I will be starting the Model Shipways kit "Dapper Tom" once it comes on the market later this month. I am very interested in the Baltimore Clipper era and the immense contribution these ships had during both the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812. During the War of 1812, the US Navy took several hundred prizes/sinkings; privateers in Baltimore Clippers took over 1500 prizes/sinkings. This primarily due to speed, manuverability and newly developed America tactics.

I have started my "tooling up" process and will top it off with the purchase of the kit. My intent is to add or modify the kit as I see fit to more closely match rigging and gunnery that I can find documented. I have been unable to find any documentation on the "Dapper Tom".

I hope others might be interested in building this kit. I will post a review of the kit contents once I receive the model.

The plans of the Dapper Tom were developed in 1954 by John Shedd, the original owner of Model Shipways in Bogota, New Jersey. The model is a reconstruction of a typical Baltimore Clipper. The model’s hull is based on Marestier’s drawing No. 6 as taken off that vessel in stocks in 1814. Rigging is based on contemporary practice.

There are only two books about Baltimore Clippers that survive the time of the building of these ships, both written abroad. The most important is Marestier’s book, “Memoirs sur les Bateaux a Vapeur des Etats Unis,” published in France in 1822. It contains eight plans, including yours, but none of them show any great amount of detail.

M. Jean Baptiste Marestier was a distinguished French engineer who traveled here in 1814-1815 to study the American application of steam engines to marine propulsion. He was attracted to the design of the Baltimore Clippers and his recording of them from a technical eye is considerably important toward authenticating them in history.

These dimensional data were of considerable help as were the hull profiles in synthesizing and conceptualizing the Pride of Baltimore in 1975-76, and of course, your model the Dapper Tom.

In accumulating his numerical data and drafts, Marestier was observing and obviously measuring the vessels himself. He admits, however, referring to the masting and sail profiles that he was sketching at some distance; therefore, the rig proportions were not altogether reliable.

Further in-depth information of the Baltimore Clippers can be found in “The Baltimore Clipper” Howard I Chapelle, “Pride of Baltimore – The Story of the Baltimore Clipper’s”, Thomas C. Gillmer, and “The History of American Sailing Ships” Howard I Chapelle.