Riley Family and Sailing

In learning about the Riley family I was delighted to hear of their connection to sailing. I have loved being on or in the water all of my life and sailed on the Waitemata from a young age. Given my Austen ancestors from Rye were mariners going back for many generations ( my great grandfather Captain John Austen went to sea as a ship's boy at age 12 ), a love of the sea and sailing is well entrenched in my DNA.

Thanks to Joy Carter, daughter of Vic Riley, I have obtained access to great photos and stories of the connections of the Riley family with early Auckland sailing, in particular Mullet class yachts and the Lipton Cup. Joy also provided access to some excellent writing by sailing historians Harold Kidd and Robin Elliott which I have referenced on the topic of mullet boats.

The Lipton Cup

This very elaborate trophy ( photo below) was presented to the Ponsonby Cruising Club by the very wealthy Sir Thomas Lipton of Lipton's tea fame, who was also an America's Cup sailor. Sir Thomas made 5 unsuccessful attempts to win the "auld mug". PCC noted that Sir Thomas had given several grand trophies to other yacht clubs. The PCC started writing to Sir Thomas in 1904 and reported its affairs to Sir Thomas every year as a way of building a relationship with him. They even appointed him a Vice-President of the PCC.

This paid off when in 1924 Sir Thomas commissioned for the PCC the very handsome cup that bears his name. It is thought their inclusion of a photo of the waterfront Devonport Hotel which gave the impression the PCC had a very grand club house, persuaded Sir Thomas that it was appropriate for the PCC to have such a grand trophy. It was decided this trophy would be competed for by the L Class of 22 foot Mullet boats. The first such race took place in April 1922 and continues to be an annual event today.

Mullet Boats

Above photo shows a fleet of racing Mullet yachts of the 26 foot H Class.

H11 BlueStreak was owned by Vic Riley

The Mullet class of racing yacht was derived from the fishing boats used in Auckland in the 1870s. These were designed to be shallow draft, fast and able to be handled by two skilled fishermen who could race back to port with the days catch of mullet fish. In these early days the Auckland Harbour teemed with mullet and other fish.

By the mid 1880s these boats had been developed into racing and cruising craft. The Ponsonby Cruising Club became the natural home of these boats as nearby Freemans Bay was the home of undecked open "centre board" based sailing boats. Residents of this area and nearby Ponsonby were fiercely proud of their identity as working class people, as distinct from the wealthier residents of Devonport and Northcote who sailed larger more expensive "keeler" yachts.

From the late 1870s Freemans Bay skippers met in local pubs and arranged their own races that drew great public interest and heavy betting. This continued through to the turn of the century when the Ponsonby Cruising Club was founded at a meeting at the Gluepot (Ponsonby Club) Hotel on October 9, 1900. By the end of the first week the club had a membership of 60 and by April 1901 had as many as 300 members.

The Mullet boat was raced in several lengths, namely 20,22, 24 and 26 feet overall. In 1904 the Ponsonby Cruising Club Regatta Committee set up some restrictions to govern various aspects of the design such as minimum ballast and general form of the hull, particularly its breadth. No restrictions were placed on sail area. These rules are considered to have saved the Mullet boat from extinction as they made it a very economical boat to build and sail.The ability to carry a very large area of sail meant they provided plenty of thrills. The smaller 20 foot Mullets eventually inspired the development of the very exciting 18 footer centre boarders that today provide great racing on the Waitemata and Sydney harbours.

Olly Riley ( brother of my great grandmother Annie Riley/Hardy) was a keen sailor from a young age. He grew up in Herne Bay close to the sea. His obituary states that he ".... was regarded as one of the most astute skippers on the Waitemata. He sailed his first race in 1886 (age 15) and the boats he sailed included Clytie, Seahorse, Miss Mischief, Gloaming, All Irish and Konini. Most of his own boats were named after racehorses."

Olly was typical of sportsmen of his day playing rugby in the winter and sailing in the summer.

Seahorse was among the first of the 20 foot "miniature" mullet boats and was built for Olly by Chas Bailey Jr in late 1910. Noel Mitchell relates in his book "Mullet Boats n Quotes"the tale told to him by Olly of launching Seahorse during the Christmas holidays and then piling aboard and sailing straight to Whangarei. She had no cabin top so a tent fly was slung over the boom. They had to go ashore to make a cup of tea. From Whangarei they sailed to Coromandel and later found there was a race on the Manukau so he railed the Seahorse over to Onehunga wharf and back in order to compete. They won the race.

The photo below shows Ivy ( also a 20 footer) built in 1909 by Harry Brown and owned firstly by Olly and later by his son Vic. She was renamed Gloaming by Olly in 1919.

Vic Riley and the Lipton Cup

Vic was the second born son of Olly and Elizabeth Riley. His great love was the sea. He was brought up in Lawrence St, Herne Bay, although he was born in Kogarah, Sydney in 1903 when Olly and Elizabeth (Bessie) were living there. They returned to Herne Bay in 1904. Olly worked in his brother-in-laws furniture factory in Ponsonby and also still spent some more time in Australia from time to time working and sending back money. Vic and his brothers grew up with access to the boats owned and raced by their father. They also helped out in the running of Olly's boat hire business. Vic became a bricklayer and much of his work still exists as stone walls, driveways and sea walls around Herne Bay.

