USS Merrimac, sometimes incorrectly spelt Merrimack, was a cargo steamship that was built in 1894 in England as Solveig for Norwegian owners, and renamed Merrimac when a US shipowner acquired her in 1897.
Merrimac being fitted out at Norfolk Navy Yard, Portsmouth, VA, 23 April 1898
Plan of Santiago harbor, showing Merrimac's course, and the coastal batteries and spanish ships that bombarded her
USS Merrimac's wreck in Santiago harbor
Richmond Hobson
A collier is a bulk cargo ship designed or used to carry coal. Early evidence of coal being transported by sea includes use of coal in London in 1306. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, coal was shipped from the River Tyne to London and other destinations. Other ports also exported coal – for instance the Old Quay in Whitehaven harbour was built in 1634 for the loading of coal. London became highly reliant on the delivery of coal by sea – Samuel Pepys expressed concern in the winter of 1666–67 that war with the Dutch would prevent a fleet of 200 colliers getting through. In 1795, 4,395 cargoes of coal were delivered to London. By 1824, this number had risen to about 7,000; by 1839, it was over 9,000. The trade continued to the end of the twentieth century, with the last cargo of coal leaving the Port of Tyne in February, 2021.
The royal yacht Royal Escape, formerly a collier called Surprise, built before 1651
A collier has been deliberately beached so that the cargo of coal can be unloaded into carts and taken for sale.
Coal whippers unloading a collier. Four men climb up a step set on the collier's deck, holding ropes that go to a pulley fastened above and then down to a basket in the hold. They jump off the step, holding the rope, and their weight lifts the basket out of the hold. It is then tipped into a chute that leads into the barge alongside.
The collier USS Merrimac