After the Fastnet race, when I entered the Royal Ocean Racing Club again, I spotted Blondie Hasler's notice about the proposed solo Atlantic race, still on the board. I thought, 'Good God! I believe I can go in for this race.' I regard it as miraculous that within thirty-two months of first being taken ill, and within fifteen months of my appealing to Dr. Mattei for oxygen in Vence, I was able to cross the starting line for the toughest yacht race that has ever taken place, and able to finish it in forty and a half days. However, during the next eight months, it was touch and go whether the race would ever get organised, and touch and go whether the yacht and I could get to the starting line. It was formidable; the prospect of racing alone across the Atlantic, when I had never been alone in any boat larger than a 12-foot dinghy.
PART 5
CHAPTER 27
TRANSATLANTIC SOLO
A solo race across the Atlantic from east to west was the greatest yacht race that I had ever heard of, and it fired my imagination. Three thousand miles, plugging into the prevailing westerlies, probably strong, bucking the Gulf Stream current, crossing the Grand Banks off Newfoundland which were not only one of the densest fog areas of the world, but also stuffed with fishing trawlers. No wonder the Atlantic had only once before been raced across from east to west. That was in 1870, by two big schooners, the Dauntless and the Cambria. The Dauntless, 124-foot long with a crew of thirty-nine, and a potential speed of 14 knots, lost the race by one hour and thirty-seven minutes, due, it was said, to spending two hours looking for two of her crew washed overboard while changing a jib. Anything once lost sight of in a seaway is difficult to find again, so 'it is not surprising that they failed to recover the men overboard.
Sheila backed me in every way to get into this race. She was criticised for this because I was thought to be still a sick man, but she stuck to her view that it would complete my cure. I wrote to Colonel Hasler and disputed some of his proposed conditions for the race, particularly one that entrants must first qualify by a solo sail to the Fastnet Rock and back. This course requires constant accurate navigation throughout, because of the nearness of land and the shipping routes along it, and a single-hander would find it difficult to get any sleep during the six to ten days' sail. Blondie Hasler came to my office for a talk. He was a quiet-speaking, interesting man; short, round and bald-headed with a red face. He never seemed to move a muscle while speaking. He steadily and quietly pursued his affairs. He was a regular officer of the Marines, retired with a total disability pension for a back injury, and famous for the expedition he thought up and led in the war which resulted in his being known as the Cockleshell Hero. Ten Marines in canoes made their way 60 miles up the Gironde River to Bordeaux, where they sank several steamers at the quayside. Only two of them returned alive. Blondie was also an expert ocean racer, and one year, with a novel type of boat for ocean racing, came top of the smallest class of the RORC for the season's racing.
Blondie's proposal was that this Atlantic solo race would encourage the development of suitable boats, gear and technique to simplify sailing. But the race had stuck; people were scared of it, saying that it was a dangerous hair-brained scheme. Sheila and I threw all our weight into the effort to get it going again. Blondie had first suggested the race to the Slocum Society of America, who seemed to me an amiable bunch of cranky American sailors quite different from what one would expect to find associated with the name of Slocum, who was an expert navigator as well as a fine sailor and a fine man. The Slocum Society had first praised the idea of such a race, later refused to support it, and now seemed to have lost all interest in it. Blondie had also enlisted the interest of the editor of The Observer, David Astor, a friend of his who had served with him in the Marines. It seemed at first that a starting line was the only thing needed for a race across the Atlantic, but the hard truth was that it also needed considerable money for a yacht in racing trim, with the special gear and six months' stores required for a double crossing of the Atlantic, apart from expenses while in America. During that half year a man would be away from his job, and probably receiving no income from it. At first The Observer offered a prize of £1,000 for the winner, and £250 for each yacht taking part. Then they shrank into their shell, warned that if the yachts were sunk, their rivals would tear them in pieces for luring the flower of young British manhood to its doom with offers of sordid gold. Fortunately they were a sporting lot, with Chris Brasher and Lindley Abbatt backing up the Editor, and finally they offered £250 each to any starter as option money for the winner's story, for which another £750 would be paid. Several good clubs were asked to start this race, but all turned it down. One of my friends, Bill Waleran, suggested the Royal Western Yacht Club of England. Of course! Plymouth was the traditional place from which to set sail for America, and the RWYC was the club to take over the race – it had sponsored the first Fastnet Race, and the RORC had been founded in its club rooms. The Slocum Society agreed to finish the race.
The prize money may seem small compared with some of the prizes in horse races and other matches, but we were concerned only to be able to take part in such a race. At one stage, when it looked as if no one would sponsor, start or finish the race, I offered to race Blondie across for half a crown.
Blondie's entry for the race was a junk-rigged folkboat. It has been said that the junk sail is the most efficient in existence, and certainly the Chinese have had thousands of years in which to perfect it. Joshua Slocum, that great sailor and the first man to sail around the world alone, built himself a junk-rigged canoe in the 1890s, and sailed in it with his family from Buenos Aires to New England, making a fast passage, including one day's run of 150 miles. Blondie was a canny, tough seadog, and with his yacht made a formidable rival.