Otira

Otira was a 22 foot L Class Mullet Boat built in 1923 by Baily & Lowe. She was first owned by Tanner Bros and then was acquired by Vic. Otira's design featured a wider beam than most Mullet boats being in excess of 10 feet. Her wide beam design resembled what were referred to as American "Cat" boats derived from French yawls. These were regarded as being mullet look- alikes. He raced her very successfully from the mid 1920s and in 1941 had the ultimate success of winning the Lipton Cup with her. By then Otira was owned by George Burke who allowed Vic and his crew to race her.

In addition to his love of sailing Vic played the banjo. His brother-in-law Ray Ford also played banjo and they loved to get together and play at parties mostly at Waiheke where they both had baches. Vic built his own bach at Waiheke and built an 18 foot launch Tina and a 10 foot dinghy in a boatshed at the bach.

Vic married May Hone and except for two years lived all his life at 11 Lawrence St Herne Bay. In the summer their time was mostly spent at the bach on Waiheke with their daughter Joy and son James. Joy and Jim both have their father and grandfather's love of the sea and sailing having grown up amongst yachts and other boats and spent many wonderful summers on Waiheke.

Vic and his banjo

"Spot" Riley and Limerick "The 1939 World 18 Footer Championship incident"

Lawry "Spot" Riley one of four sons of Olly Riley was, like his father and uncles, a skilled yachtsman and excellent rugby union and rugby league player. Spot took to racing the very fast 18 footer class yachts that developed from the Mullet class in both Australia and New Zealand. His yacht Limerick became one of Auckland's most famous V class 18 footers through being at the centre of one of the most bitterly contested trans-Tasman sporting events seen when the 1939 World's 18 Footers Championship was sailed in Auckland.

Yachting writer Robin Elliott provided an excellent account of this story in Boating New Zealand magazine of April 2016 - see above image. I have referenced that article in my account that follows.

Robin compares this incident with the infamous under arm bowling incident in cricket that took place some 40 years later. Robin comments that "... Australians prefer to go for a clear win than risk a loss and that while losing is bad enough, losing to New Zealand is almost unthinkable."

As background its worth noting that 18 footer racing on Sydney Harbour developed into a popular form of gambling. There was lots of money at stake because yachting was the only form of betting available on a Sunday. Gamblers would gather on the ferries on the harbour, along with the bookies, in order to follow the races. Special racing rules were developed to make the sailing similar to a horse race with the winner being first past the post, insignia on sails like jockeys silks, starts requiring all boats to be on a starboard tack and disputes resolved by umpires on the water during the race so that results were certain - and bets could be paid out. Protests were discouraged because they made for uncertain betting.

When the 1939 Worlds 18 Footer Championship came around Limerick under skipper Spot Riley was racing at the top-end of a growing 18 footer fleet in Auckland. Her competitors included Shamrock, Irina, Riptide, Va'alele and Jeanette. The 1939 event in Auckland followed the 1937 first ever sailing of the 18 Footer Worlds event in Sydney. A team of four yachts travelled from Auckland to Sydney for that event and failed to have any success, the trophy being claimed by Sydney skiff Taree sailed by Bert Swinbourne.

Limerick was expected to do well in the 1939 race as were the other New Zealand entries. In particular Jeanette sailed by Jimmy Faire was expected to do very well because of her excellent recent results. However there was marked difference between the Aussie and NZ skiffs. The NZ 18 footers typically carried about 400 square feet of sail and had a crew of 5. The Aussies designed heavier boats that carried up to 700 square feet of sail, increasing by another 1100 square feet downwind, and had a crew of 7. There were no restrictions on sail area in this class of racing. Rigs were taken to the extreme with booms that hung well outside the length of the hull and long bow sprits that could carry very large spinnakers.

The championship was to be determined over three races. In the first races the NZ team did well taking 1st to 3rd placings through great performances by Manu, Jeanette and Va'alele ahead of the Aussies. Limerick was 9th. The poor performance by the Aussies was a result of putting up smaller than usual rigs in the mistaken belief the winds would be much greater than proved to be the case. The second race saw a much better result by the Aussies with St George finishing first and Swinbourne's Taree second.

The third race saw another good result from the Aussies with Taree leading from start to finish. However Limerick who had finished 12th posted a protest against Taree for a breach of the port and starboard rule that saw Limerick and Taree collide 30 seconds before the start of the race. The Aussies were not happy. They did not expect that a boat could protest after the race, particularly one that had not finished in one of the top positions. However for the NZ event the more conventional YRA rules applied instead of the rules the Aussies were used to racing under.

Spot had the support of another skipper who had witnessed the incident between Limerick and Taree. After a 4 hour deliberation by the Appeals Committee Taree was out and NZ skiff Manu was declared the overall winner. Thanks to the actions by Spot Riley New Zealand had won the series. The Aussies protested the outcome, the prize giving was cancelled and Swinbourne refused to hand over the trophy which he took back home. There was a claim made in the NZ Free Lance magazine that several of the Australians involved in the event had lost large sums of money through their bets on the races.

An example of an early Aussie 18 Footer carrying large sail area