Prices of Ship Building

[Ink]

Following this book there are some examples of prices of ship building in various times during the XVIII century [p. 285-286], e.g.:

From the year 1702 to 1713, the price, per ton, for building a 90 gun-ship, was 16l.; and 80, 12l.; a 70, 10l. 15s.; a 64, 9l. 10s.; a 60, 10l. 6s.; a 50, 9l. 3s.; a 42, 7l. 15s.; a 40, 8l. 7s. 6d; a 32, 8l.; a 26, 6l. 5s.; a 24, 7l. 10s.; and sloops, 5l. 12s. 6d.

 

My question is does that mean a ton of displacement or a ton of tons burthen? Does anyone know exactly? I guess it's displacement but not sure.

Also, don't hesitate to put any other sources about the subject if you know any

[Barberouge]

Thanks. I can't find the source, but I noted that building a Ship of the Line required 3500 oak trees. In the 17th and 18th century, the French Navy used 1.5 million oaks. Under Louis XIV, 2 million trees were dedicated to the ships, and 1 to 2 more to the shipyards.

[Brigand]

Displacement is a modern notion, back in the age of sail, only the tons burthen where of interest (for levying taxes). Usually it is builder's old measurement or something that was inspired by it.

 

~Brigand

[Barberouge]

I found the source: http://defense.ac-montpellier.fr/pdf/cercle/Bois_marine.pdf - it's in French though

[Marion van Ghent]

Jean Boudriot has, in his book «Le Navire Marchand, Ancien Régime: Étude historique et Monographie» ("The Merchant Ship, Ancient Regime: Historic Study and Monograph"), a section on the cost of a merchant ship. I will check what it says and edit this post once I no longer have a cat occupying my lap

 

EDIT: I'm not going to reproduce all of Boudriot's calculations here, and he prefaces everything as being a very crude estimate... but for a merchant ship built on the Atlantic coast circa 1770, he estimates a total cost per ton of capacity at about 250 livres. This includes cost of labour (which would be about 960 man-hours per ton if I'm reading him correctly).

 

Next I'll see if I can find some information that gives meaning to the figure of 250 livres...

 

2nd EDIT: Well so far my searches aren't yielding much fruit, though according to this site 250 livres would have been about £18 15s in 1709, but obviously exchange rates would have differed wildly throughout the period.

 

That said, if I'm reading this text correctly (it's a poor scan and the relevant information is in a footnote on p. 203 and phrased ambiguously), in 1770 one tonneau of Toulouse wine was worth 500 livres. That seems... remarkably high. 

[Ink]

So far I've found following:

First reference: ""The St. Lawrence constructed at Kingston in 1814 at the fantastic cost to the British taxpayers of $500,000 would translate in today's money as twenty million dollars." (Since there is no info about article's year I skip the current values) and also from there "In 1789 a 38-gun frigate cost 20,830 British pounds and a 74-gun ship of the line cost 43,820 pounds."

secone one:"In commercial terms, the cost of a 74-gun ship-of-the-line in 1793 was placed at just under £50000 (£25 million or $40 million in today's terms)." The book is from 2001 year (in relation with current value). There is also a table about tonnage of certain types of SoL's which can be used with the infomration in the book I linked in the first post.

Also I've also found a very usefull tool which can be used to research value comparison over time and also the difference between $ and £ over time.

And, finally, this one with a quite strange url name tho:) So, according to this source 250 livres were about $50 in the late of 18th century

[Marion van Ghent]

Spasibo, Ink! If that last link is reliable in the slightest, that makes the cost of a barrel of wine seem much more reasonable.

 

I'm also reminded that the book on the "anatomy" of HMS Blanchard (1719, I think) provides costs associated for the construction of that vessel. I can't go rummaging about for it at present but may be able to do so in the next couple days.