Name Hope of Porthleven

HOPE OF PORTHLEVEN was built in 1906 at a cost believed to be around £80. She was used as a fishing vessel for mackerel under lug sail until the early 1920s when a Kelvin diesel engine was fitted.

Her first skipper and owner was Tommy Bawden and she was used by the same family up to the early 1950s when she was then hulked on a beach and repaired. HOPE OF PORTHLEVEN was berthed at Gillingham on the Medway in 1958.

She was purchased around 1984 by an ex-Army officer as a derelict hulk. She was restored at Shamrock Quay before sailing for France in March 1986 travelling through the French canals, entering the Med at Marseilles. Having by then purchased another renovation project we put her up for sale once we reached Majorca.

Her current owners found her on the Mediterranean island of Majorca, in the marina at Palma.  A 35hp MW engine had been fitted, probably replacing the original Kelvin sleeve valve engine no.11853 (15hp) that was fitted on 2 January 1926 by the Porthleven marine engineers, J.T. Cowls & Son.

In 1987, the task began of bringing the vessel back to the UK. The first stage was to the port of Barcelona and then to another Spanish harbour, Roses, before she arrived at the French port of Sete. No changes have been made to her rig since 1987.

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