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“During my voyage around the world in Gipsy Moth IV, my Rolex
watch was knocked off my wrist several times without being damaged,”
he wrote in a letter in 1968. “I cannot imagine a hardier timepiece.
When using [it] for sextant work and working the foredeck, it was
frequently banged, also doused by waves coming aboard; but it never
seemed to mind all this.”
Sir Francis epitomised a certain spirit of yachting and adventure. An
entrepreneur and aviator, he took up ocean sailing in the 1950s and won
the first solo transatlantic race in 1960, sailing from Plymouth (UK) to
New York in 40 days. With his circumnavigation, the unassuming 65
year old beat yachtsmen half his age and defied critics who felt his twin-
mast yacht was best handled by a crew of eight.
On September 17 1966, during the early stages of his single-handed
journey, Sir Francis donned a dinner jacket to quietly celebrate his
birthday in the mid-Atlantic with a champagne cocktail.
Months later, an estimated quarter of a million people lined the shore
to cheer him home as he sailed into Plymouth.
The Queen used the sword used by her predecessor Queen Elizabeth
I to knight the adventurer Sir Francis Drake, the first Englishman with
his crew to complete a circumnavigation.
Chichester was also honoured in 1967 with a postage stamp showing
him aboard Gipsy Moth IV. This is unusual because he wasn’t a member
of the royal family, or dead, when the stamp was issued. The Sir Francis
Chichester Trust was set up in 1968. At his request, the trust provides
funding for 16-19 year olds from Devon, Plymouth and Torbay to attend
an Outward Bound course.
He famously held no emotional regard for the ketch after his return.
“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,” Sir Francis wrote in his book Gipsy Moth
Circles the World.Top: Sir Francis saluting well-wishers on his arrival in Sydney, mid-way
through his one-stop solo circumnavigation.
Bottom: Gipsy Moth IVPHOTO: CHICHESTER ARCHIVE/PPLPHOTO: EILLEEN RAMSAY/PPL