Category: Lecture Summary

     Wednesday 9th March    Colin van Geffen Calshot – A Place in Time   Colin returns after his successful talk last year to explain the history of Calshot Castle and the Spit, from Saxon times to the present day.  It has been used  by the Army, Navy, Air Force and Coastguard in peacetime and…

Wednesday 3rd February Stuart Carruthers and Gus Lewis Future of UK Cruising – from the RYA   Stuart is RYA Cruising Manager and and Gus is Head of Legal and Government Affairs. They will explain the wide variety of contributions the RYA makes on our behalf with government and regulatory issues. Find out what the…

Wednesday 17th February Paul Farrell Summer cruises on Amoret GXSA member Paul finally got to visit the Azores!  He will tell us about his voyages on Tony Firth’s Amoret, focussing on last summer’s cruise taking in Spain, Portugal and the passage home from the Azores –  interesting places and sailing experiences…

  Wednesday 10th February Nigel Sharp Dunkirk Little Ships plus Wartime Leisure Sailing     Commodore of St Mawes Sailing Club, Nigel is a lifelong sailor. He spent 35 years in the boatbuilding industry before becoming a freelance marine writer and photographer in 2010. He will explore the story of how 700 small privately-owned vessels…

 Wednesday 20th January Giles Milton Nathaniel’s Nutmeg and Fascinating Footnotes in History Giles Milton is a writer who specialises in narrative history. His books have been published in twenty languages worldwide and are international best-sellers. He is best known for his 1999 best-selling title, Nathaniel’s Nutmeg, a historical account of the violent struggle between the…

Wednesday 24th February Stephen Taylor Edward Pellew     Stephen Taylor worked as a foreign correspondent for The Times in Africa, Asia and Australia. He is the author of several celebrated books on Africa and a recent biography of Edward Pellew. Pellew, captain of the legendary Indefatigable, was quite simply the greatest British frigate captain…

Wednesday 27th January Graham Anthony “Sorely Tried”- the story of HMS Beagle, Fitzroy and Darwin       Britain developed techniques that would keep our sailors healthy and our ships at sea for long periods. With Napoleon defeated and the Industrial Revolution in full swing, the role of the Royal Navy was changing rapidly when…

      Wednesday 9th March Colin Palmer Traditional Boatbuilding Around the World Boats in Vietnam Around the world, traditional boats are built without plans, using skills and traditions handed down over the generations. This talk will take you around the world, comparing and contrasting the different approaches and explain the evolution of boatbuilding in Europe. Colin has worked…

Wednesday 13th January Jeremy Batch Going Boldly – Across, Beneath and Beyond the Ocean One of our favourite speakers, Jeremy returns to entertain us with a wide ranging and amusing account of marine historical developments that we all take for granted today.   What sort of lifejackets did the ancient Egyptians wear, and how did…

Wednesday 18th November Paul Barnett Purton Ships Graveyard     One hundred years ago erosion of the banks of the Upper Severn threatened the collapse of local canals, so eighty small ships were run aground to give stability and reinforcement. The Friends of Purton have researched many of the craft and help preserve the thirty…