Thousands line the cliffs at St Agnes to witness launch

The long awaited story of the St Agnes schooner Lady Agnes and her figurehead has now been published by the St Agnes Museum Trust. 

The Search for the Lady Agnes was launched on Saturday 24 May at Schooners Restaurant, overlooking the beach at Trevaunance Cove, St Agnes, a venue that couldn’t be closer to the now vanished shipyard where the Lady Agnes herself was launched 131 years ago on 5 September 1877.  Priced £9.99, all proceeds from the sale of the book go to museum funds.

The view from the restaurant is superb, it is easy to imagine the cliffs lined with people and the cove thronging with onlookers as the customary bottle of champagne sent the Lady Agnes on her 60 year career.  “We only hope the book launch draws the crowds in the same way!” said museum Chairman Colin Harris.

The story has been pieced together over the last seven years by the museum’s honorary secretary, Roger Radcliffe.  “Every time I thought it was finished, something new would turn up”, said Roger. “However, after 60 years of active life, crossing the Atlantic many times on the Cod run, 11 years as a hulk and then a figurehead with a life of its own – eventually leading us to Toronto – untangling the story was always going to be a bit of a task.  The end result is hopefully a good read; I’d certainly buy it!”

From St Agnes, ownership of the Lady Agnes moved to Hayle, then Newquay where in 1896 a fateful voyage to Ellesmere Port ended in her being declared a “wreck” at Llandudno after a storm in which the master and crew very nearly lost their lives. Salvaged and refurbished, she went on to spend many years based in north Wales, especially Porthmadog.  After a short time in Cardiff, at the end of the First World War, she returned to Cornwall where she was based at Pentewan.  For many years during the 1920s she was a familiar sight in the clay ports of Par, Charlestown and Fowey until, in 1935 she returned to Porthmadog, ending her days there in 1948 when she was broken up.

Thanks to Eifion Davies of Porthmadog Maritime Museum, St Agnes Museum is now in touch with several descendants of the families who owned the Lady Agnes during the Welsh part of her career. Local contacts also put the museum in touch with descendants of Cornish owners and captains, all of which has furnished the museum with anything from a copy of a poem written on her launch day by her first captain, Adolphus Blowey, to details of her galley stove which still survives in Wales! 

It was in 2001 that Sheffield based figurehead historian Richard Hunter (Hunter by name, hunter by nature!) finally tracked down the figurehead, so beginning the now famous figurehead campaign in St Agnes which galvanised the whole community into action and raised nearly £18,000 to successfully bring her home.

The Search for the Lady Agnes contains nearly three dozen images of the vessel, including six paintings (five of them reproduced in colour), numerous photos of the figurehead, the owners and the captains, there are even three photographs taken on deck.  Almost all of this material has never been seen by the general public so we are delighted to bring it together in this publication.

For those who were unable to make the book launch on the Saturday, Roger will be selling copies at the St Agnes Victorian Fayre on Bank Holiday Monday 26th May from 1.30 to 4.30pm. 

As the book cover states: The story of the search for the figurehead of the Lady Agnes takes us on a journey from her launch day at St Agnes in 1877 to Mediterranean, North American and many lost or forgotten British Ports during a life spanning more than 70 years.  The voyages of the Lady Agnes provide a fascinating glimpse of 19th and early 20th century life aboard a Cornish vessel engaged in the coasting and foreign trade. The conclusion to this story rekindled the same sense of local pride as must have existed in St Agnes at the time of her launch.  Past and present, a tale of local endeavour and achievement.

For further information please email Roger Radcliffe.