Museum Ships
Preserved vessels and recovered historic hulls displayed as museums or memorial ships. Explore the ships, the work of conservation and the evidence that survives aboard them.
-
Battleship Texas: The Work Beyond Drydock
Texas remains at Gulf Copper as deck, interior and berth work continue towards a targeted 2027 reopening at Galveston’s Pier 15.
-
Gunboat Philadelphia at 250: Conserving the 1776 Hull
At Valcour Island’s 250th anniversary, conservation of Philadelphia reveals shipwrights’ marks and the legacy of earlier treatments.
-
USS Silversides: What the 2026 Drydock Reveals
Silversides’ drydock exposes the hidden work of preserving a fleet submarine, with an October return still anticipated.
-
SS John W. Brown: A Working Liberty Ship from Baltimore
How a 1942 Liberty ship carried cargo and troops in war, trained New York students for 35 years and was restored to steam in…
-
HMS Victory: Nelson’s Flagship and the World’s Oldest Commissioned Warship
How HMS Victory was built at Chatham, refitted for Trafalgar, saved in dry dock at Portsmouth and kept in commission as a flagship.
-
Cutty Sark: From the Tea Trade to Australian Wool and Greenwich
How a clipper built for the China tea trade made her name carrying Australian wool, survived as Ferreira and became a museum ship at…
-
SS Rotterdam: A Liner Designed for Two Markets
How Rotterdam’s split stairway, public rooms and two-thirds aft machinery let a 1959 Atlantic liner become a cruise ship and then a hotel.
-
USS Missouri: A Battleship Across Two Eras of Weapons
How Missouri kept her 1944 heavy guns and gained Tomahawk, Harpoon and Phalanx for her final commission and the 1991 Gulf War.
-
HMS Warrior: Britain’s First Iron-Hulled Armoured Warship
How HMS Warrior combined an iron hull, armour, steam and sail in 1861, and how a ship that became a hulk and an oil…
-
Vasa: Why the King’s Warship Sank and How She Survives
Why Vasa sank in Stockholm harbour in 1628, how she was raised in 1961, and the long work of keeping her hull from deforming…
-
HMS Belfast: A Cruiser’s Service From Scapa Flow to the Thames
HMS Belfast from the 1939 mine damage and the Battle of North Cape to D-Day, Korea, her 1950s rebuild and five decades as a…
-
Cap San Diego: Inside a 1960s General Cargo Liner
How Hamburg Süd’s Cap San Diego carried coffee, meat and edible oil to Europe, escaped the breakers in 1986 and still sails as a…
