Gipsy Moth IV

After being nursed back to health from a suspected lung abscess by his wife, Chichester undertook two single-handed Transatlantic races from Plymouth to New York in 1960 and Plymouth to Newport in 1964 in Gipsy Moth III. He won the '60 race and was runner-up in the '64 race. During the '64 race he became inspired to challenge the times set by the tea and wool clipper ships. The tea clippers took an average of 123 days to make their passage to the East Indies, so Chichester set himself the target of making the passage in 100 days. He subsequently wrote his book Along the Clipper Way, which charts the voyage taken by 19th century wool clippers returning from Australia.

In 1965 Chichester commissioned Gosport-based ship yard Camper and Nicholsons to build the boat, designed by John Illingworth and Angus Primrose. Launched in March 1966, Gypsy Moth IV is 38 ft 6 in (11.73 m) on the waterline and 53 ft (16 m) overall, with a hull constructed of cold-moulded Honduras mahogany. The scheduled displacement (to follow Chichester's requirements of maximum weight) was 10.4 tons, after trials increased by 1 ton of added ballast to cope with insufficient righting moment.[1] Ketch rigged, she has a sail area of 854 sq ft (79.3 m²), extendable with a spinnaker to over 1,500 sq ft (140 m²). The boat incorporated the maximum amount of sail for the minimum amount of rigging, whilst employing tiller based self-steering using design principles established by Blondie Hasler that could enable steerage from the skipper's bunk, essential for solo sailing for a voyage of this length.

Oil painting by Peter Macdonagh Wood

Gipsy Moth IV set out from Plymouth on 27 August 1966 with 64-year-old Sir Francis at the helm. The voyage was not uneventful, and Chichester later recalled three moments where he noted that the trip nearly ended. The first was when part of the frame holding the wind vane self-steering failed, when still 2,300 miles (3,700 km) from Sydney. Not wanting to put in at Fremantle, Western Australia, Chichester spent three days balancing sails and experimenting with shock-cord lines on the tiller, once again getting the boat to hold a course to enable her to cover 160 miles (260 km) a day.[2]

An exhausted Chichester entered Sydney harbour for a stopover 107 days later. He enlisted the help of America's Cup designer Warwick Hood, who added a piece to the boat's keel to provide Gipsy Moth IV with better directional stability to stop her broaching, but the modification did nothing to improve her stability.[2]

One day out on the return trip via Cape Horn, the boat was rolled in a 140-degree capsize. Chichester calculated the angle by measuring the mark on the cabin roof made by a wine bottle. He commented in his diary and in a later interview with Time magazine that he knew she would self-right as she was designed to, but was concerned by the incident as this was a light storm and he still had to pass Cape Horn, where the third and most significant event of the voyage would occur:

"The waves were tremendous. They varied each time, but all were like great sloping walls towering behind you. The kind I liked least was like a great bank of gray-green earth 50' (15 m) high and very steep. Image yourself at the bottom of one. My cockpit was filled five times and once it took more than 15 minutes to drain. My wind-reading machine stopped recording at 60 knots. My self-steering could not cope with the buffeting....I had a feeling of helplessness."[2]

Just as he thought all hope was lost and he was alone, on exiting the cockpit one day he was followed by the British Antarctic Survey vessel HMS Protector (A146), and later the same day a Royal Air Force plane broke through the clouds. On 28 May 1967 having logged 28,500 miles (45,900 km) in just 274 days (226 days actual sailing time), the voyage claimed the following records:

• Fastest voyage around the world by any small vessel
• Longest non stop passage that had been made by a small sailing vessel (15,000 miles (24,000 km))
• More than twice the distance of the previous longest passage by a singlehander
• Twice broke the record for a singlehander's week's run by more than 100 miles (160 km)
• Established a record for singlehanded speed by sailing 1,400 miles (2,300 km) in 8 days

Because of the boat lacking of directional stability (despite fin extension) and righting moment, Chichester commented:

"Now that I have finished, I don't know what will become of Gipsy Moth IV. I only own the stern while my cousin owns two thirds. My part, I would sell any day. It would be better if about a third were sawn off. The boat was too big for me. Gipsy Moth IV has no sentimental value for me at all. She is cantankerous and difficult and needs a crew of three - a man to navigate, an elephant to move the tiller and a 3'6" (1.1 m) chimpanzee with arms 8' (2.4 m) long to get about below and work some of the gear."[2]

In his book The Circumnavigators Don Holm describes Gipsy Moth IV as "perhaps one of the worst racing yachts ever built."[3] The boat was too big and too demanding for the 65-year-old skipper.

By the early 2000s, the condition of Gipsy Moth IV, even though she continued to rest in a Greenwich dry dock hoist, had seriously deteriorated. In 2003, Paul Gelder, editor of the London-based sailing magazine Yachting Monthly, launched a campaign to restore the yacht and sail her around the world in 2006 on the 40th anniversary of Chichester's voyage, and the 100th birthday of the magazine. He enlisted the support of The Blue Water Round the World Rally, a club-style cruising rally that the magazine had been covering since 1995.

In 2004, in a joint proposal with Yachting Monthly and Gipsy Moth IV's owners, The Maritime Trust, the yacht was purchased by the United Kingdom Sailing Academy (UKSA) in Cowes, Isle of Wight, for a token sum of £1 and a gin and tonic (Sir Francis' favourite tipple). The UKSA, Yachting Monthly and the Maritime Trust were the three major project partners in the campaign to save the yacht.

In November 2004 Gipsy Moth IV was lifted out of Greenwich dry dock and taken by road to Camper and Nicholson's yard in Gosport, where she had been built and launched in 1966, for restoration. Although C&N did the work at cost price, the restoration cost more than £300,000, with money raised by donations from the public, and equipment and services given by the British marine industry. As part of the yacht's restoration, the original B&G Navigation equipment was replaced with up to date electronics, but the original devices were left on a covering panel to maintain the feel of the 1966 build. On 20 June 2005, Gipsy Moth IV was relaunched.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Gypsy Moth IV).

• Francis Chichester (1967). Gipsy Moth Circles the World. Hodder & Stoughton Ltd. ISBN 0-340-40667-4.
• Paul Gelder (2007). Gipsy Moth IV: A Legend Sails Again. Wyley Nautical. ISBN 978-0-470-72443-9.

• The Gipsy Moth Trust