Sea Witch, an American Extreme Clipper Ship, 1846

While Rainbow was under construction, John W. Griffiths wondered whether he should have designed her as a more extreme ship. The result was a new clipper in 1846, the very next year: Sea Witch. She immediately established new speed records between New York City and Canton, eclipsing what Rainbow had just accomplished. One of her passages from Hong Kong to New York took only 74 days, a record that stood unbroken until recently. She was wrecked near Havana, Cuba in 1856, when she was 10 years old. She measured 908 tons, 192 feet long on deck, and 43 feet beam.