“The Marshall” at South Shields Museum and Art Gallery
John Scott (1802-1885)
The Marshall, about 1846
oil on canvas
Marshall was a barquentine rigged iron screw steam ship of 214 tons and was one of the early iron steam ships built at the Lawe yard of the innovative South Shields shipbuilder and engineer Thomas Dunn Marshall (1804-1864).
Marshall was built in 1846 for the Hamburg company ‘Elbe-Humber Dampschiffahrt Gesellschaft’, and seems to have been one of five ships built for the same company in 1845/6. As one would expect given her date, she looks very much like a sailing ship, with a steam engine grafted on to her. She has the decorative painted gunports that were popular around this time and you can also see the outfall of cooling water from the engine.
Although she is apparently entering the Tyne she is flying the Blue Peter flag from her foremast meaning “I am about to proceed to sea”. Many of John Scott’s ship portraits include the Blue Peter. The ensign flying from the gaff of the mizzen mast is of Hamburg.
