24 CLASSIC BOAT AUGUST 2016HATHOR
founding editor of the Broads guide Hamilton’s
Navigations, Claud Hamilton, as a replacement for his
previous wherry Claudian. That ill-fated pleasure wherry
had been lost earlier in the year as a result of the
disastrous East Coast floods which caused Claudian to
break her mooring on Lake Lothing and end up perched
6ft above the high water mark on the wreck of a drifter.
The stranded wherry remained in this precarious
position for ten weeks until her back broke during an
unsuccessful attempt to drag her clear.
Following brief spells at Oulton Broad and Geldeston,
Hamilton moved Hathor to the moorings by his riverside
bungalow at Fishley Mill on the River Bure near Acle.
He lived on board with his wife Connie and their two
dogs. Constrained by a constant lack of funds, Claud
was always on the look out for opportunities to improve
his situation. Hathor inevitably played a role in some of
these dubious schemes including an unsuccessful plan to
tempt Procter & Gamble to use the wherry within the
company’s advertising programme. He enjoyed greater
success catching out unwary holidaymakers with one of
Hathor’s quant poles which were stowed crossed over
the bow in true wherry fashion. One of the poles
inevitably projected into the channel and as soon as the
pole snagged its latest victim Claud would appear on
deck demanding appropriate recompense. Afterwards, he
simply glued it back together ready for the next time.
Martham Boatbuilding and Development Company,
now known simply as Martham Boats, bought Hathor
in the late 1950s. Despite operating the third largest hire
fleet on the Broads, Martham Boats decided to let
Hathor as one of its static houseboats. The company’s
managing director, Jimmy Brown, had always wanted to
own a wherry and would often live on board with his
wife Phyllis, in-between lets. He sailed Hathor at either
end of the season and usually took some of the yard’s
workers with him to give them a taste of Broadland
sailing. When these trips ceased after Brown’s death in
1977, her mast and rudder were removed for safe
keeping ashore, thereby reducing the strain on the hull’s
extremities. The rest of her sailing equipment was also
put into storage along with some of her more precious
original features such as the saloon’s ornate lamp.
Although some were dismayed by her use as a
houseboat, Martham Boats ensured Hathor’s survival at
a time when so many of her contemporaries were
scuttled or broken up. By the mid 1980s, the company
started to sell off some of its hire fleet and rumours
began to circulate that Hathor might be put up for sale.
Peter Bower and Barney Mathews decided to find out
if the rumours were true and approached Martham
Boats with an offer to buy the Edwardian pleasure
wherry in 1985. They already owned the wherry yachts
Olive and Norada respectively and had recently joined
forces to establish the not-for-profit organisation WherryFacing page,
clockwise from
top left: Hathor’s
saloon even
includes a piano;
bespoke bell
push and door
furniture; looking
aft from inside
the forward
starboard cabin.
Cabins were
originally fitted
with earthenware
tip-up basins
with a gold rim
and a separate
water tank
located behind
the mirror; the
sycamore panels
in the saloon are
adorned with
lotus flowers
formed with
stained teak inlayyounger brother Alan began showing signs of
tuberculosis and was taken to the family’s coastal home
at Corton near Lowestoft. Alan’s health initially seemed
to benefit, but he suffered a relapse and Alan’s doctors
suggested the warm, dry, climate of Egypt. Accompanied
by family members and his personal physician, Alan
sailed from London to Port Said on board the P&O
steamer Simla. By early December, the party had reached
the Mena House hotel in Giza near the Great Pyramid,
but Alan’s health continued to deteriorate and he asked if
he could see the Nile. The family chartered the dahabeah
Hathor for a cruise upriver to Luxor. Manned by a crew
of 20, the luxurious Egyptian sailing barge made a
number of stops along the way, enabling Jeremiah and
his daughters to go ashore and amass a surprisingly
important collection of ancient Egyptian artefacts. Sadly,
the 30-year-old Alan succumbed to his illness five days
after reaching Luxor, on 7 February 1897.
Despite the painful memories associated with the
family’s collection of approximately 250 ancient
artefacts, the Colmans were conscientious custodians
and subsequently donated them to the Norwich Castle
Museum, where many can be seen in its Egyptian gallery.
Seven years after Alan’s death, his sisters Ethel and
Helen commissioned the construction of a pleasure
wherry. Poignantly, they named it Hathor, after the boat
in which their brother had spent his final days. Daniel
Hall of Reedham, whose family built some of the finest
Norfolk wherries, including fellow survivors Maud and
Solace, agreed to build Hathor, while John Hurn was
employed to make the internal partitions. The plans for
the lavish Egyptian themed interior were drafted by
prominent architect Edward Boardman, who was
married to Ethel, and Helen’s sister Florence. Many of
the interior’s sycamore panels are embellished with
Egyptian hieroglyphs that were formed by the use of
inlaid teak and based on sketches, made by one of
Boardman’s assistants, Graham Cotman, of motifs on
display in the British Museum. The Egyptian theme even
extended to the smaller custom-made metal fittings such
as the hinges, door furniture and the bell push in the
saloon. The bill for the internal work came to £1,464 –
compared to the £575 charged for the rest of the wherry.
The Colman and Boardman families travelled to
Reedham in their summer best to watch Hathor’s launch
in July 1905. Florence Boardman, who was a keen
photographer, recorded the day’s events for posterity
including the release of two doves by her three-year-old
daughter Joan, to bring good luck in accordance with
Japanese traditions. Within a month, on 2 August 1905,
the wherry was ready for her maiden voyage.
Hathor eventually passed to Florence Boardman who
regarded the wherry as an expensive white elephant.
Having unsuccessfully tried to cover her running costs by
letting her privately, Florence sold Hathor in 1953 to the“She is a dream in a light air and a beast in a breeze. Hathor
gets headed up very quickly on open water”