Bronze Age Gold from Wales

Bow view of barque VIKING with 2 tugs at Penarth Head, June 1939.

Another vessel in the Erikson fleet originally built as a sail-training vessel was the 2,670 gross ton barque Viking. Built in 1906 for the Danish Schoolship Association, she was bought by Erikson in 1929 and is seen here off Cardiff with a cargo of grain from Australia in June 1939. She survives as a schoolship at Göteborg, Sweden. (Source: Shipping at Cardiff: Photographs from the Hansen Collection 1920-1975 by David Jenkins, 1993).

VIKING. Barque built in 1906 by Burmeister & Wain at Copenhagen, Denmark, as a training ship for the Danish merchant marine, and at 2959gt, is reported to be the biggest sailing ship ever built in Scandinavia. From 1929 until Second World War, she was owned by Gustaf Erikson and served on the Australian wheat run. In 1950 she was sold to the Swedish city of Gothenburg, where she is currently preserved.