The idea of an offshore race from Dublin Bay to Cork Harbour around the middle of July seems a no-brainer when you look at how sailing types spend their summers. Many cruiser-racers appear to move along that Leinster-to-Munster axis around this period of the summer almost of their own volition. Yet it has taken time for the K2Q sprint to gain a secure place in the sailing consciousness.
We can say "it has taken time" with heartfelt meaning. For as everyone now knows, it goes back to 1860. And for 1861 and 1862, the idea was repeated, using the form in which it was originally promoted in 1860 by the remarkable 80-year-old Admiral of the Royal Cork Yacht Club, Thomas G French of Cuskinny House on the Cobh side of the harbour.
As his club was a world leader in terms of antiquity with its foundation date of 1720, in his gentlemanly way he may not have thought that some thrusting newer people might try to kidnap his cherished idea. Yet they did. But either way, by the 1870s Cork was going through a bit of an economic recession, whereas Liverpool on the Irish Sea was basking in the benefits of its period of wealth.
FOCUS SHIFTS TO IRISH SEA
Thus the offshore racing powerline shifted to Royal Alfred YC and Royal Dee YC cross-channel "matches" from Dublin Bay to North Wales from the 1870s onwards, although one other Dublin Bay to Cork race was sailed in 1888. But while the great Harry Donegan reminded everyone of the pioneering Cork spirit when he campaigned his 17-ton cutter Gull to third place in the first Fastnet Race of 1925, he went to start and finish at English ports in order to do so.
Harry Donegan's Gull from Cork, a Charles E Nicholson design of 1898. For twenty years in his ownership from 1921 to 1940, she competed to third place in the first Fastnet Race of 1925, took part in the founding cruise of the Irish Cruising Club to Glengarriff in 1929, and sailed in the revival of the Dublin Bay to Cork Race in 1937. Photo: RCYC
REVIVAL OF DUBLIN TO CORK IN 1937
Yet by 1937, the 1929-founded Irish Cruising Club felt confident enough to promote a well-supported Dublin Bay to Cork Harbour Race. And Gull under the command of Harry Donegan Jnr was leader coming in towards the finish. But in trying the make the historic finish line at Cobh in light airs, she came gently to a stop on the Spit Bank. And there she sat for most of a tidal cycle, while in time the line honours were taken by John Kearney's Mavis from Dun Laoghaire, and the handicap win was taken by the new Scandinavian designed-and-built 6-ton Bermudan sloop Curlew, owned and skippered by Francis Cobbe of Malahide.
RORC ON BOARD IN 1963
But after World War II of 1939-45, the Royal Ocean Racing Club was increasingly recognised as the reference point for signature events, and the powerful duo of Douglas Heard and Rory O'Hanlon of the Royal St George YC in Dun Laoghaire signed them up as co-organisers for a 200-mile race in the Irish Sea in 1963. It started and finished with the RStGYC in Dun Laoghaire, and the winner in tough conditions was Stephen O'Mara's Dublin Bay 24 Fenestra (RIYC), skippered by Arthur Odbert.
John McConnell's robust cutter Susannah (NYC) comes in past Roche's Point lighthouse to win the 1964 RORC Beaumaris-Cork Race. Photo: Examiner
Then in 1964 the Royal Anglesey YC in Beaumaris in northeast Anglesey reeled in the RORC for a revival of sorts of the Irish Sea Race to Cork, and this time the winner – with the finish at the entrance to Cork Harbour rather than off Cobh - was the hefty performance cruiser Susannah, owned and skippered by John McConnell of the National YC, where he was to be Commodore from 1965 to 1969.
The Beaumaris-Cork Harbour format was re-used under the RORC administration again in 1966. In ultra-summery weather, the two International 8 Metre Cruiser/Racers from Howth, Johnny Pearson's Orana and Ross Courtney's Fionnuala, reckoned to get help from the night breeze off the land close along the Wexford coast. And they did so, to such good effect that they were clear first and second overall.
