Severn

Restoration of Severn

Thanks to National Lottery Players

Severn is currently being restored by David Moss Boat Builders at Skippool Creek near Blackpool with the help of funding from the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Barnes Trust (Arnside), Headley Trust, Cumbria Community Foundation and Arnside Silverdale Grant Fund.. We hope to have her back on the water at Arnside in 2025.

However we still need donations to complete the restoration and to maintain her once she is back on the water.

Donate to Severn's Restoration

https://peoplesfundraising.com/donation/severn-restoration

If you agree to gift aid your donation, we can claim 25% back from the Government

The restoration includes

a) Replacing her internal framework

The framework holds the boat together. It is made up of larger sawn frames, which are sawn to shape and smaller steamed frames, which are steamed then bent to fit. Whilst it is difficult to see in the photos, the frames are either soft, rotten, cracked, split or have come apart from the hull. In places the frames have been doubled up with sister frames put in to support the original frames. These too have deteriorated over time. The sawn frames will be replaced with laminated frames made of thin strips of wood glued together which are structurally stronger

Before Images

Recent Images

b) Repairs to the boat’s backbone, including the stem at the front of the boat, keel and keelson

c) Rebuilding the boat's stern counter

c) Fitting a new engine – The old engine was underpowered, old and unreliable

d) New mast - The mast will be hollow and fitted to a tabernacle so it can be raised more easily. The new mast is funded by a grant from the Headley Trust, one of the Sainsbury Family Trusts.

e) New cockpit and side decks

f) Returning the boat to her original historic appearance with an open cockpit as in the below photo.. The cabin is a later addition This will allow us to take more people out on her at Arnside.

Rivers Class Yacht "Mersey" in 1912

As well as sailing her at Arnside, we would like to take her down to the Mersey in 2027 the 100^th anniversary of her rediscovery on the bed of the Mersey.

The grant from the National Lottery Heritage Fund also includes funding for people to go on courses to learn how to sail boats with traditional such as Severn and wooden boat maintenance skills and the purchase of a Gaffling 4.1 dinghy an entry level boat to sailing traditional boats such as Severn so that we are better able to look after and sail her in the future once the restoration is complete.

Other grant funders

Video of Severn's Restoration (April 2024)

Severn was built in 1912. She is one of ten Rivers Class yachts made by Crossfields for the Royal Mersey Yacht Club. Owners of the yachts included three 1908 Olympic silver medallists, partners in Cunard, a future High Sheriff of Westmorland and the 17th Earl of Derby who was Secretary of State for War 1916-18. The yachts cost £50 each, with additional £12.7s for sails. (The average yearly wage was £67). They were used for short races in the Mersey with a crew of 2 to 3 and raced for prize money.

Severn was originally called Elwy after a river in North Wales. In 1913 she was joint winner of the Rivers Class series. Severn was sold in 1914 to Captain Harvey Broadbent of HMS Conway, a training ship anchored in the Mersey and renamed Ribble.

Severn sunk in a Royal Mersey Race on the 23rd July 1914 just days before the start of the First World War. She was rediscovered on the bed of the Mersey in 1927. She was raised to the surface and sold by the Receiver of Wrecks for £25 to Joe Wallace of the West Cheshire Sailing Club, New Brighton, aged 24, who restored her and named her Severn. By the 1960s she was in North Wales kept near Porthmadog. Between 1972 and 2018 she was on the East Coast, before returning to Arnside.

Click below to read more about Severn's History

Severn History

Severn Song

A song celebrating Severn's history has been composed by Mike Greenwood. His uncle was a friend of Joe Wallace who owned Severn in the late 1920s

The building in the background of the photo with blue shutters is Crossfield's boatyard where Severn was made in 1912.

You can download the word's below.

