Over the years many members of the Prance family have owned or had part shares in ships, in most cases their livelihoods depended on them. In many cases we know very little about them but in some we know a great deal about the ships themselves, those who sailed on them and the adventures in which they were involved. The information in this section has been gathered by Christopher Prance with assistance from the North Devon Maritime museum in Appledore which has access to records for the area and has researched the local maritime history. The following are those we know about so far.
Note - All dimensions in the information below are in feet and inches but are given in decimal measurement i.e. One foot is still 12 inches but each foot is divided into 10 divisions. For example a length of 65 feet 6 inches is recorded as 65.5 feet.
This is an example of a 19th century Brig the USS NIAGARA
At 297 tons and carrying 20 guns the USS Niagara was about twice the size of the JOSEPH. The original vessel was built in 1813 and in the same year served in the Battle of Lake Eirie against the British. The current USS Niagara is a reconstruction using a few timbers salvaged from the original.Herring boats at Clovelly
Picaroons drawn up on the beach at Clovelly
Modern Picaroon at Clovelly
DEERA on the River Torridge c.1900
DEERA at Instow 1971 |
DEERA at Lelant 1991 |
Captain Fred Prance at the tiller of the DEERA |