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Albert Strange’s TALLY HO A YACHT WORTH SAVING Winner of the FASTNET RACE 1927 The Albert Strange Association yachttallyho.com
Albert Strange’s
TALLY HOA YACHT WORTH SAVING
Winner of the FASTNET RACE 1927
The Albert Strange Association
yachttallyho.com
If you may be able to help Tally Ho, you can contact The Albert Strange Association by one of these methods:
In the UKJamie Clay
+44 (0)1621 853804 / +44 (0)7950 [email protected]
In the USThad Danielson+1 413-212-8169
Tally Ho has her own website at yachttallyho.com
This booklet was written and compiled byJamie Clay, Thad Danielson, Tony Watts, Dick Wynne
Photos have been supplied by Beken of Cowes, Fran Flutter, Dave Olson, Michael Holcombe, Judy Lopez, Pat Kellis
A Note about the Albert Strange Association.
The Association was formed by a group of yacht owners and others interested in Strange’s life and work, in the late 1970s, with one of its aims “to trace and pre-serve the designs of Albert Strange”. In this quest the Association has published two books Albert Strange, Yacht Designer and Artist 1855 - 1917 by John Leather, 1990, and Albert Strange on Yacht Design, Construction and Cruising by Jamie Clay and Mark Miller, 1999. The Association’s main website has more details of
boats, designs, etc.
www.albertstrange.org
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TALLY HOA PROSPECTUS
4Yachts like Tally Ho are rare. Designed and built in the best Eng-lish tradition of the powerful, sea-kindly gaff cutter, she has proved herself over a long and colourful career to be a quite exceptional yacht within that tradition, and as such offers an opportunity of tre-mendous potential and reward to anyone with the resources to un-dertake her restoration.
She is lying at the Port of Brookings, Oregon, on the west coast of the USA. The Albert Strange Association has, with limited resources, taken over title and the payment of storage fees for an interim period while seeking that person or group.
The Association is working hard to save Tally Ho. We have pro-duced in the following pages:
• Information on her very varied life and accomplishments
• A summary of the current situation
• An account of the famous 1927 Fastnet Race which she won
• A note on her designer, Albert Strange
• The lines, construction and general arrangement drawings and sail plan of Tally Ho
A new urgency is focussing our efforts—Tally Ho has to be moved, and the deadline from the Port of Brookings is 30 June 2017.
Contact can be made and further developments followed through the website set up for the purpose at yachttallyho.com. Tally Ho is also on brokerage with the Sandeman Yacht Company:
sandemanyachtcompany.co.uk, tel +44 (0) 1202 330077
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TALLY HO in the 1920s, close-hauled on port tack, in her original rig, setting 1374 sq. feet
(photo: Beken)
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TALLY HO in 1927, running with spinnaker, showing off her en-larged rig with new mast and the addition of a topmast
(photo: Beken)
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TALLY HO’s History
4At 47ft 6in loa and 30 tons tm, Betty was the largest transom-stern-ed boat designed by Albert Strange. She was built for Charles Helly-er of Brixham, who had fishing interests in that port, as well as in Hull, where he owned one of the first steam trawler fleets, and was a member of the Humber Yawl Club. Betty was built by the well-known and reputable yard of Stow & Sons at Shoreham, Sussex to Lloyd’s highest class. The ’midship section drawing shows the hull was to be planked in American elm below the waterline, with teak above. The commentary which accompanied the publication of the design in The Yachting Monthly in 1910 remarks that Hellyer required a yacht in which he could ‘cruise in comfort whilst indulging in deep-sea fishing’. This explains the barrel windlass forward of the mast and perhaps the unusually clear flush deck. It continues:
The transom stern, rather unusual in a yacht of this tonnage, was adopt-ed in deference to the wishes of the owner, in order that she might lie in the crowded harbour of Brixham in the smallest possible space.
The boat has had a colourful career. When Hellyer commissioned Strange to design the larger Betty II of 50ft waterline in 1913 Bet-ty was sold, and in 1927 passed into the ownership of Hugh Gros-venor, Lord Stalbridge, who renamed her Tally Ho. The photograph by Beken of Cowes shows her at this period under racing canvas, with the short pole mast changed to a taller fidded topmast rig, and sail area increased by some 400 sq.ft. or about 20%. Her celebrated win of the 1927 Fastnet Race in storm conditions is related later. Alf Loomis, crewing on the Alden schooner La Goleta, wrote of it:
At the time, this contest between Tally Ho and La Goleta was character-ised as the hardest fight between two yachts that had ever been sailed in Eng-lish waters over so long a course and under such heavy weather conditions.
