This paper describes experiments in which a vertical surface-piercing circular cylinder with a large draught was towed at steady speeds through water initially at rest. The cylinder diameter d was 210 mm, and measurements were made of pressures around its circumference at elevations between 2.4d below still water level to 0.7d above, at Froude numbers (based on d) up to 1.67. The tests were carried out at a constant ratio of Reynolds number to Froude number of 2.79 x 10(5). The total resistance coefficient reached a maximum at a Froude number of about 1, when that part of the loading that can be attributed to the presence of the free surface was equivalent to the submerged form drag on a length of cylinder of about 0.9d. Measurements are also presented of the run-up on the front of the cylinder and of the depth of the depression at the back. Previous measurements by Hay (Flow about Semi-submerged Cylinders of Finite Length. Princeton University Report, Princeton, NJ, 1947) for the case of a cylinder with a submerged free end, and by Hsieh (Proc. Am. Soc. Civil Eng. 90 (1964) 161) of forces on cylinders standing on the floor of an open channel, are reanalysed. In most respects these results are found to be compatible with the present data for a cylinder of large draught.