The Sisk brothers and the crew of Sarnia after their win in 1970
This Irish Sea dominance of the top finishing slots was slightly dented by the RORC race of 1970, as it was won by the Sisk brothers with their Cork connections saiing the S&S 36 Sarnia. Yet in reality, Sarnia was Dun Laoghaire-based, with an all Ireland crew. But as the 1970s drew on, any racing towards Cork from any port was increasingly Crosshaven-dominated on the leaderboard by the likes of Archie O'Leary's Irish Mist II, Denis Doyle's Moondusters, and Clayton Love's Assiduous.
The summer of 1975, when Crosshaven still awaited much of the development that is now integral to its many facilities. Dried out alongside the pier in traditional style is Otto Glaser's McGruer 47 Tritsch-Tratsch II, and moored off are Archie O'Leary's Holland 40 Irish Mist II, Clayton Love's Swan 44 Assiduous, and Denis Doyle's blue S&S 47 Moonduster of 1973 vintage. Photo: W M Nixon
With this more recent history, we watch the current edition of the "Great Ocean Race" with fascination, as the strong contingent from Cork have much to live up to. And those of us who remember when Imp was the hottest new boat on the ocean now have to accustom ourselves to the fact that a George Radley of Cobh – having won the trophy for the oldest boat in the 2024 Round Ireland race which he also won overall back in 2000 - is now in line for the same honour in the race to Cork.
FINISH AT ENTRNCE TO CORK HARBOUR
But much and all as Imp's skipper would enjoy finishing close off the waterfront of his home place, the result of the race in times past has so often been determined by luck – or the lack of it – in the final stages within Cork Harbour that the organisers of ISORA and SCORA - co-ordinated by former NYC Commodore Peter Ryan - have deemed it sensible to finish in the Cork Harbour entrance, just north of Roche's Point.
GETTING THE FLEET TO CORK
Then too, where the original race of 1860 was made possible by the assembly beforehand of a fleet for a week of racing in Dublin Bay, this time round – 164 years later - the purpose is to encourage boats to the South Coast and Cork Harbour for Volvo Cork Week.
They won't have finished when this latest issue of Sailing on Saturday is first posted. So in recognition of those who kept the spirit of sailing going through the Covid Lockdown with the Fastnet 450 (when it was just about the only form of sailing possible) we revive the spirit of the 1860 race:
THE GREAT RACE
In 1860, the Royal St George Yacht Club on Dublin Bay organised a week of regattas in early July, and the Admiral of the Royal Cork Yacht Club, the remarkable Thomas G French of Cuskinny in Cobh – and still going strong at the age of 80 years - saw an opportunity for implementing his long-held dream of a distance race from Dublin Bay to Cork Harbour.
But instead of having a great blaring of publicity beforehand for this then-novel idea, he quietly circulated the idea in what we now think of as pop-up style among those owners and skipper – they came from many parts of Ireland and from England too – in the days before the week in Dublin Bay. And during the course of the regatta socialising ashore, he continued to quietly press the idea.
Destination for July 1860….the members of the Royal Cork YC at Cobh (now the Sirius Arts Centre) expected to be able to witness the finish of the race from Dublin Bay close at hand and in comfort, regardless of the flukey winds sometimes found within Cork Harbour.
SIXTEEN ENTRIES TO RACE 160 MILES
After the regattas had concluded, no less than 16 boats – of very varied size and type – had accepted Admiral French's challenge of racing the 160 miles to Cork, and it started on the morning of July 14th. But it was still very informal, with those definite entries only being finally firmed up on the morning of the race as the Admiral visited each boat in turn as they lay anchored, and personally collected the entry fees based on boat size, while wishing owners and crews the very best of luck and encouragement.
That year, Admiral French didn't sail the race himself, as he wanted to get to Cobh to be sure the Royal Cork YC in its impressive 1854-completed premises was ready to receive the finishing fleet in appropriate style. It was an overland journey which in itself must have been quite an effort for an 80-year-old, as the railway system wasn't to be extended to the Queenstown waterfront until 1862.
