Electrifying Developments

Though Expeditious and Essence still be on the stocks, a new keel has been laid.

I've learned a lot working on the other two ships. Most importantly what I enjoy and what I'm not very good at. I always intended to build a third ship (at least). I had wanted to make a Dutch one (a captured Dutch ship, that is) but the plans I was set on using were not very good, and became too much of a hassle to scale properly. So I fell back on what was my very tenuous plan for a fourth ship, and am combining some plans into a mostly-original design.

The Electryone is based primarily upon Gambier's Triton.

An odd little 32 built in that great era of experimentation from 1796-1801, she's curious, and, to me, quite beautiful.

The Admiralty was not overly pleased with some of the odd developments Gambier built into her, though he loved her, and she didn't have much of a career. Fortunately in the land of fiction, that is easily mended.

However, for this to be a proper frankenship or kitbash, we need some more plans!

Enter the fastest ship in the west, Endymion.

Rather more traditional, wouldn't you say? And also, apparently the fastest frigate there was, and so good that it remained the standard for decades.

Simply taking the decks I like from each wouldn't work, they're too different. What I've done instead is modify Triton's plans based on what I liked from Endymion's. Endymion for example has a longer quarterdeck, when viewed from above. So now so does Triton - or rather Electryone.

There are going to be many more differences that appear as I work on the hull. At the moment, it's rather goopy with glue, since the middle deck split rather badly when I was cutting it, and one of Triton's defining features was straight or sheer sides, so I wanted to build that form back up. (Without cutting a whole new piece.) Because I'm doing Electryone as more "inspired" than "based on" any given ship, I'm not going to be too wholly devoted to making sure her lines match Triton, or Endymion, though she will take more after Triton, obviously.

One of the little "background" details for Electryone I've decided upon, though, is that she'll be oak, whereas Triton was fir. White oak, to be needlessly specific. Part of the reason is that I wanted a stouter ship, and also, 18pdrs. Not a lot of them, it's true, but still. With any luck she'll be a fast, weatherly (and dry!) ship with a nasty bite. Oh, and of course, the 32pdr carronades on her quarterdeck won't hurt, either.

Well they will hurt, but, oh, you know what I mean.

As to her name, it's a relic of an older idea.

I had got it in my head to build a companion of sorts for Endymion, and so the first name I thought of using was Selene, but then I decided that competitor was more interesting. Looking into Greek mythology, I found Electryone (there are various spellings) was sometimes attributed with being the spirit of wakefulness, whereas Endymion was, essentially, sleepiness. Perfect.

But for a ship based on Triton, I thought perhaps one of Triton's children (and not the Disney ones!) Pallas would have been perfect, but was already used extensively. Athena was Triton's foster daughter, but oddly the Royal Navy never named a ship that, and while I've always been a fan of Athena, I feel she deserves a rather larger ship. Kalliste might have done, had she not been born from a lump of dirt and turned into an island (hardly what you want of a warship), and Tritea, as possibly a handmaiden or priestess of Athena, also could have been good, but simply felt too close to Triton for my liking.

So then I found some unsubstantiated blog post that mentioned Athena as having been a sun deity at some point and figured, hey, that's close enough to wakefulness, might as well just go back to Electryone. And here we are.