We blazed the trail to Rockland

from the Leicester Mercury, August 29th 1952

The cruise to Rockland in 1952 is part of Green Wyvern folk-lore. The EDP printed photographs and the Leicester Mercury wrote the following under the headline: 'The Wyvern takes to sail'.

 

'Happy the boy, (or girl for that matter) who lives where he can mess about in boats, For, as Ratty said to Mole: “There’s nothing like messing about in boats.”

The only unfortunate thing about it is that once you have sailed in little boats, you’re never completely happy away from water and the lap of waves on the boat’s side.
But if you have grown up where your river is a poor thing in the way of rivers and the sea is far away, then the sooner you remedy this state of affairs the better.

So a salute of guns to Commodore C. Howard, Vice-Commodore J.H. Plumb, and Rear-Commodore H.E. Howard for putting this life, even if only for a short time each year, within the reach of boys from two Leicester schools, the City of Leicester Boys, where the Commodore is a master, and Alderman Newtons, where the Rear-Commodore presides over a department.

They sail for six weeks of the year under the burgee of the Green Wyvern Yachting Club, a wyvern on a background of green and red, doing honour to both schools.

Eight boats, crewed by 45 boys and old boys of the two schools, have just completed three weeks on the Broads, setting sail from Horning in the north and sailing through Yarmouth, crossing Rockland Broad and being the first keeled boats to do so for 25 years.

By the way, some of you may have heard on the radio an appeal for boats to help to keep this broad open, since it was gradually becoming reed ridden and silted up.

The club is perfectly ship-shape in its organisation, and there is a system of promotion by ability from crew to mate, first mate and skipper, the latter being expected to navigate a yacht competently in every respect, to look after its crew and its gear, and to be able to instruct lower ranks therein.

An absolutely first rate idea, and I can think of nothing more likely to traina boy for leadership and for team co-operation; since in sailing and racing, decisions and obedience to orders must be immediate.  If you have ever sailed with a keen sailor  you will have learnt that no detail can be left to chance. And that’s a valuable lesson, apart from the happiness that comes from the success of something difficult well carried out.
    

This club got under weigh in 1949, and in its list of members I see many who come back to cruise with it from university addresses all over the country, but mostly the mates and the skippers are from the streets and country places of Leicestershire in the middle of England, which is by tradition a land of seamen and boat-lovers.'

The fleet moored at Rockland in 1952. (Photo: Eastern Daily Press)