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There is less recorded of Tally Ho in the following decades, al-though the delightful photographs from the Clark family album show her at the outset of a year-long transatlantic cruise in 1958. It seems that she completed more than one trans-Atlantic trip after the Second World War, whilst still based in the Southampton area. Then, in 1967, New Zealander Jim Louden set out in Tally Ho from England heading for home, via the Panama Canal. He paused to charter for a few months in the Caribbean and then sailed on single-handed to Rarotonga, in the Pacific, which he reached in July 1968. Here he was offered a charter to fetch 20 tons of copra from the island of Manuae (Hervey Islands), 120 miles to the northeast. With a young lad as crew, he reached the offing during darkness and hove to waiting for dawn. As they slept, the current carried the yacht down onto the is-land, where the surf lifted and drove her onto the coral reef and stove in her port side amidships.
She was eventually dragged off the reef, after seven tons of lead ballast had been removed from her bilge and her cabin filled with empty oil drums. As she came off, she rolled over and was dismasted, also losing her rudder and bowsprit. But the drums kept her float-ing just awash and, in that condition, she was towed the 120 miles back to Rarotonga, something of a tribute to the strength of her orig-inal deck construction. In Rarotonga she was rebuilt over a period of years, during which time she changed hands, and eventually she found her way, via Tahiti and Hawaii, to the west coast of the United States. There, with aft wheelhouse and twin trolling poles rigged on the mast, she went to work periodically, under the name Escape, fish-ing for tuna and salmon out of Brookings Harbor, Oregon. During this ownership, in the 10 years between 1977 and 1987, Dave Olson sailed some 20,000 miles in her, twice to the Marquesas, to Tahiti, a frequent visitor to Hawaii, even Pitcairn.
At this time she was still in remarkably good condition for a boat of her age and usage. But when Dave Olson wanted to move on, a new owner could not be found and she languished in Brookings Har-bor for some years.
It was during this period that the Albert Strange Association be-came aware of Tally Ho, and that she was potentially running into
TALLY HO in 1958
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trouble. In 2008 the Port of Brookings sold her at auction to a local artist, fisherman and shipwright, Manuel Lopez, who formed a chari-table foundation and set out to restore her, with the idea of making her a show-piece for Brookings. Manuel did extensive work on the hull, but sadly died in early 2010 without having got her back in the water.
With the loss of Manuel’s driving force, Tally Ho found herself again ‘in limbo’, with storage fees accumulating which the charitable foundation had no means to pay. By late 2012 the Port was prepar-ing to foreclose on her again, and there was a real danger that she would have to be broken up. It seemed to be in the nick of time that the Association, in a renewed effort, contacted the Port Manager, and a plan of action was initiated. With the full and generous co-operation of the Port Manager and members of the foundation that Manuel Lopez had set up, a plan was agreed. The Port offered to prepare a piece of ground and move Tally Ho away from the busy working area she had occupied, and to waive overdue charges. The Association formed a wholly owned UK limited company for the sole purpose of holding title to the boat, and through which it would pay storage fees at a very reasonable rate.
Pat Kellis, a retired waterman in Brookings, who lives in the vicin-ity, undertook to thoroughly shore and cover the boat to protect her from the ravages of summer and winter weather. The ASA embarked on a campaign to raise awareness of Tally Ho, and locate that person, or perhaps syndicate, with the passion and resources sufficient to get her back on the water. Jeff Rutherford, a very experienced yacht res-toration specialist from Richmond, California, kindly inspected her and gave us his preliminary assessment of her condition and a projec-tion of possible restoration costs.
Throughout her long life of cruising, racing, fishing, injury, re-pair and neglect, she has retained her all-important shape and not in-considerable degree of structural integrity—a great testament to the quality and strength of her original construction.
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Why TALLY HO ?