Printed version of the entry list for the first race of 1860 as it appeared in H P F Donegan's History of Yachting in the South of Ireland, published 1908. Sir John Arnott certainly hedged his bets – he had two entries, and one of them, Sibyl helmed by the amateur Capt. Henry O'Bryen, was the winner
The Entry List for the second race of 1861 was still very much an ad hoc affair, with RCYC Admiral Thomas French encouragingly visiting each boat pre-start in Kingstown, confirming their entry and the fee paid on this list believed to be written in his own hand. He also competed personally in this second race – aged 81 – with his 61-tonnner Spell (top of list). Image courtesy RCYC
Before travelling back to Cork, the Admiral supervised the start of the first race and saw it well on its way. Much of it was sailed in rugged windward conditions, but light airs prevailed at the finish off the Cobh waterfront for a real knife-edge conclusion, with Sir John Arnott's 39-ton cutter Sybil – designed and built on Cork Harbour by Joseph Wheeler of Lower Glanmire – winning line honours and the race by three minutes from J.W.Cannon's 40-ton cutter Peri, with Cooper Penrose's 90-ton schooner Kingfisher another two minutes astern of Peri.
AMATEUR ACE
Sybil was skippered by the amateur ace Captain Henry O'Bryen, who had reputedly relinquished the helm for a total of only one hour during the race, a triumph for Corinthianism before it had became profitable or popular, if we may mix metaphors for a moment.
The hand-written Start Instructions for 1860 were also on a "make it up as you go along" basis. It reads: "Ocean Race. A flag boat will be moored off the harbour, and no yacht may pass between her and the Light House on the East Pier until 11 am, when a gun will be fired from "Urania" as the signal for starting. The yachts may lie where they please provided they do not pass between the Light House and flag boat before the gun fires".
You would have thought Admiral French would have received eternal credit and respect for inaugurating this first recognisably modern offshore race. But Sybil's owner Sir John Arnott (1814-1898) was something else, a real go-getting Scottish-born entrepreneur who'd arrived into Cork in 1837 aged 23.
He had immediately launched himself into a sometimes rocky commercial career which at various stages involved heavy investment in department stores in Ireland and Scotland, horse racing both as an owner of thoroughbreds and of noted race courses, steamship companies, railways, and for a while the inevitable newspapers, in his case The Northern Whig in Belfast and The Irish Times in Dublin.
Victorian entrepreneur Sir John Arnott, who had two yachts entered in the first Kingstown to Queenstown Race of 1860.
Arnott was always a man in a hurry, so it's possible that he thought the distinguished flag officers of the Royal Cork were a bit conservative in their management. Thus he was one of a bunch of shaker-uppers who set up a new club in Cobh, the Queenstown Yacht Club, which they cleverly up-graded by taking on the tattered-remains of the old Royal Western of Ireland YC, founded in 1828 in Kilrush by Maurice O'Connell and his nephew Daniel of Derrynane among others, but wandering more or less homeless after the horrors of the Great Famine of 1845-47 had wiped out fripperies like yachting on Ireland's Atlantic seaboard.
After a vague period in Dublin, suddenly the old Royal Western emerged re-born in 1861 in Cobh with Sir John Arnott as Commodore, and Henry O'Bryen – in a shrewd bit of window-dressing worthy of Arnott's at their best - drafted in as Vice Commodore of the Royal Western of Ireland, despite his family's connections with the Royal Cork going back to the original Water Club of 1720.
However, all these seemingly-rebellious Young Turks in the re-born RWIYC had retained their membership of the Royal Cork YC and would in time become part of its establishment lineup, as so often happens. But everything seemed up for grabs in the early 1860s, and though the Kingstown to Queenstown Race was sailed again in 1861, the management at either end was less clear.
THE SECOND K2Q OF 1861
Be that as it may, the 1861 race had started in Dublin Bay on 19th July, and once again mustered 16 starters with the winner being Colonel Huey's slippy 62-ton cutter Osprey, with designer-builder Joseph Wheeler's own 48-tonnner Avalanche having to make do with second despite having led into Cork Harbour in light airs, while E J Saunderson of Lough Erne YC was third with another even smaller and equally slippy craft, the 34-ton cutter Phasma.
