It’s all there in sepia and white. America’s course (dashed line) takes her inside the Nab while most – but not all of her rivals – pass outside (grey boxes). Unlike in today’s Round the Island Race, the Squadron saw fit to time the race for maximum help from the tide…
buoy, into which America was entering, was no more than 0.6 miles wide! (I was able to verify this myself in 2001, when I went there with a few English history buffs equipped with GPS). The ‘infamous’ three-mile gain to wind-
ward, from not rounding the lightship, is still claimed by some as an unfair advantage which thus diminishes America’s victory. But it is a falsehood. So the America’s Cup is not born with a winner who should have been disqualified. Nor was America alone in passing to windward of the fireboat. According to Peter Johnson, only five
yachts tacked out around the Nab: Aurora, Brilliant, Gipsy Queen, Bacchante and Constance. Years after the race a sailor wrote to The Field newspaper and attested, while aboard Arrow and close to Volante, that these two yachts had indeed tacked around the Nab. If we accept this total of seven ‘legalists’, six other competitors followed the Americans! That’s still a lot. America re-passed Volante at 11.30am.
Then at 11.47am she tacked to port for a short tack towards the shore. At this point many historians report a lead of at least two miles over her pursuers. All are based on The Times reporter’s account of 23 August. Strangely enough, none of the accounts challenge the implausibility of the Times’s story. Extending two miles ahead of the fast Volante in just 17 min- utes? Requiring 7kt more speed over the ground? Heading directly into a flood current that is now well established? We’re barely at the start of ‘the race’ and already the reports start to conflict. America made a further short tack to
the south, then at 11.58 tacked west again onto port towards Sandown. That’s three
44 SEAHORSE
complex and expensive tacks against the current in 11 minutes… We are clear that on her tack back into
the coast America fell into the island’s wind shadow. To free herself the ‘chal- lenger’ hoists her largest jib and flying jib. But the crew on the windlass ask too much of the rigging and at 12.58 Ratsey’s longer jib boom exploded in front of Dunnose. Much to the delight of Brown, who has hated this sail from the outset. But America isn’t the only one in trouble.
After Dunnose, Arrow, one of England’s fastest cutters, is hard aground on Church Rocks. Alarm will later escort her back to Cowes. Only 12 competitors left. Significantly, the two cutters Freak and
Volante regained the lead ahead of America at midday. One conclusion is clear: despite her fine sails America is not as fast upwind as the best British cutters. But the euphoria is short-lived for the British. At around 3pm Freak and Volante crash into each other on a cross while tacking beneath the cliffs. With bowsprit and mainboom broken, Volante heads back to Cowes. We’re halfway through the race and the Royal Yacht Squadron has already lost its four best yachts. From Dunnose the famous New York
YC’s schooner takes a long starboard tack offshore, and finds the wind more stable than nearer the coast. She then tacks back onto port towards St Catherine’s Point, the island’s southernmost tip. However, all this time Aurora, Thomas
Le Marchant’s little Irish cutter, has been sailing steadily closer to America since the Nab. According to The Times reporter, Aurora was two miles behind at Dunnose. At St Catherine’s Point she was only
10 minutes behind. There is really nothing surprising about this performance. Aurora’s fine mainsail is set on a Houari rig with a near-vertical gunter that seemed to reach almost to the sky; this tall Houari configuration preceded the future Euro- pean Marconi rig by more than 70 years! No doubt it excels upwind. Then, arriving off St Catherine’s, the
Yankees spy a sail out in front of them. For a moment they thought they recog- nised Aurora. In fact, it was the 19m Irish cutter Wildfire. Wildfire left last, only to be disqualified because her crew were moving two or three tons of mobile ballast to windward with each tack. Some historians point out that Wildfire
set off well ahead of America to the south of the island. This is incorrect. Historian Dixon Kemp points out that Wildfire was behind America at the first mark, the No Man’s Land buoy in the Solent. More surprisingly, Wildfire did arrive
back in Cowes well before America, as Squadron historian Montague Guest points out in his club memoirs. Knowing that the Royal Cork YC entry was automatically disqualified, by dint of her movable ballast, journalists from The Times and Illustrated London News had paid little heed to Wild- fire’s race, which was in fact superb from start to finish. Unsurprisingly, the Ameri- cans completely ignored the presence of this ‘illegal’ interloper throughout the race. Once past St Catherine’s, now with a
softening breeze, still from the southwest, America was able to make the most of her favourite conditions as she bore off slightly for the tip of the Needles. Now America was quickly catching Wildfire, overtaking her as the pair crossed Freshwater Bay just
ALAMY
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