4For all the celebration of her Fastnet victory, what that race actually demonstrated is Tally Ho’s extraordinary capability as a cruising boat, and as Loomis put it at the time, her sea-going rather than sea-keeping ability. She continued to look after her crews, nota-bly in the Pacific, during 4 days in a hurricane en route for Honolulu in 1976.
The effort and expense of her restoration, an exciting and fasci-nating project in itself, would be rewarded with the creation of a first class cruising yacht of known qualities and pedigree. Very well-suit-ed to many uses as family yacht, deep-sea cruising, chartering, or sail training, the project might suit a syndicate as well as an individual.
For the competitively-minded, a very important appointment awaits; the 2025 Centenary of the first Fastnet Race, in which a class of veterans, including the splendid Jolie Brise, Ilex, and other old ri-vals would attract huge interest. The search is on to track down the whereabouts of La Goleta and other 1927 competitors.
...Tally Ho, working toward the Lizard under reefed main and spitfire jib. High though the seas rose, she seemed as steady as a church, and we watched her in silent admiration. Here indeed was a competitor...
And here indeed is a yacht worth saving.
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appendix i
TALLY HO’s Fastnet Race 1927
4The first Fastnet race took place in 1925 after several prominent members of the Yacht Racing Association expressed a wish for a true ocean race that would keep sea-going yachts at sea for several days in testing waters; a course from the Isle of Wight to the Fastnet Rock was decided upon, the rules limited the size of the boats (50ft WL maximum, 30ft WL minimum) which meant roughly 50 tons TM to 10 tons TM and specifically excluded yachts of the International Classes, which were regarded as racing machines and unsuitable for the exposed waters of the Atlantic. Seven entries were attracted and Jolie Brise, a converted Le Havre pilot boat built in 1913, was famous-ly the winner. In 1926 there were nine entries with Ilex, a 20 ton cruis-ing yawl built in 1899, coming first. Jolie Brise had entered again and finished fifth.
The summer of 1927 in England was appalling with storms, floods and generally unsettled weather; the fortnight before the scheduled start of the race, Saturday 13th August, had seen south-westerly gales with rain squalls and there was talk on the eve of the race of a possi-ble postponement, but in fact the weather moderated overnight and when the 15 starters came to the line there was only a light south-westerly breeze. Jolie Brise, Altair, Penboch and Ilex from the 1926 race were joined by eleven newcomers: Tally Ho, La Goleta, Saoirse, Nica-nor, Morwenna, Shira, Content, Maitenes, Spica, Nellie and Thalassa.
La Goleta was a schooner of 30 tons owned by Mr R Peverley, designed by the American John Alden, built in England only just in time for the start of the race and with Alfred F Loomis (the au-thor of several books on sailing) of New York aboard as navigator. Further American interest was in Nicanor, another Alden design, a 36 ton schooner built in America in1926 for Alvin T Simonds and sailed across the Atlantic in 22 days to take part in the race for which
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she picked up additional local crew. Saoirse was the 20 ton square- rigged staysail schooner made famous through his books by Conor O’Brien, who had Miss O’Brien, Peter Gerard and Maurice Griffiths aboard. Spica, a 22 ton cutter, was co-owned and sailed by Mrs A M Hunt and Mr J T Hunt with Mrs Aitken Dick also on board. Nel-lie at 12 tons was the smallest boat in the race, she was a 40 year old cutter built on the lines of a fishing smack and based on the East Coast. Lord Stalbridge’s crew on Tally Ho consisted of his son Hugh Grosvenor, Mr Peter Bathurst and paid hands Mark Spinks, Jim Wills (cook) and Lou Springett (steward). The crew was divided into two watches; the starboard watch being Lord Stalbridge and Mr Bathurst and the port watch his son and Jim Wills, the other two crew members to be available on call at any time.
The Weather Gods did not relent for long; shortly after the start-ing gun at 11.30am strong winds and rain hit the fleet and the weath-er was so thick that the yachts lost sight of each other whilst still in the Solent. At that time, according to Loomis, Jolie Brise was in the lead followed by Nicanor, Ilex, and then Tally Ho and La Goleta along-side each other. Once they left the shelter of the Island they were met by the full force of the wind and big seas, and it became neces-sary to hand topsails and reef mains for the beat into the night. Over the next two days beating down Channel much damage was suffered by the fleet. On Monday with the wind at gale force Jolie Brise, Nica-nor, Tally Ho, La Goleta and Ilex were off Start Point when Ilex sprang a leak, blew out two jibs and was forced to turn tail and run back to Plymouth. Jolie Brise carried on in the lead until the Lizard Light where she was hit by a wild squall, took down her main and ran back to Falmouth, speaking to Tally Ho on the way.
