BOATYARD HISTORY

HISTORY OF H. ATTRILL & SONS (IW) LTD

The boat building firm was formed in 1947 by two brothers, Mike and Gordon Attrill. Prior to this date a Mr. Hardy, who was a prisoner of war with his friend Mr. Bevan, gave them an order to build a dinghy. This was built in the Golf Professional work shop of the Royal Isle of Wight Golf Club. (This is mentioned because to date the direct families of both Gentlemen remain friends and clients of the Attrill family)

The brothers had plans to start their own business as soon as Gordon was demobbed from the Navy.

Gordon spent most of the war on Fleet Sweepers with a long period in Russia, while Mike was retained building Fairmile MLS at Woodnutts Boatyard. They were both trained as boat-builders at Woodnutts under Captain Westmacott. (Designer of X-boats, Sunbeams, Victory and other famous keel-boats).

The firm's name H. Attrill & Sons (Isle of Wight) Ltd. was after their father, Henry. Part of the firm was the ferry to Bembridge, which had been in the family for many years. For a few years they rented a piece of land from the Priory Estate, and later on bought the Freehold. On this Freehold were two house-boats, paying rent to the Southern Railway. The railway agreed, after a survey, to sell the land to the brothers, which gave them their present area together with Rights to Bembridge Harbour. Both areas of land were sand-dunes with no roadway. The adjacent house had a roadway through the centre of the golf course. There was a rough road to the Royal Isle of Wight Golf Club, so they laid chalk all over their area.

Their very first order was from a fisherman in Poole. Designed by Eric French, the boat was to be 28' long and of heavy build, . As they did not have a shed at the time, they decided to buy a Nissen hut which had been advertised. They put down a cement floor, laid off the lines of the boat, and made a keel mould and cast the lead keel on the beach.

The next problem was to cut the timber.

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