Severn Song by Mike Greenwood

You can also hear the song performed by Lunetide from Sunderland Point below

Crossfields built yachts and fishing boats in Arnside. They were the leading builders of Morecambe Bay Prawners or Lancashire Nobbies, which were fast sailing boats used to catch prawns, shrimps and flounder in the Irish Sea. Crossfields also built Arthur Ransome’s Swallow and Coch-y-bonddhu, now in the collection of Windermere Jetties. Swallow was kept at Arnside in 1930s by a local teenager. Coch-y-bonddhu was used to teach sailing at Earnseat School on the front at Arnside in the 1950s Crossfields were active from the 1840s to the 1940s. The Boatyard continued as Crossfields Successors, eventually closing in 1985.

Click to read about the History of Crossfields Boat Builders

Other Boats built by Crossfields

Around forty Crossfield’s boats are still in existence. These include

Bontia (1888), the oldest boat built by Crossfields still in existence. She took part in a Round Britain Event in 2013 and sailed to the Baltic in 2016.
Ziska (1903), which is now on the West Coast of America, having been sailed across the Atlantic. Ziska took part in the 2019 Race to Alaska. She featured in a documentary by the explorer Tim Severin investigating the different inspirations for Robinson Crusoe in 2000.
Moya (1910) now based in Mediterranean. Moya featured in an Italian TV documentary in 2017. At one time owned by John Llewellyn Moxley, a TV and Film Director, Moya took in the Fastnet Race in 1975 coming second in the classic yacht class. Her history is recounted in "Il segno dell’onda Moya 1910 -2010- the Mark of Tide" a book in Italian and English,
Deva (1912) - A Rivers Class yacht like Severn. Featured in Jon Wainwright's book "Only So Many Tides". Jon owned Deva for over 40 years. An European Classic Yacht Champion in 1997. Deva has been sailed across the North Sea and back 5 times, often experiencing stormy weather.
Molly (1914) - Built for a Lancaster doctor, now in Spain. At one time called Nahula. Owned by a Chorley cinema entrepreneur for thirty years and kept at Lytham. The last boat to leave the Ulverston Canal.
Spray 1896
Sir William Priestley (1934) - The Morecambe fisherman's lifeboat, now awaiting restoration in the Lancaster Maritime Museum. Around 12 boats have built from a mould taken from the Sir William in 1979.
Spray (1896) - A Morecambe Bay Prawner now owned by the Morecambe Bay Prawner Trust.
Laura (1908) - Built as yacht. Featured in Edmund Delmar-Morgan's 1953 book "I brought a Prawning Boat." In the 1990s the leading gaff rigged boat on the East Coast winning nearly every race she entered when owned by Gayle Heard. Now kept in North Wales.

You can read about some of the boats built by Crossfields in the OGA Boat Register

Arnside Print featuring Severn

A print of Arnside by Bels Scambler featuring Severn is available. Price £18 unframed.

To buy contact the artist via her website www.bellsscambler.com

or visit her shop at Wolf House Gallery, Silverdale. If you mention the Sailing Club, when buying the print from her, she will donate £3 to Severn

Line Drawings of Severn and a Morecambe Bay Prawner

Line drawings of Severn and of a Moreeambe Bay Prawner by Andrew Wortensholme, one of the country's leading yacht designers are available £25 framed, £15 unframed plus £5 postage.

Email severn@arnsidesailingclub.org.uk

Friends Group

A Friends Group has been set up as a charity to help maintain and sail Severn. If you want to join please email severn@arnsidesailingclub.org,uk

If you would like to receive updates about Severn click here

Facebook Site

https://www.facebook.com/crossfieldyachtsevern

Return of Severn to Arnside in 2018 Video

Watch a video of the return of Severn to Arnside. She arrived back in the village on Good Friday March 2018, 106 years after she was launched. The video shows her journey to Arnside, her arrival back in the village and preparations for her launch in June 2018. She quickly became an icon of the village with both visitors and residents alike constantly taking photographs of her. Severn appeared in a fashion shot and in the Guardian. It was great day when we sailed her for the first time on 14th July 2018.