These yachts had in fact weathered the conditions rather better than the rest of the fleet but by Tuesday the 16th of August only La Goleta, Tally Ho and Nicanor were left at sea. Split mainsails had caused Altair and Maitenes to run for shelter in Weymouth and Fowey respectively; Content was unlucky in that she was handling the weath-er in the Atlantic well when her compasses became unreliable and she put into Queenstown in Ireland; Saoirse, with a rig more suited to down wind sailing, gave up and ran back to the Solent; little Nel-
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lie with her low freeboard found a safe haven in St Helens after a wet and windy struggle, and the equally small Penboch, the converted French fisherman, was in Dartmouth. After putting in to Falmouth for respite (where three of her local crew jumped ship) Nicanor car-ried on short-handed into the Irish Sea only to be forced to retire with a broken gaff, leaving Tally Ho and La Goleta to fight it out.
When off the Eddystone on the 15th, Loomis in La Goleta later wrote:
... the only other contestant in sight was Tally Ho, working toward the Lizard under reefed main and spitfire jib. High though the seas rose, she seemed as steady as a church, and we watched her in silent admiration. Here indeed was a competitor.
After speaking to Jolie Brise Lord Stalbridge wrote:
Now was our chance as, knowing from the experiences in a gale in the Bay of Biscay what a wonderful sea-boat Tally Ho was, and also, confident in our sails and gear, we thought that by reefing her down and making things shipshape, we might be able to weather the Lizard, and if so would catch the tide and be a tide ahead of any of our competitors who failed to do so. So we hove-to and double reefed the mainsail, reefed the foresail and set our storm jib. We also got out the canvas covers for the skylights and the hatches and lashed them down securely, and put some more lashings on our dinghy and our spare spars and thus made ourselves as snug and as comfortable and watertight as we possibly could be.
After clearing the Lizard in enormous seas Tally Ho stood into Mount’s Bay and as they neared Penzance she felt the shelter of the land but as the seas moderated the wind appeared to increase and swung to the north-west. As night was coming on and with a foul tide in prospect, and believing that none of the others still at sea had yet rounded the Lizard, it was decided to run into Newlyn Roadstead and anchor for the night before beating out round the Longships. After a more comfortable night in relative shelter she was underway again by 6.30am in a moderating wind but when the Longships was
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reached there was still a big sea running; beating out into the Irish Channel no other sail was in sight and by 10pm a position about 6 miles north-west of the Sevenstones had been reached, the wind went into the south-west and moderated to a nice sailing breeze, and for the first time a course for the Fastnet could be laid. At dawn the next morning a sail was sighted far astern which was at first believed to be the Nicanor but by late evening, with the Fastnet Rock some 3 miles ahead and in an almost flat calm, it was in fact La Goleta that appeared out of the murk and hailed Tally Ho. (The scene so beauti-fully depicted by David Cobb on the cover). The yachts had sailed into the centre of the depression and Tally Ho was the first to pick up a light air and round the Fastnet at 1.20am some quarter of a mile ahead of La Goleta.
Of this time Loomis wrote:
At one thirty-five in the morning of the 18th, in pouring rain and freshen-ing wind, we considered ourselves around and signalled our name and letter to the light keeper. We had held Tally Ho to windward, and now if we could get a reaching wind instead of this northeaster that was commencing to blow the cold of the Arctic down our way, we felt that we had a chance to save our time.
and Lord Stalbridge later recorded:
The glass was now down to 29.3 and we were palpably in the centre of a depression, large or small, of course we had no means of telling, but I fear that standing into a lee shore in thick weather and a falling glass was not an act of great seamanship. However you cannot make omelettes without break-ing eggs; we were out to win the Fastnet Race if we could, so we were out to take some chances and luckily they came off as, no sooner were we clear of the Fastnet, than it began to blow hard from the north- east, and from 2 to 4am that morning I think we had as big a bucketing as at any time, as the wind was against the sea. Yet we had to drive her along for all we were worth, not only to beat La Goleta, but to get sea room. And drive her we did, more under water than over I fear, but by 4am it had got too bad and we had to heave-to and reef again.