I was going to race my new yacht Gipsy Moth III which had been launched the previous September. She had been built during my illness, and few new yachts can have been less supervised or visited by the owner. We saw her only twice while she was building. Once during a temporary improvement in my lung trouble I flew over to Dublin with Robert Clark and Sheila. While Robert and I walked down to the yard beside the river, the biting cold wind seemed to drive right through me. Robert grew more and more irritated at my stops for coughing bouts, and finally snapped, 'Stop coughing, now!' To my astonishment I did stop, and wondered if I must be a malade imaginaire. Fortunately for Robert this lull did not last long, otherwise I should have had to ask him to live with me until his new cure was complete.
When we visited the yacht, Sheila said that the seats in the main cabin were too low. Robert assured her that they were the standard height. Sheila, probably because she is a portrait painter, has an incredible eye for line and form. She was convinced that they were too low, and refused to budge in her opinion. They argued about it for hours on the way back to the hotel and throughout the evening, but Sheila, although she was opposing a famous architect who had been designing yachts all his life, refused to change her view. Before breakfast next morning Robert went down to the yacht and returned with this story: the water tanks under the cabin sole (floor) had been built the wrong shape, and were two inches higher than designed. Instead of re-making the tanks the yard had re-made the cabin sole two inches higher.
Several times when my illness was at its worst and seemed hopeless, I said, 'Sell the yacht, and let's be free of that worry at least.' Each time, however, I changed my mind and hung on. Jack Tyrrell and his firm were very good about my illness; they moved the half built yacht to the side of the shed, and let it rest there until I was well enough to consider starting again. In September 1259, after the Fastnet Race in Mait II, Sheila and I crossed to Arklow on a Monday morning to launch the yacht, which we found sitting in her cradle beside the river. The tides are erratic there, and we waited about all Tuesday for enough water to launch her. We had given up hope for the day, and were in the middle of our dinner at the hotel, when a boy came rushing up to say that the boat would be launched in ten minutes. We dropped our forks, grabbed a bottle of
champagne, and rushed down to the yard. There were only a few people standing by when Sheila climbed on to the platform and well and truly crashed the champagne on the stem of the yacht, showering us with champagne and glass fragments as she named the yacht Gipsy Moth III. The yacht had looked powerful and tall standing on the hard of the river bank, and slid away quietly into the water.
Next morning Robert Clark arrived and rowed with me round the moored boat. 'What's wrong with the doghouse?' he asked. The doghouse is the raised part of the cabin roof at the aft end. I said, 'It seems all right to me; in fact Sheila and I were saying how attractive the yacht looked.'
'Oh well,' said Robert, 'if you are satisfied, that's all right.' It appeared that the Tyrrell family, who have been building boats for generations and have strong views of their own, had reversed the doghouse, so that it sloped down aft instead of up. This was a much better design, made the cabin roof stronger, and gave the whole line of the deck a more handsome look. The price we paid for it was countless cracks on the head when stepping too quickly from the cabin up to the cockpit outside.
I had often puzzled why a famously fast yacht or ship had never had an equally fast sister ship. Now I realised why. Gipsy Moth's designed length was 38 foot 6 inches overall. When launched she measured 39 feet 7, which is 13 inches longer. I mentioned this to Robert, and he said, 'If that's the only difference from the plan, you ought to be grateful,' implying that no wooden vessel can be built exactly as planned. The yacht suited me. She was staunchly built, and gave me confidence. She seemed so powerful that I felt at first like a small boy astride a tall, strong, broad-backed horse which would not stop. When we left for England on Saturday, four days after the launching, I think that there were several leprechauns still on board. One must have had his feet jammed in the rudder stock. By the time we reached the Solent I could only move the rudder by exerting my full strength with both hands on the tiller, and both feet on the cockpit seat opposite. However, Gipsy Moth III has always had a friendly atmosphere, as if she carried the goodwill of the craftsmen who built her, and I try to avoid strangers coming aboard for fear they might trample the Little People and drive them away.
The rudder stock tube could not be trued up until the yacht was hauled out, so that I had no chance to try out Gipsy Moth's sailing qualities before she was laid up for the winter. As a result I had only ten weeks from when she was launched in the spring, on 3 April, until the start of the race on 11 June, in which to try her out for sailing qualities, to learn her tricks and foibles, and to improve my handling of her. I need two seasons of solid sailing to get anything like the best out of a boat, and would prefer to have three seasons. I think this might well apply to all yachts; certainly the last race for the America's Cup was won by a 12-metre which had been raced hard for three seasons.
Gipsy Moth III was a good deal bigger than my Gipsy Moth II, and I soon found that there were drawbacks as a result. She drew 6 foot 5 inches and I went aground several times. With her high freeboard and 55-foot mast, the windage was considerable, and with her 13 tons she was likely to go aground good and hard. When I laid out a kedge anchor by myself to kedge her off the mud it was desperately hard hauling without a winch.
