All Hands on Deck: Storms, Turmoil, and
I
a Rompin’ Good Sail Aboard the Tall Ship Rose
courtesy the williams family
was blindsided when Tony offered me a paid crew spot aboard the lofty square rigger, as I had only just met him ten minutes before. I was there because I was broke. Casey, my former captain, told me to go down to the ship at her berth in Newport to ask for some day work. I thought I’d spend my morning cleaning bilges or chipping rust; instead I was presented with an opportunity to sail to California to make a Hollywood movie. Tony was the chief mate of the tall ship Rose, a modern re-creation of an 18th-century British warship. The ship had been purchased earlier that year by 20th Century Fox to star in a new film directed by the acclaimed Academy Award-winning director Peter Weir, based on the bestselling books by Patrick O’Brian. The movie would be called Master and Commander: Far Side of the World and star Hollywood A-listers Russell Crowe as Jack Aubrey and Paul Bettany as Stephen Maturin. Rose was in Newport, Rhode Island, and our job was to get the ship to San Diego in time to be transformed into “HMS Surprise” for the film production, which was set to begin in the summer of 2002.
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by Will Sofrin Truthfully, despite the Hollywood allure, I was not thrilled about the idea of working aboard a tall ship. I had a preconceived plan for becoming a professional sailor that was limited to only working on classic sailing yachts cruising from one luxurious destination to the next. I had just returned from a summer in the Mediterranean, where I worked onboard the 12-meter yacht Onawa for the America’s Cup Jubilee, followed by the Prada Classic Yacht Challenge. A recent graduate of the International Yacht Restoration School (now IYRS School of Technology and Trades), I had convinced myself that my newly acquired skills, along with my experience aboard Onawa, would be a guaranteed ticket to success. Reality set in when I got back from the Med, and it only took a few days for me to realize that landing a crew position on a yacht headed for the Caribbean in late October was going to be next to impossible, as all those jobs had been filled earlier in the fall and those vessels had already left for the winter. I didn’t know much about squareriggers, other than having attended a few tall ship festivals as a kid. Rose was a full-
rigged ship, built in 1969 by Smith & Rhuland Shipyard in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, commissioned by John Millar for the 1776 Bicentennial celebration for $300,000 (roughly $2.4 million in 2022). Millar hired naval architect Philip Bolger to develop a set of plans for a modern recreation of the 1757 HMS Rose but designed to meet financing and modern safety requirements. The 20th-century version of Rose was 179 feet long (LOA), with a 30.5foot beam, and the top of her tallest mast towering 130 feet above the water. Millar’s vision for the ship was never fully realized, and after the Bicentennial celebrations concluded, Rose fell into disrepair because the cost of maintaining her outweighed her ability to generate revenue. In 1984, Kaye Williams purchased Rose and relocated her to Bridgeport, Connecticut, where he owned and operated a marina and tourist venue. Williams put together a team that included sailing ship master Captain Richard Bailey to repair the ship and restore her to seagoing condition. Following an extensive refit, Rose was inspected and certified by the US Coast Guard, becoming the only Class-A Sailing School Vessel in the United States. Rose went on to serve as an educational platform offering a variety of sail training programs to the public, until being acquired by 20th Century Fox in the spring of 2001. I began working as one of the ship’s carpenters at the start of November. To prepare for our voyage from Atlantic to Pacific, Rose was hauled out at a Newport shipyard, where twin Caterpillar 3406 diesel engines were installed in her engine room and the hull was re-caulked below the waterline. We replaced several hull planks and added a section of copper sheathing below the waterline up near the bow. My work was focused on rebuilding Best-selling author Patrick O’Brian (center) with Rose’s captain, Richard Bailey, onboard the replica ship in New York City in 1995 for a press event to promote The Commodore, the 17th installment of his hugely popular Aubrey-Maturin series. SEA HISTORY 182, SPRING 2023