Alfred Mylne 58 ft Bermudan Cutter 1931/2003

Unhindered by the mathematics of any rating rule when tasked by her first owner to design a fast, spacious and of course very beautiful family yacht, Alfred Mylne’s answer was this gorgeous ‘fast cruiser’ with no vices. EILIDH has charmed only four owners in ninety years, in Scottish and northern European waters, and for the past almost twenty years in the Mediterranean where she has become something of a star. EILIDH owes this extended longevity to two passionate French owners and a necessary 2002-2003 restoration at the skilled hands of Gilbert Pasqui’s Villefranche yard, followed by ongoing upgrades and maintenance – and the fact that Alfred Mylne designed such an attractive cruising boat that she simply deserves - and gives - love.

- Moderate long keel displacement hull form with lead ballast keel
- Burma teak planks on oak frames and elm deadwoods
- Copper and bronze fastened
- Stainless steel floors
- Teak swept laid deck (2003)
- Teak superstructures

2019-2021
- Local refastening
- Mechanical, electrical and systems upgrades
- Electronic instruments upgrades
- Invoices available on request

2011 - CHANTIER NAVAL PASQUI, VILLEFRANCH-SUR-MER, FRANCE
- Upper stem replacement

2007 - CLASSIC WORKS, LA CIOTAT
- Mast step reinforcement

2002-2003 - CHANTIER NAVAL PASQUI, VILLEFRANCH-SUR-MER, FRANCE
- Major restoration
- All structural issues attended to by repair or replacement
- Always respecting faithfully the original build
- Retaining the wonderful simplicity that is the hallmark of the 1930s yacht
- New double cabin forward in former crew forepeak
- New mast and boom by Pasqui following the original drawings

ALFRED MYLNE & CO. DESIGN No. 331
During its late 19th and first half 20th Century flourishing as a yachting paradise, the Firth of Clyde and West Coast of Scotland somehow produced few yachting people who voyaged much beyond its shores - though, famously, its yacht designers and builders produced many wonderful yachts well capable of doing so. Perhaps there was enough adventure there among its sounds and lochs and hundreds of islands fringed by the North Atlantic Ocean. EILIDH’s story is one of the exceptions.

Her first owner - one of only four to date - Thomas E. Russell (1880-1957), was comfortably-off from the labours of his family’s deep involvement as part-owners in one of the world’s foremost architectural iron foundries, Walter Macfarlane & Co., whose Saracen Works in Glasgow employed 1200 in the 1890s; yet he was independently active as a Lancashire-based engineer and building contractor. In semi-retirement from his early 50s, Thomas would become an ambitious cruising yachtsman, with EILIDH commissioned to afford more space and comfort for sailing adventures with his grown family. That she would be incredibly beautiful as well as practical was rather taken for granted; the Russells had always owned beautiful yachts – and Alfred Mylne never designed an ugly one.

Through the turn and early years of the 20th Century, Thomas and his older brother William had shared small racers in the local and international classes for Firth of Clyde regattas, and from 1920 the beautiful 1902 Mylne-designed 43ft cruiser racer RUNAG, registered to William, which served as platform for summer cruises on the west coast until the arrival of EILIDH in 1931, registered to Thomas.

The choice of A.M. Dickie & Sons of Bangor, North Wales, as builder may have had much to do with Thomas still living in Lancashire at that time, and the Bangor yard’s strong ties to the “home” yard at Tarbert, Loch Fyne on the west coast of Scotland, regular builders of Alfred Mylne designs. Peter S. Dickie had left the Tarbert yard in 1925 to found his own business on the site of the old Rowlands Dockyard at Bangor and it developed great success and reputation.

Not long after EILIDH’s 1931 commissioning, Thomas returned north to a coastal villa by the waters of his birth, at Colintraive in the Kyles of Bute. Brother William would eventually do the same and became a close neighbour. William was probably more the racer: his Mylne-designed International 6-Metre KYLA was the 1934 challenger for the Seawanhaka Cup on Long Island Sound, New York.

From 1935, EILIDH’s wholesome yet fast and of course beautiful form (a Mylne speciality) was properly put to the test when Thomas and family cruised her in Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Estonia. In his book ‘Mary Anne Among 10,000 Islands’, Adlard Coles recalled a memorable encounter with EILIDH at Storsottunga in the Åland Islands.

The outbreak of the Second World War put a halt to this exploration, and EILIDH was laid up in Finland with a prayer for her survival. Survive she did, in remarkable condition, having apparently been respectfully used by German officers.

Returning to the Clyde in 1948, EILIDH continued her role as the Russell family’s cruiser, and occasional participant in longer distance races. On Thomas’s death in 1957, EILIDH remained with the family, her olive green hull a beautiful sight on the home mooring at Colintraive – and a reminder of the Clyde’s heritage in yacht designing and building to younger generations of sailors passing thorough the busy Kyles of Bute passage aboard their plastic and increasingly imported yachts. The Russells finally parted company with EILIDH in 1973, but she remained in home waters.

EILIDH appealed to Clyde Cruising Club member and future Commodore, John W. Mill for the same reason Thomas Russell had commissioned her: as an able, elegant and spacious yacht for his growing family of very active and competent sailors. Long distance races were often enjoyed as a means of exploring new destinations. In Mill family ownership, EILIDH was a two-time overall winner of the CCC/ RORC Blue Water Race: in 1981 to La Trinity-sur-Mer, Brittany, and in 1992 to Brest, Brittany, for the first of the spectacular Festivals of the Sea there. And in 1994 she clipped a day and an hour off the course record from the Clyde to Brest. Perhaps it was all a message about EILIDH’s future destiny.

