Salt Water Palaces

SUPERYACHTS AND SALT WATER PALACES OF YESTERYEAR

By Harry Crossley

Imagine a 222’ luxury yacht driven by steam turbines and carrying two masts purely for aesthetics, a plush interior to rival the Waldorf Astoria or Claridges, a panelled dining room with a huge polished table seating ten and you have NARCISSUS, one of the superyachts of a byegone era.

The saloon was classical marine with much polished panelling and superb furniture, even containing a piano. There was a curved sofa in an alcove with a cleverly designed skylight immediately above to provide light to those wishing to relax there with a good book. Note: The word settee was not used because the word was also the name for a long, sharp, decked, lateen rigged vessel of the Mediteranean.

She was built in 1905 at the great Clyde shipyard of Fairfield Ship and Engineering in the heyday of British shipbuilding, for E.Miller Mundy of Shipley Hall, Derby, who owned her until 1919. He was a member of the Royal Yacht Squadron when it really meant something, as were most of the superyacht owners of the day.

NARCISSUS had three owners, not counting the Admiralty who employed her in World War one as an armed yacht during which she was credited with damaging a German submarine. She ended her days when she struck a mine in 1940 while taking part in the evacuation of British troops from Dunkirk.      

Then  at 288’ there was MARGARITA, another Clyde built (1900) steam yacht for A.J.Drexel, a banker from Philadelphia. She was his third yacht of the same name and one of G.L.Watsons most beautiful designs. He was able to combine the grace and beauty of a well proportioned sailing ship into his steam yacht designs, and he achieved this superbly with MARGARITA, a twin screw schooner. She had a classic clipper bow with raised fo’c’sle and quarter deck which gave an excellent balance to her hull.

As one observer reported ‘This is Victorian ornate at its very best and most extravagant. It is in complete contrast to the Royal Yachts VICTORIA & ALBERT  11 & 111 but these glimpses are incomplete, for they do not include the rose garden she sported until the salt air killed the flowers!”

Upon her acquisition in 1911 by the 6th Marquess of Anglesey her name was changed to SEMIRAMIS, and this gentleman kept his yachts in immaculate condition, the story going that on one occasion he noticed that his guest Lord Adolphus Fitzclarence was wearing varnished boots that were marking the scrubbed teak decks. Rather than upset the Lord – or for that matter the scrubbed teak – he had a hand follow on behind wiping the stains away as they appeared. Well, he could spare the man, he would hardly be missed out of a crew of 90!