Rumbelow Boats
The Brigand

The BRIGAND in 2010

https://southernwoodenboatsailing.com/news/wood-not-weather 

In the third and final of our Roger Badham related stories, we move away from awards and the weather and tell of his connection with the BRIGAND, an historic 130 year old boat built for racing on the Lakes at the bottom end of the Murray River.

BRIGAND was built by Fred Potts in 1890. in his workshop at Calliope in Langhorne Creek, using local red gum (Eucalyptus camalduensis) and steamed American elm for the frames and jarrah (Eucalyptus marginata) for the planking. Fred commenced drafting out BRIGAND on the 1st May 1890 and launched her at Milang on 29th November 1890. Incredibly that’s just six months. With the help of his brother Henry they did everything. They drew the plans, lofted, sawed the timber, built the boat, mast, spars, blocks and stitched the sails.

For her launch Fred loaded the boat onto a timber wagon pulled by eight bullocks for transportation to Milang. There he was assisted by his father Frank and the boat was slung from the wagon by crane into the lake off the Milang jetty.

She is best described as a gaff rigged cutter and she was built with an eye to winning the regattas on Lake Alexandrina, run by the Goolwa Regatta Yacht Club. 

Shortly after the launch, Fred entered BRIGAND in the Milang Regatta, taking first prize. Three months later BRIGAND won the Wellington Regatta and the handsome sterling silver cup remains in the Potts’ family possession. The racing on the lake 1870’s to 1910 was very competitive between the local farmers and sailing enthusiasts for the 2 annual regattas and the Potts built yachts were dominant across the fleet. Racing was eagerly awaited and money changed hands with the results!

The father, Frank Potts (1815-1890) was a man of extraordinary ability and energy and his legacy lives on at Langhorne Creek where he created the "Bleasdale" winery. But wines were not his only passion as he excelled in boat building as well as designing and building all the necessary heavy engineering aspects of developing the farm.  The very heavy and very hard redgum trees were harvested and milled on the property for all of these projects. Frank Potts built a number of paddlewheel steamers for the Murray river, several small trading vessels as well as some excellent racing and sailing fishing boats. He is credited with building: the paddlewheel steamers WILCANNIA and BOURKE as well as sailing boats PASQUIN, FOX, TAM O'SHANTER, SOUTER JOHNNIE, ARK, SWALLOW, CHALLENGER and BUTTERFLY as well as several barges and punts.

Fred, it seems was cut from the same cloth as his father Frank, and carried on this tradition of boat building (PASTIME, DARWIN, GALETEA, NYOCA and BRIGAND between 1880 and 1890) but in terms of the family history, he seems to have been overshadowed by his father Frank and his much younger brother, Frank II, who took over the Bleasdale winery. 

Following the death of Frank snr in 1890 and the suicide of Fred in 1907, the passion of boating declined for the Potts. They ceased yacht racing and boat building and from that time on, it seems that the family concentrated more on the farming and winery.

A year before Fred died, he sold BRIGAND on 21st March 1906 to Captain Oliver, a man well known to the family. Capt Oliver was the skipper of the paddle steamer QUEEN that traversed both the Lake and the lower reaches of the Murray River. From that ownership, the family lost control of BRIGAND, and while they have been aware that it has passed through many hands and is still sailing - BRIGAND and the Potts family parted ways.

Owners of Brigand:

1890-1907       Fred Potts, Milang, Goolwa

1907-1914       Captain Oliver

1915-1920       David Rumbelow, Victor Harbor

1920-1924       Jim Ratcliff, American River

1924-1928       Ossie Bates, American River

1928-19??        Harold Chandler, American River

1940-1960       Murray Cadd, Edithburgh

1960-1970       Frank Judd, Adelaide

1970-1995       David Moss, Adelaide

1995-1997       David James, Goolwa

1997-2002         David James, Sydney

2002-2015          Roger Badham, Sydney

2016- Present     Alexandrina Council

Roger Badham first saw BRIGAND in 2002 when she was for sale as she lay on her mooring at Balmain, on Sydney Harbour. She had been brought from South Australia to Sydney Harbour in 1997 by her then owner, David James.  She floated well, but looked somewhat 'agricultural' with a 'flagpole' like bowsprit, large heavy windlass up front, ugly half cabin, metal waterpipe for a tiller, heavy green plastic covers and poor tan sails, poorly arranged mainsheet system and a rudder that appeared to be 3 hardwood planks braced together with some iron strapping!

With a view to purchase, Roger had his good friend and well known sailor-shipwright, Ken Beashel come and look at her on the slip. Ken gave the thumbs up and a deal was done. At the time, Roger was working in New Zealand with Team New Zealand's America's Cup effort so it was taken to Beashel's Boatshed where Colin Beashel was given a brief for the work that needed to be done. 

As someone who has spent 30 years in professional sailing all over the world, Roger has seen countless big and small classic yachts - from the largest grand Fife yachts in the Mediterranean, to the very small unknown pedigree gaff cutter.  In New Zealand, there is a rich history of early gaff racing boats - many built by the Logan Brothers or Baileys of Auckland. Ranging from 20ft to around 70ft in length many have been lost and most have come close to dereliction at one time or another. But very few have had a continuous life on the water. BRIGAND was different - she has been active all her life -  a credit to her builder and material used - the hardwoods of Redgum and Jarrah are generally thought of as being for heavy engineering  and large working ships - not fine gaff cutters designed to win yacht races! . 

BRIGAND is reasonably faithful to her original looks but has definitely been modernised and streamlined. Over the 133 years she has never really returned to the original specs. The re-fit modernised the internal space and is now an oval shaped inner well with a full length seating arrangement on both port and starboard sides, whereas originally she was never easy to sail with a box shaped well. She is probably more 'pretty' now than she would have been in 1890; without taking anything from the functionality and performance. The main item that is missing now is the 7 ft (2.1m) centre board. In lieu of that problem and the internal ballast she has carried all her life - she now carries a 1 ton lead shoe on her keel. During years outside Beashel's Boatshed, she floated very high - some 3 inches (75mm) above her marks and extra weight was required to get her back into the water.

For at least the first 20 or perhaps 30 years of her life, BRIGAND had no motor - she was a true sailing boat. Gifford, references her as being powered by a 7 HP Ailsa Craig petrol motor, probably fitted sometime between the wars.  At some stage that motor was replaced, as she had a single cylinder 8HP Yanmar diesel when Roger purchased her in 2002. That motor was replaced in the re-fit in 2008 with a 3 cyliner Nanni 21 HP diesel motor. 

Perhaps key to BRIGAND’s uniqueness, is that she was built in 1890 for racing - purposely built to beat their rivals on Lake Alexandrina! This is in contrast to most of the sailing craft of that era; that were either small trading vessels or working fishing boats.  

Roger found that his work commitments took him away from Australia for six months each year, and in 2015 decided to gift BRIGAND to Alexandrina Council and the community so she could be returned to her home waters. 

She is now back in Goolwa and part of the sailing scene in the region once more.