27/05/2026
As we look forward to the Royal Irish Yacht Club’s 195th anniversary week, with the Classic Regatta on 20 and 21 June and the Club regatta on 27 June, our Club History White Sails Crowding tells the story of the first ever regatta in Dublin Bay in 1828 which led on to the founding of the RIYC three years later.
Recreational sailing had all but disappeared from Irish and British waters in the years of blockade and danger during the Napoleonic Wars. It was only after the decisive defeat of Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 that the sport of sailing was able to grow and organise formally. The Ports of Dartmouth and Plymouth held regattas in 1822 and 1823 and the Royal Yacht Squadron launched the first Cowes Week in 1826.
In Dublin, the appointment in 1828 of Lord Anglesey, Waterloo hero and keen sailor, as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, was the spur to renewed sailing activity in the bay. Despite losing his leg at Waterloo, Anglesey was a renowned sailor and proud owner of the fastest super-yacht of the day, the 68 foot, 113-ton cutter Pearl. Anglesey had looked for the builder of the fastest boats in Britain, and found him in Philip Sainty of Essex. The problem was that Sainty was in jail. He had been caught out both building fast Revenue cutters and fruit schooners to catch smugglers, while simultaneously building even faster, more manoeuvrable vessels for the smugglers themselves to outrun the official craft. Pearl was Sainty’s ‘Get out of Jail’ card.
On 22 July 1828, Anglesey inaugurated the first regatta in the newly-constructed Kingstown Harbour, anchoring Pearl as a spectator vessel at the finish line. Huge crowds turned out to watch the racing in excellent conditions of sun and wind, before a heavy afternoon downpour drove them to the shelter of the tents and booths set up along the foreshore. The Earl of Elgin’s Liberty won the Fifty Guinea Cup and such was the success of the event that another regatta was held in 1829, with even larger crowds of enthusiastic spectators.
There was no regatta in 1830 due to the death of George IV, but yachting was now firmly established in Dublin Bay. The next step was surely the establishment of a yacht club.
White Sails Crowding: A History of the Royal Irish Yacht Club will be available at the special discount price of €25 for the month of June to mark the Club’s 195th Anniversary.
Contact the Catering Office to purchase.