How YOU can helpTALLY HO
4The Fastnet Race Centenary in 2025
and the 2027 Centenary of Tally Ho’s win are tantalising aims for the restoration of this,
Albert Strange’s largest surviving yacht.
yachttallyho.com
Our plans for TALLY HO
The Albert Strange Association has identified a number of stages and alternatives for the rescue of Tally Ho. The immedi-ate priority is to move her from her present location in the Port of Brookings, Oregon by the end of June 2017.
1. Move her to a secure, temporary, nearby location. This would be a fall-back plan, merely to ‘buy time’.
2. Once the cost of loading and trucking is met, it would be much more cost-effective to shift Tally Ho to an area of more significant wooden boat activity—and further along her long journey ‘home’; this could be Seattle (a possible departure port), San Francisco, or the eastern seaboard—Baltimore is an-other possible departure port. If the funds can be raised, this is what we will do.
3. Transport her by sea to Europe. Either from Tacoma (Se-attle) or Baltimore. The most likely port of entry is Southamp-ton, UK, from where she can be taken by road to a location such as Barton-upon-Humber where a first class yacht restora-tion yard has offered free storage for the medium term.
4. We continue to seek a new owner/restorer, whether a pri-vate individual, a syndicate, or an organisation such as a chari-table foundation.
Repatriation seems a sensible aim, and one more likely to find her a restorer and a new lease of life, but a viable future for her on any continent would be welcome.
How YOU can help TALLY HO
You, your organisation, or a syndicate you form, can buy Tally Ho right now. She is on brokerage with Sandeman Yacht Com-pany for £25,000. However, the broker and the Association are open to offers by which a reduced purchase price would very substantially offset the cost of repatriation/transport to the restoration location.
You can pledge an amount towards our costs in moving Tally Ho. We are looking for:
£6,000 to move her away from the Port to a new local site
A further £14,000 to move her from Oregon to the eastern sea-board of the USA
A further £15,000 to ship her back to the UK pending further developments
You might be able to offer storage for Tally Ho, or further ide-as for her restoration.
240 donations of £150 would bring her home; so would 3500 donations of £10. Outright donations will be put to good use by the Association in our aim “to trace and preserve the de-signs of Albert Strange” even if we are unsuccessful in saving Tally Ho.
Crowdfunding pledges will be called in only when one of the targets is reached, and the corresponding Rewards will be dis-patched to you; of course the real reward is knowing you’ve helped with the rescue of a truly quintessential piece of fine British yacht design and construction.
What to do next
Please visit Tally Ho’s web page yachttallyho.com for details of how you can contribute online to her transfer to a place of safely or her return to the UK. For legal reasons con-tributions are made to Fastnet 1927 Ltd, the ASA’s wholly-owned subsidiary formed to handle the Tally Ho project.
For further information or to discuss more practical ways you can help, please contact:
Our broker Barney Sandeman+44 (0)1202 330077
The Albert Strange Association
In the UKJamie Clay
+44 (0)1621 853804 / +44 (0)7950 [email protected]
In the USThad Danielson+1 413-212-8169
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In these testing conditions the yachts raced hard back to Plym-outh, often within site of each other, reefing as the weather demand-ed and passing through the French fishing fleet, all hove-to, with a big following sea that required only the most experienced steersmen to be at the helm. La Goleta, with six men on deck and the jumbo set, gradually drew ahead of Tally Ho and much to the relief of those on shore – there had been concern expressed for the safety of both yachts in the prevailing conditions – crossed the finishing line at 1.40pm on Friday the 19th of August followed by Tally Ho some 50 minutes later, Tally Ho saving her time by nearly 4 hours and so winning the Fast-net Cup. In spite of the number of retirements, and perhaps because they were all carried out safely in some of the worst conditions that could be experienced, the English cutter and the American designed schooner showed once and for all to the many doubters at the time that well designed, well found and well sailed yachts could race off-shore satisfactorily and give good sport to those who wished to enjoy more than sheltered waters. Ocean racing for the larger classes had been in vogue for some time but the Fastnet in 1927 confirmed that racing of this kind for the smaller classes had come to stay and Albert Strange had played his part in it.
