CHARLES MILLER LTD
The yacht that defeated a navy
When the Royal Navy was at the very peak of its powers in the 1830s there was one foe it could not subdue: the sensational racing yacht of the Earl of Belfast.
The immensely wealthy earl, a trailblazer in the, a dramatically sleek-hulled 334-tonne, square-rigged brig 90ft 6in (27.4m) in length and with an immense spread of sail. In trials off Cork, immediately outsailed everything the Royal Navy’s Experimental Squadron could muster against her, and the press soon mounted a campaign urging the Admiralty to buy into the fleet. In 1834 again proved her prowess, outperforming the RN Channel Squadron on all points of sail, but still the admiralty demurred.