The high freeboard made it more difficult to haul the dinghy on deck by myself, and because of this I lost the dinghy one day. I was sailing out through the Needles, towing it astern, when the painter snapped. There was a short, steep sea and a tide race, and although I sailed up to the dinghy several times, I could not get hold of it with the boathook while controlling the yacht at the same time. In the end I hauled down the sails to try approaching the dinghy under motor. While lowering the mainsail I lost sight of the dinghy, and was never able to locate it again. I spent my first night alone at sea looking for it. I carried out a square search, increasing the length of the sides each time. I had no self-steering device fitted then, the wind was unusually fickle, changing speed and direction every few minutes, and I could not make Gipsy Moth sail herself, though I kept on trimming and retrimming the sails. When I was not exhausted with the effort of handling the heavy gear, sweating with heat under my thick clothes, I was shivering in the cold wind. My 380-square foot mainsail, with its 18-foot boom, was awkward and heavy to handle. While lowering it, one of the runners (movable stays bracing the mast) had to be slacked away, and its big blocks would be flying round, trying to dash my brains out as I gathered in the mainsail for furling. My main halyard carried away one of the main jumper struts at the top of the mast. I had no lifeline or harness, and nearly fell in.
When it was too dark to look for the dinghy any longer I tried to make Gipsy Moth sail herself so that I could have some sleep. She pigheadedly refused to settle on any of the courses I chose. Finally I gave in to her, furled the mainsail, made the tiller fast and waited to see what she would do. She swung round on to a south-south-west heading and stayed on it, jibbing along at half a knot. This was taking her right into the main shipping lane, but I switched on all my navigation lights and slept soundly till dawn. I had lost my dinghy, but I certainly gained plenty of experience that night.
I was hampered in my trials by having no self-steering gear until 5 May, only five weeks before the start of the race. It was clear that no yacht without a self-steering gear could have a chance against yachts equipped with them. One of the rules of the race was that no yacht could use an automatic pilot – or any other gear – driven by electricity or any other form of power. We were allowed only wind-powered or hand-operated gear.
I had been thinking about self-steering gear from the start, and I had talked it over with an old friend, Allen Wheeler, who was at school with me at The Old Ride, and who is now a celebrated boffin or aviation consultant. He said, 'You must have a modern self-steering device operated by an air-driven propeller.' This was to be like a windmill at the stern of the boat. It would be kept facing into wind by a wind vane, and it would wind up a cord attached to the tiller to pull it one way or the other if the boat's heading changed relative to the wind. This sounded marvellous, and I was stuffed full of hope. Presently Allen said that he had not enough time to make it work. By now I was so intrigued with the idea that I took it over myself. I niggled away at the design until I had a model in Meccano working satisfactorily. I showed this to another friend, Dingle Bell of the Sperry Gyroscope Company, and he was enthusiastic about it. He said that Sperry's would make it for me, and pay me a royalty if it turned out to be a popular design and suitable for all yachts. It was not until March that their engineers came to the conclusion that it would need a minimum of 7mph of wind to actuate it. My hopes were shattered; half my sailing would be done with less than that wind strength. And so in March, after I returned from visiting Vence to get my lung checked up by Jean Mattei, I was stuck with the task of getting myself a self-steering gear with only three months in which to design, to build, and to practise sailing with it.
Every Sunday morning I took a bus to Kensington Gardens where I watched the model yachts being sailed across the Round Pond. I reckoned that if a model yacht can be sailed across the Round Pond without a helmsman, then my yacht could be sailed across the Atlantic in the same way. I bought an excellent book on model yacht sailing, and incidentally learned a lot about ocean racing from it though I dare say the author would be surprised to hear it. My new design was in principle a wind vane, which would always weathercock into wind. In fact it was a mast which could rotate in a socket at the stern of the yacht, with a flat sail instead of a metal vane. As soon as the yacht was sailing to my satisfaction I would lock the vane to the tiller. If the yacht came up into wind, the vane would be moved round with the yacht, and the wind would press on the side of it. This would pull on the tiller until the yacht had been steered back on to its original heading, when the vane would be weathercocked again, and do no work as long as the yacht kept on its original heading. The model yacht book told me that the area of the vane must be four and a half times that of the rudder, and so I designed my vane sail to be 45-squar
e feet. The chief problem in design was to make all the parts, the stays, and the spars, strong enough to stand up to a gale, or even a storm, without being so heavy that it would require too much wind to weathercock the vane. I cannot describe how ugly it looked on the beautiful Gipsy Moth.
It was not till 7 May that the yard finished and installed the vane. I crossed the bar at the entrance to the Beaulieu River, headed the yacht across the Solent and locked the vane to the tiller. Gipsy Moth started tearing through the water, sailing herself entirely. Her wake was almost dead straight; it was fascinating to watch. That was one of the most thrilling moments of my life. Gradually I found out that Miranda, as I christened the self-steering device, required just as much skill to get the best out of her as does setting the sails of a yacht in a keen race. Also it gave me the same pleasure to succeed.
The Lonely Sea and the Sky Page 34