Bronze Age Gold from Wales

Full hull model of the 4-masted barque PAMIR.

PAMIR. Steel four masted barque of 2798 gross tons, built by Blohm & Voss of Hamburg, and completed in July in 1905. Built for F. Laeisz also of Hamburg - the famous 'Flying P. Line' The Company's main business was the transportation of nitrates from South America to Europe. In 1913 she was sold to Gustav Erikson of the Aland Islands in the Baltic (he was the last European shipowner to employ sailing vessels in the transportation of grain from Australia to Europe). Laid up at Santa Cruz de la Palma for the duration of WW1. 1920 – Handed over to the Italian Government as war reparations, but laid up from 1921. 1924 – Bought back by Reederei F. Laeisz, and returned to the nitrate run. 1931 – Sold to Gustaf Erikson of Mariehamn, and used for carrying Australian wheat. 1941 – Seized as a “prize of war” by the New Zealand Government. 1948 – Returned to the ownership of Erikson. She made her last commercial voyage in 1948-49 with her sister ship PASSAT, rounding Cape Horn on 10 July 1949 – the last time a cargo-carrying sailing vessel would do so. 1951 – Bought by a German shipowner, together with PASSAT, from a breaker’s yard, and rebuilt with auxiliary engines at Kiel, as cargo-carrying sail training ships. laid-up in Penarth dock in the early 1950s. In October 1951, both vessels were towed to Kiel and the PAMIR was converted into a sail training vessel. On 21 September 1957 she sank when her grain cargo shifted during hurricane Carrie in the Pacific Ocean. Only six of her complement of 86 souls survived.