SALEROOM

SOTHEBY’S/CHRISTIE’S Victory model tops £600K

Nelson scored another victory, this time in the saleroom, when a full-hull model of HMS Victory sold for £630,000, the second highest price ever paid for a ship model at auction. The 56in-long (142cm) model (top right) constructed during Victory’s “large repair” between 1800 and 1803, during which Britain was briefl y at peace with France, is the only known model of Admiral Nelson’s fl agship from this period and bears witness to the very short period when Victory was in her prime Trafalgar state. The Victory of today is substantially di erent.

Key 1800-1803 updates shown on the 1:48 scale model include the new smaller carved fi gurehead of two cherubs supporting a royal standard. The open stern galleries were also closed in and glazed, with restrained painted decoration in place of the earlier, highly ornate, gilded carving. Victory was also painted in yellow and black “bumblebee livery,” though the gun ports were later painted black at Nelson’s request, to create his bespoke chequerboard e ect, which emphasised the ship’s fi repower.

However, as relations with France rapidly deteriorated, Nelson’s fl agship was rushed back into commission without the poop railing and solid bulwarks shown in the model. When a patched-up Victory fi nally limped into Chatham two and a half years after the 1805 battle she was shot through, her bow and galleries shattered, with only remnants of masts and yards. The subsequent major refi t resulted in the round bow and fl at stern we know today. The all-time auction record still belongs to an exquisite Admiralty Board model of a fi th-rater, sold by Christie’s in 2003 for £663,750.

SOTHEBY’S

CHRISTIE’S

Top: Model of HMS Victory in her pre-battle prime Above: Early-1700s Admiralty Board model of a fi fth-rater

RM SOTHEBY’S The Shape of fi ns to come

By the mid-1950s the Chevrolet Corvette had broken the mould as the world’s fi rst fi breglass volume production car and American “land yachts” were sprouting jet-age tail fi ns. Cue the 1955 Chris-Craft Cobra, as the world’s largest mahogany

boatbuilder made its fi rst foray into fi breglass.

Produced for one year only in 1955, the fl amboyant Cobra with an outrageous fi breglass gold fi n and engine cowl was a big mission statement, with its matching gold upholstery in its three-abreast cockpit. The hull, however, was still planked in mahogany in the traditional way.

Just 56 of the 21ft (6.4m) Cobras were produced, and 52 of the 18ft (5.5m) models, such as this six-cylinder example being o ered at no reserve at Marshall, East Texas on 22-24 September in an auction that also includes vintage outboard motors. As an indication of value, the fi rst production 18ft Cobra sold for $79,200 in 2020.

The Cobra was indeed the shape of things to come as by 1971 Chris-Craft had migrated entirely to fi breglass production.

Sectioned 1956 Starling Jet Troller is among 30 outboards all being o ered at no reserve in a massive private museum sale in Fountain City, Wisconsin USA on September 14-17 (mecum.com)

MECUM AUCTIONS

MECUM AUCTIONS Jet outboard didn’t fl y

Propulsion Research Inc’s 1956 advertising claim to have produced “America’s fi rst production line jet-propelled outboard” turned out to be somewhat spurious, but nevertheless their Starling P-500 Jet Troller was among the fi rst of its kind.

Marketed to fi shermen wanting to navigate in weedy shallows and safety-minded swimmers, the 5hp single-cylinder trolling outboard dispensed with a propeller and replaced it with an enclosed turbine to provide “super hydro thrust.” It failed to create much of a stir and the company gave up its sales thrust a few years later.