentina in 1925
• Preussen II, built 1902, beached in 1910 after being rammed by a steamer

and of course the four-masted barque

Barque

A barque, barc, or bark is a type of sailing vessel with three or more masts.- History of the term :The word barque appears to have come from the Greek word baris, a term for an Egyptian boat. This entered Latin as barca, which gave rise to the Italian barca, Spanish barco, and the French barge and...

s

• Pamir
  Pamir (ship)
  Pamir was one of the famous Flying P-Liner sailing ships of the German shipping company F. Laeisz. She was the last commercial sailing ship to round Cape Horn, in 1949...
  
  , built 1905, capsized and sunk in 1957, 80 died, 6 rescued.
• Pisagua
  Pisagua (ship)
  Pisagua was a four-masted barque which was built for F. Laeisz, Hamburg, Germany in 1892 and served for twenty years, surviving a collision with a steamship in 1912. She was repaired and sold to a Norwegian owner, only to be stranded in the South Shetland Islands the following...
  
  , built 1892, stranded 1912 South Shetlands
• Placilla
  Placilla (ship)
  Placilla was a four-masted barque which was built for F. Laeisz, Hamburg, Germany in 1892. She was sold in 1901 and renamed Optima in 1903. In 1905 she was wrecked on the Haisborough Sands.-Description:...
  
  , built 1892, stranded in Norfolk 1905
• Ponape
  Ponape (barque)
  Ponape was a four-masted steel–hulled barque which was built in 1903 in Italy as Regina Elena for an Italian owner. In 1911 she was sold to Germany and renamed Ponape. In 1914 she was arrested by and confiscated as a war prize by the Admiralty. She was renamed Bellhouse In 1915 she was sold...
  
  , built 1903 in Italy, scrapped 1936
• Priwall, built 1917, burnt 1945 while loading in Valparaiso
• Parma
  Parma (barque)
  Parma was a four-masted steel-hulled barque which was built in 1902 as Arrow for the Anglo-American Oil Co Ltd, London. In 1912 she was sold to F. Laeisz, Hamburg, Germany. During the First World War she was interned in Chile, and postwar was assigned to the United Kingdom as war reparations. She...
  
  , built 1902, after an accident in 1936 was scrapped in 1938

Other P-Line ships were:

• Pudel, built 1857, sunk 1870
• Palmyra, steel full-rigged ship built in 1889 by Blohm & Voss, Hamburg. Stranded on the Wellington Islands on the South Chilean coast 1908 July 2. The Captain and the first mate were able to reach shore but the rest of the crew of 21 men disappeared in one of the lifeboats.
• Pera, built 1890, torpedoed 1917
• Pitlochry, built 1894, sunk 1913 in the English Channel
• Preussen I, built 1902, sunk in South Atlantic 1909
• Pellworm, built 1902, sunk 1944
• Pangani, built 1903, sunk 1913
• Penang, built 1905, torpedoed 1940

The Laeisz shipping company still exists today, operating many freighters under traditional names.

External links

• Homepage of the F. Laeisz shipping company today.
• Krusenshtern ex Padua