Just before Christmas 2001 she moved to her first French ownership with Jean-François Behard, and the deep restoration a septuagenarian inevitably needs in the skilled hands of Gilbert Pasqui at Villefranche-sur-Mer, near Nice. Since 2005, in two loving French ownership’s she’s been the darling of the Mediterranean classic regattas and charmed all who have sailed with her. Her next owner will be only her 5th in 90 years.

©2024 Iain McAllister/ Sandeman Yacht Company Ltd.

Deck from aft
- Teak decks and raw teak caprail
- Bronze fairleads and ensign jack staff socket
- Dorade vent
- Liferaft in container
- Bronze main sheet horse
- Bronze mushroom vent
- Bronze boom crutches
- Teak and bronze cleats outboard
- Cockpit with raised coamings with cleats mounted outboard
- Teak seating
- Engine controls
- Bronze and teak tiller
- 2 x deck level hatches to lazarette inboard
- 2 x Absolute bronze sheet and warp winches port and starboard
- Bronze deck mountings and ash blocks
- Teak Mylne forward sloping doghouse with two sliding hatches
- Doorway to accommodation offset to stbd
- Teak planked coach roof fwd
- 2 x Butterfly hatch skylights abaft the mast
- Mast with bronze halyard winches and fittings
- 2 x Bronze winches on coach roof
- Butterfly skylight fwd
- Teak swim ladder stowage
- Fore cabin hatch with bronze port in trunk cabin
- Foredeck
- Samson post
- Muir 24 volt windlass powered by a dedicated battery
- CQR anchor, 140 lb with two lengths of galvanised chain
- 80 lb Fisherman storm anchor
- Bronze fairleads at bow

Summary
- Accommodation for up to eight
- High quality Honduras mahogany and teak panelling, cabinetry and furniture.
- 3 x Butterfly hatches in the deck head provide ample light and ventilation
- Upholstery is beautifully finished in dark green leather
- Cabin sole is teak and the deck head is painted white

Entering from the main cockpit companionway steps down
- Doghouse lobby
- 2 x Quarter berths aft, port and starboard

Galley to port
- Gas fully restored Blacks gimballed hob and oven
- Fridge
- Lockers for crockery and provisions

Navigation opposite to starboard
- Chart table
- Demountable pilot berth

Main saloon
- After part with green leather upholstered seats port and starboard
- Sideboards port and starboard
- Settee berths fwd upholstered in green leather port and starboard
- Pullman berths outboard to port and starboard
- Drop leaf dining table to seat up to 8 fixed to cabin sole

Forward to WC compartment
- WC wash basin and shower
- Large full length hanging locker to starboard

Owners cabin
- King size double berth
- Generous stowage drawers beneath

Access to chain locker forward

SPARS/ RIG
- Cutter rig
- All spars in Spruce new 2004 by Pasqui, Villefranche sur Mer

SAILS
- By Incidences in off-white/ cream Dacron
- Mainsail
- Genoa
- Yankee 1
- Staysail
- Spinnaker (2004)
- Boomed staysail (2006)
- Yankee (2007)

CANVASWORK
- Sunbrella boom cover, new
- Sunbrella cover for mast fittings, new
- Sunbrella coach roof cover, new
- Hatch covers, new

MECHANICAL
- Nanni 5250 TDI 85 HP diesel (2004) with new starter
- Ratio ZF25A hydraulic gearbox (2020)
- Fixed mounting with flexible coupling to the shaft
- Single Maxprop Whisper 5P, 110, 23" 2 x bladed propeller (2020)
- Kubota genset with new starter
- 2 x Volvo 24 V alternators (2020)

ELECTRICAL
- DC Master inverter 24 / 220 V 24 A (2020)
- Dolphin pro 12V 108 A battery charger (2020)
- Battery controller BMV 501 Victron
- Cobra 300 battery charger 220 to 12 V (2020)
- Sinewave Sinshark 1 KVA
- 12 x Dolphin batteries 12 V (2020)

TANKAGE
- Isotemp Basic water heater 30 L
- Fuel tank: 270 L
- 3 x Fresh water tanks: 320 L and 2 x 80 L with pressure pump
- 1 HP High Pressure Water maker (2005); capacity 60 L/ h
- Hot water system heater and pumps
- SELFA electric WC
- Grey water tank with pressure pump

COMFORT
- Eberspächer diesel heater system, 3 x outlets
- Air conditioning system

- Garmin 923 GPS Chartplotter - new
- Blue chart G3 HD Europe code Eu 723 L
- Garmin 215i VHF AIS
- Sestrel Compass

- Fire extinguishers 2.45 Kg (2020)
- 2 x 6-person Zodiac valise liferafts
- Engine coupled Prestolite bilge pump
- Rule 800 24 V electric bilge pump
- Rule Mate 1100 auto electric 24 V bilge pump, new
- Upi 24 V 35 L/m bilge pump, new
- 2 x Rule 12 V pumps, new
- Manual bilge pump in the cockpit

- 9 ft Stinger RIB inflatable
- 6 HP Honda outboard and cover
- Teak swim ladder
- Full set of blocks, warps, fenders, lines etc; mostly new