Gypsy Moth III – Tyrrell built 1960 trans-Atlantic winner | Season 3 – Episode 30
Floats May 14, 2023
Beginning in the 1770s, generations of Tyrrells have built ships in Arklow, County Wicklow. In 1864 John Tyrrell & Sons Ltd. boat yard was established on Arklow harbour and gained an international reputation for excellence. Over the decades shipwrights who served their time in the yard could find work anywhere they went, ‘Tyrrell-trained’ was as good a stamp as ‘Tyrrell-built’.
Francis Charles Chichester (1901 – 1972) was an English pioneering long-distance aviator, trans-Atlantic and circumnavigation solo-sailor. An enthusiastic sailor, known for sailing in all weathers often at the expense of the comfort of his passengers. During a particularly ‘lively’ race from Cowes, England, to Dinard, France in the mid-1950s, Chichester’s wife Sheila suggested a more comfortable boat. This led to the conception of a new vessel, as later described by Francis Chichester, who sketched his design ideas on the back of an envelope and passed it to yacht designer Robert Clark.
In September 1959 Clark then commissioned Tyrrell & Sons to construct the Gypsy Moth III whose name comes from the two de Havilland Gipsy Moth biplanes ‘I’ and ‘II’ previously owned by Francis Chichester.
In his Arklow, boatyard John ‘Jack’ Tyrrell and his skilled workers then built a 40-foot (12.19 m) racing cutter. Francis Chichester entered his mono-hull cutter featuring a 650 sq. ft (60.4 sq. m) of sail and 14 h.p. Yanmar engine in the inaugural 1960 Observer Single-handed Trans-Atlantic Race (OSTAR) a gruelling east-to-west yacht race across the wild north Atlantic.
When the race was conceived in 1956 by Herbert ‘Blondie’ Hasler (seen as the father of solo-racing and inventor of self-steering gear for yachts) it was thought to be near impossible not only because of the adverse weather and sea conditions in the north Atlantic but more so as the westward crossing route from Plymouth, England to New York in the United States over a distance of around 3,000 nautical miles (5,600 km) would be against the prevailing winds.
Despite the widely held belief that the race was nearly impossible to complete, never mind race, one-hundred and fifteen yachts expressed their interest in participating in the Observer Single-handed Trans-Atlantic Race (OSTAR), organised by the Royal Western Yacht Club, and out of the eight entries, five actually took part and four departed Plymouth harbour on June 11th 1960.
Each captain employed different plotting strategies, with Hasler opting for the northern route to steer clear of depressions, Lacombe and Howells choosing more southerly routes and Chichester and Lewis sticking closer to the great circle.
Of all the skippers, Francis Chichester had the most advantageous position, as he had the longest boat by far, the robust 39-foot (12 m) Gipsy Moth III was well-built and able to withstand the violent seas while set up to sail single handed.
In 1960, the modern communications we have today were not available and even with an overwatch by the US Coast Guard there was no way to know how things were progressing out on the Atlantic. As time passed and a month went by, concerns about the well-being of the competitors grew on both continents. Then, on July 21st 1960 after 40 days, 12 hours, and 30 minutes, Gipsy Moth III with Chichester aged 58 at the helm sailed into view on and entered the harbour at New York, winning the race.
Speaking afterwards to a reporter, Chichester said of the race, “Every time I tried to point Gipsy Moth at New York, the wind blew dead on the nose. It was like trying to reach a doorway with a man in it, aiming a hose at you. It was much tougher than I thought.”
Chichester raced Gypsy Moth III again in OSTAR 1964 to secure second place, behind French naval lieutenant Eric Tabarly, aboard Pen Duick II, completing the journey in just 29 days 23 hours 57 min.
It was not just the perilous weather and high seas that had to be contended with as Derek Kelsall found out while leading the second OSTAR in 1964 when his 35 ft Piver Trimaran struck, while going 10 knots what was probably a whale and suffered a broken rudder and a broken dagger board and lost his lead.
The OSTAR is now recognised as the oldest single-handed transatlantic race in history is usually held every four years and as recently as 2021 renamed as The Transat CIC.
Over the years Gypsy Moth III has had a succession of owners and enjoyed a programme of ongoing upgrades. Most recently she cruised in western Greece and in c.2017 was sold on to new owners.
John Tyrrell went on to build many more memorable vessels and in 1977 received a commission from the Irish government to construct Asgard II, an 84-foot (25.6m) brigantine, which was at the time the first sailing vessel built in Ireland in sixty years. Asgard II was launched on March 7th, 1981, by the Taoiseach, C. J. Haughey. More on this story in a later episode.
Boatbuilding is still part and parcel of modern Arklow with the fifth generation of Tyrrell brothers operating as Arklow Marine Services continues to produce steel and aluminium vessels to the marine industry in Ireland and abroad.
Please email [email protected] if you have an idea for a story.
Check out some of our other Arklow boat building stories:
12 metre Landing Craft construction – Arklow Marine Services Co Wicklow | Season 1 – Episode 36
First motorized fishing vessel design in the British Isles – MFV Ovoca | Season 1 – Episode 50
Information sources:
Alamy
Arklow Marine Services
Asgard: the story of Irish sail training (2000) – W. M. Nixon and Eric Healy
Associated Press (AP)
British Movetone
Classic Boat
Classic Yacht Info
Dictionary of Irish Biography
George Berkis
Gypsy Moth circles the world (1967) – Sir Francis Chichester
Irish Times
Jester – a Short History – Mike Richey
National Library of Ireland
Pplmedia.com – Eileen Ramsay & Roger Lean-Vercoe
Rolex.org
Royal Western Yacht Club of England
Sailworld.com
Sandeman Yacht Company
Shaun Tyrrell
Solarnavigator.net
Soundings Online
The Lonely Sea and the Sky (1964) Autobiography – Sir Francis Chichester
To Sail the Crested Seas’ – WM Nixon
Wicklow People
