Hi thanks for your thoughts guys, sadly there is no boiler or steam engine, I have been checking through old catalogues but can not find anything of this size, Bassett-Lowke made some large ship models but they had wooden hulls, I know the big London toy shops like Gamages sold imported toys before WW1, the other thing I considered is that it might have had a clockwork motor, although it is 5 foot long it is not that deep, so any steam plant would have been small
Regards Jeff