Admiral French's own 61-ton yawl Spell took part in this second stahing, but although he was to continue as RCYC Admiral until his death in 1866, he'd already been 77 when he took over as Admiral in 1857, and his enthusiastic promotion of the Kingstown-Queenstown race's first staging in 1860 suggested an old man in a hurry to promote an idea which he'd been carrying for some time.
THE THIRD RACE OF 1862
Certainly at the Kingstown to Queenstown Race's third staging on July 11th 1862, there's a clear impression that others had taken it over, as the host club on Dublin Bay has become the Royal Irish YC from their impressive 1851-completed clubhouse, while the trophy is an expensive bit of silver plate presented by the Royal Western of Ireland YC.
History twice over. The Royal Irish YC hosted the start of the third K2Q in 1862, and berthed off it in this photo is the 70ft Fife cutter Hallowe'en, winner of line honours in the second Fastnet Race of 1926. Photo: W M Nixon
For anyone seeking abstruse historical connections, it's of interest that The Liberator, Daniel O'Connell of Derrynane (1775-1847) had been present at both the foundation of the Royal Western in Kilrush in 1828, and the meeting in Dublin on July 4th 1846 when the 1831-founded Royal Irish YC had been revived.
Meanwhile in 1862, the third Kingstown-Queenstown Race once again attracted 16 starters (though there's no note of any entry limit), and they ranged in size from three 35-ton cutters – Ariadne (G Higgins), Coolan (G Robinson) and Glance (A Duncan) – to two 130-ton schooner, Galatea (T Broadwood) and Georgiana (Capt Smith Barry).
The clear winner was the 50-ton cutter Phosphorous owned by W Turner - who is doubtless immortalized in modern Cork by Turner's Cross - while C J Tennant's 90-ton cutter Clutha was second on the water, but Galatea won the schooners and was reckoned second on handicap.
THE ROYAL WESTERN'S TIME IN COBH
They arrived into the finish at Cobh where the Royal Western of Ireland was now well-established as the second club with premises at Westbourne Place next the Queen's Hotel, and a membership which by 1863 included the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Carlisle, as well as Sir Robert Peel, at that time Chief Secretary for Ireland.
So heaven only knows what politicking was going on behind the scenes, for the Royal Cork, still with T G French as Admiral, had been well settled into its purpose-designed new clubhouse in Cobh since 1854, and no-one doubted its claim of seniority in its descent from the Water Club of 1720.
As it happened, 1863 was probably the high point of the RWIYC's time in Cobh, for the rest of the decade saw a period of economic decline, and a Dublin Bay to Cork Harbour Race wasn't staged again until 1888. While the Royal Cork came through the thin times as it had come through many others, in 1870 the Royal Western of Ireland YC was quietly wound up at Cobh.
ROYAL WESTERN REVIVES WITH KILRUSH MARINA
But in the west of Ireland, and particularly with the Glynn family of Kilrush and the The Knight of Glin across the Shannon Estuary, enough of its memorabilia, artefacts and records survived for yhe Royal Western of Ireand to be revived with the opening of Kilrush Marina, with the club's greatest modern success being Ger O'Rourke's overall victory with the Cookson 50 Chieftain in the RORC Rolex Fastnet Race 2007.
The Royal Western of Ireland lives again – Ger O'Rourke's Cookson 50 Chieftain on her way to winning the 2007 Rolex Fastnet Race overall. Photo: Rolex
THE GREAT CONTRIBUTORS TO CORK SAILING
But for now, it is timely to realise that while a readily-inspired club spirit is essential to stories like that of the wonderful sailing in Cork over centuries, it takes determined individuals to give that club spirit a sense of direction. We can think of several who have done so. But with this historic 164-year-old race being sailed again towards today's version of Cork Week, it is behoves us to recognize the exceptional contribution made to the golden thread of Cork sailing history by visionaries like Thomas G French, Harry Donegan and Clayton Love Jnr.
Harry Donegan (1870-1940). His genial appearance was a useful cover for a great and serious determination to promote Cork and Irish sailing. Photo: RCYC
