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Key Facts

  • Nancy Blackett was Arthur Ransome's favourite amongst his various cruising yachts.
  • Nancy Blackett was named after Arthur Ransome's favourite character, the adventurous and irrepressible leader of the Amazon Pirates in his "Swallows and Amazons" books.
  • Nancy Blackett provided Arthur Ransome with the inspiration for possibly his best book "We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea", a classic of both children's and seafaring literature, in which she plays a leading role as the Goblin.
  • Nancy Blackett was built in 1931, a Hillyard 7-tonner, 28 feet long, excluding her bowsprit, with an unusual Bermudan cutter rig. In 1988, she was discovered near-derelict in Scarborough harbour, and brought back to the River Orwell to be restored.
  • Nancy Blackett is now in the care of the Nancy Blackett Trust, recognisable once more as the boat that Ransome knew and loved.
  • The patron of the Nancy Blackett Trust is Dame Ellen MacArthur.

Vital Statistics

  • Length on deck: 28ft 6in (8.68m)
  • Beam: 8ft 1in (2.46m)
  • Draft: 4ft 6in (1.53m)
  • Gross (Thames) tonnage: 6.80
  • Registered tonnage: 4.86
  • Official Number: 162814
  • Goblin’s Official Number was 16856 in "We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea" by Arthur Ransome)

Header image: Nancy Blackett at Robertson's yard, Woodbridge, February 2012. Credit: Bryan Bonser.