Britannia in her first season |
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| Career | United Kingdom |
|---|---|
| Name: | Britannia |
| Owner: | 1893: Edward VII RYS 1910: George V RHYC |
| Ordered: | 1892 |
| Builder: | D&W Henderson Shipyard Ltd |
| Yard number: | 366 |
| Launched: | April 20th, 1893 |
| Fate: | scuttled (July 10th, 1936) |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | British Big Class gaff-rigged cutter |
| Displacement: | 221 tons |
| Length: | 121.5 ft (37.0 m) |
| Beam: | 23.66 ft (7.21 m) |
| Height: | 164 ft (50 m) |
| Draught: | 15 ft (4.6 m) |
| Sail plan: | 10,328 sq ft (959.5 m2) (1893) |
His Majesty's Yacht Britannia was a gaff-rigged cutter built in 1893 for Commodore Albert Edward, Prince of Wales. She served him and his son, King George V, a long racing career.
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After the Prince of Wales' nephew Kaiser Wilhelm II acquired the racing cutter Thistle in 1891, her Scottish designer George Lennox Watson received a commission from Prince Albert Edward for a sailing yacht in 1892. He designed His Royal Highness' Yacht Britannia to the "Length And Sail Area Rule" as a First Class cutter and had her built alongside his America's Cup challenger Valkyrie II at the D&W Henderson shipyard on the River Clyde. She was launched on April 20, 1893, a week ahead of Valkyrie II.
By the end of her first year's racing, the Britannia had scored thirty-three wins from forty-three starts. In her second season, she won all seven races for the big class yachts on the French Riviera, and then beat the 1893 America's Cup defender Vigilant in home waters.
Despite a lull in big yacht racing after 1897, the Britannia served as a trial horse for Sir Thomas Lipton's challenger Shamrock I, and later passed on to several owners in a cruising trim with raised bulwarks. In 1920,[1] King George V triggered the revival of the "Big Class" by announcing that he would refit the Britannia for racing. Although the Britannia was the oldest yacht in the circuit, regular updates to her rig kept her a most successful racer throughout the 1920s. In 1931, she was converted to the J-Class with a bermuda rig, but despite the improvements, her performance to windward slopped dramatically. Her last race was at Cowes in 1935. During her racing career she had won 231 races and took another 129 flags.
King George V's dying wish was for his beloved yacht to follow him to the grave. On 10 July 1936, after the Britannia had been stripped of her spars and fittings, her hull was towed out to St Catherines Deep near the Isle of Wight, and she was sunk by HMS Winchester (L55), commanded by Captain W.N.T. Beckett RN. This fate marked the end of big yacht racing in Europe, with the smaller and more affordable International Rule 12-Metre Class gaining popularity.
A new replica of the Britannia was built Russia in from 1993 to 2009, and after legal problems in securing her release from her Russian shipyard,[2] she was shipped to Norway and subsequently sold to a foundation in Cowes that will finish and rig the yacht.
The Britanna was the last of the British royal racing yachts. Previously Prince Albert Edward had acquired the 205-ton schooner Hildegarde in 1876, which he had replaced with the 103-ton cutter Formosa (Michael E. Ratsey, 1878) in 1879, and the 216-ton schooner Aline (Benjamin Nicholson, 1860) in 1881.[3] From 1962 to 1969, the British Royal family also owned the ocean racing yawl Bloodhound (Charles E. Nicholson, 1936).
The Britannia faced many opponents in her 43-year career. The most notable were:
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