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The War Years

Racing was virtually impossible during the war, following orders to disable all boats in harbours, rivers and creeks.

Yachting Monthly, May 1941: South Coast and Solent Notes.

Prospects of sailing in this area during the summer are nil. It was hoped the Admiralty would allow racing in the Medina River in the coming season. What privileges and concessions the Admiralty were willing to make, and had even planned, have now had to be abandoned entirely due to the grim necessities of our war effort. The Island Yacht Club, Cowes (membership 700, balance sheet credit £109 7s 4d.) - boats have been hauled up since last June, by order. Members of the “Island” are serving in Forces all over the world.

In most of the South Coast yards where yachts are berthing, or at moorings, they have been painted grey, to make them less visible at night.

Ratsey & Lapthorn, Gosport, have restarted their sail loft on another part of the yachting centre…. in a Mission Hall. The century-old premises have been destroyed, but not the spirit of this sail-making firm, which supplied the sails for Nelson's flagship, H.M.S. Victory at Trafalgar.

Solent yachtsmen, as indeed yachtsmen everywhere, applaud the genial United States sportsman and yachtsman, Mr. Gerard Lambert, rear-commodore of the New York Yacht Club, for his thoughtful act in selling his “J” Class Yankee and giving the proceeds of about £2,500 to Lord Queensborough, commodore of the Royal Thames Y.C., towards buying a Spitfire fighter plane.

Harbours and rivers were patrolled, and, in the case of the River Fal, the following inspection of the Home Guard's boats off Lime Quay, Tregothnan, serves to illustrate same. John Trembath's father owned Eastwood Farm, Penryn. He was one of 8 sons and, aged 16 found himself Guarding the cottage adjacent to lime Quay, before going to sea on R.M.S. Rangitiki 18,000tons, owned by the New Zealand Shipping Co. Ltd.

	John Trembath's father owned Eastwood Farm, Penryn. John was one of 8 sons and, aged 16, found himself guarding the cottage adjacent to Lime Quay, Tregothnan, before going further to sea on R.M.S. Rangitiki 18,000 tons, owned by the New Zealand Shipping Co. Ltd.
Pinnace F 2174 passing Lime Quay, Tregothnan, in 1945	(Left) Home Guard Captain Goodman (Truro Harbour Master), (Middle) Captain Kemp & Captain Pearson (Right)
Home Guard River Fal patrols F 2174 and F3795
	John related how one of these small boats was fitted with a Hotchkiss machine-gun


New Zealand Shipping Line's R.M.S. Rangitiki, seen here in Wellington, circa September 1945.	'Deckies' aboard R.M.S. Rangitiki in Wellington Harbour, 1945
Pitcairn Island, from R.M.S. Rangitiki, 20 August, 1945. Colonised by Fletcher Christian & cohorts off H.M.S. Bounty in 1789	Pitcairn Islanders, by John Trembath, 1945.
John joined the 8,000 ton, 12 knot, S.S. Atreus (1911) in Liverpool on 26 June, 1946, bound, with NAAFI stores, for Malta, Port Said, Aden, Colombo, Port Sweetenham, Singapore, Hong Kong, Penang, Cochin, Massaura, Suez and home. Under Captain Dryden, "this was quite an eventful trip owing to illness, delay (3-months) strikes in Colombo, Typhoons in Hong King, two monsoon gales in the Indian Ocean, and heavy seas from Malta home, rolling 35 degrees. Without further detains, we proceeded [again for Hong Kong] - seeing H.M.S. Anson going through Suez	First port of call - Malta

A postcard view of the RCYC (franked 1947)