Jackass-barque

A jackass-barque, sometimes spelled jackass bark, is a sailing ship with three (or more) masts, of which the foremast is square-rigged and the main is partially square-rigged (topsail, topgallant, etc.) and partially fore-and-aft rigged (course). The mizzen mast is fore-and-aft rigged.

A four-masted jackass barque is square-rigged on the two foremost masts (fore and main masts) and fore-and-aft rigged on the two after masts (the mizzen and spanker or jiggermasts). Some 19th century sailors called such a ship "a fore-and-aft schooner chasing a brig". In general a jackass barque is a sailing ship which is half square-rigged and half fore-and-aft rigged.

A five-masted jackass barque which has probably never been built would be equipped with square-rigged fore and main masts, with a partially square-rigged and partially fore-and-aft rigged mizzen mast, and fore-and-aft rigged jigger and spanker masts.

The Olympic

A well-known example of a (white wood-hulled) four-masted jackass-barque was the Olympic, a 1,402 GRT "Down Easter" (a square-rigged sailing ship from the dockyards of the downeastern ports, preferably made of timber). Said to be the only one in the world, she was launched in 1892 at the shipyards of the New England Ship Building Company, Bath, ME, for Captain W. H. Besse of New Bedford, MA¹⁾. Her maiden voyage under her first master, Captain Stephen Bourne Gibbs, led her from Bath to New York City, South Street Seaport, with...
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