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appendix ii
ALBERT STRANGE
4Albert Strange (1855-1917) was one of the foremost designers of small cruising yachts and his craft, acknowledged to be of classic quality, were and still are sought after by small boat sailors and builders in many countries. His designs, and his writings on the subject, contrib-uted significantly to the evolution of the seaworthy cruising yacht. He had a lifelong career in art, exhibiting many times at the Royal Academy, and turned to yacht design as an activity complementary to his love of small boat sailing.
The work of Albert Strange has been admired and respected by yachtsmen for more than a hundred years. He designed some 150 craft of varying size and style. Some were drawn on spec, others for design competitions, still others for commissioning clients. Many still grace the world’s harbours and anchorages.
A keen sailor from a very young age, in later years Strange was to make many two-handed cruises, often in the company of his great friend George Holmes, in UK and European waters, and a number of noteworthy extended single-handed trips along the east coast of England. All of these adventures he recorded in prose, drawings and paintings, the accounts appearing in The Yachting Monthly and other magazines of the day. The experience he gained afloat lent great au-thority to his output as artist, writer and yacht designer. He num-bered among his friends that most respected of English yachtsmen, Claud Worth, for whom he drew up the lines of Tern III, and W. P. Stevens, the American yachtsman and writer, whose collected papers at Mystic Seaport Museum contain many of Strange’s original de-sign drawings.
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appendix iii
DRAWINGS
4Design No 96 created 1909 by Albert Strange
to a commission from Charles Hellyer of Brixham
LOA 47ft 6inLWL 44ft 1in
Beam 12ft 10inDraught 7ft 0in
Sail Area 1374 sq ft(increased to 1660 sq ft. in Stalbridge’s new rig)
Ballast Keel 4.78 tonsInternal Ballast 8 tons
Thames Measurement 30 tons
Full-size copies of Albert Strange’s original design drawings are available.
TALLY HO looks deceptively small in the drawings. Had she the counter stern and more raked bow that usually balanced it at this
period, her overall length on this waterline would have been some-thing like 60ft, and indeed, her accommodation and performance are what one would more commonly expect from a yacht of that
length.
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Strange’s original sail plan is here shown with (in pecked lines) a conjectural sail plan of about 1660 sq.ft. as carried at the time of the
Fastnet Race in 1927, drawn by designer Iain Oughtred.
Ori
gina
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omm
odat
ion
plan
O
ther
arr
ange
men
ts m
ay b
e en
visa
ged
for p
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te, c
hart
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r sai
l tra
inin
g us
es
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These alternative and approximate accommodation plans drawn by designer Paul Spooner could suit Tally Ho’s use as (from top to bottom)
a charter yacht, a training vessel, or a private yacht.
– 21 –
appendix iv
PHOTOGRAPHS
4
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TALLY HO as a fishing vessel, 1980s. Above, anchored off Lahaina, Maui (Hawaii). This bermudan rig used the old lower mast with the addition of a sock-eted upper section. The original gaff has been used as the boom. Her original accommodation had almost entirely gone by this stage, with a refrigeration unit fitted in the ‘hold’, but her deck layout was never altered (the wheelhouse being built onto the original cockpit coamings)
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TALLY HO in 2005,after many years retired from fishing
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TALLY HO in 2009,Manuel Lopez and friends
TALLY HO in 2013,Robustly shored-up and covered against the weather
Front Cover: Tally Ho and La Goleta approaching The Fastnet Rock at the centre of the depression, oils, by David Cobb, RSMA. The framed original, image size approx 24” x 19”, is in the ASA’s possession and will
be available to Tally Ho’s restorer.
Above: Tally Ho as she will sail again, watercolour, by Tony Watts.
yachttallyho.com
Following a lengthy and varied career, including winning the 1927 Fastnet Race, being wrecked on a Pacific atoll, and years working as a longline fishing vessel out of Oregon, the Albert Strange-designed gaff cutter TALLY HO, built 1909, is in need of a benefactor – perhaps you
– to get her sailing once more. Here is her story.
