What is the difference between a clipper ship and a schooner?

Answer 1

A clipper and a schooner were of different sizes and had different style rigging. The terms schooner and clipper represent two different ways to describe a sailing vessel.

The word 'schooner' refers to the way a vessel's masts and sails are set up.

A schooner is a vessel with at least two masts (some Great Lakes schooners had up to seven) and the foremast is usually smaller or sometimes the same size as the main mast. The schooner's sails are primarily rigged fore'n'aft though some schooners may have square sails rigged on the foremast as well, or they may have square tops'ls on the fore or both masts.

The term 'ship' refers to a saling vessel that has at least 3 masts and has square sails rigged on all 3 masts.

The term 'clipper' refers to a vessel that has been designed specifically for speed and usually for a particular purpose or trade. Most well known are the tea clippers that raced between China and England transporting tea, but there were also wool clippers, opium clippers and nitrate clippers. These were usually ships or sometimes barques ( a barque is a vessel with at least 3 masts and is square rigged except for the rearmost mast which is fore'n'aft rigged.

There was also the Baltimore clipper, famous for it's use as a blockade runner, privateer and slaver, which was actually a schhooner.