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Donald Crowhurst
Donald Charles Alfred Crowhurst (1932 – July 1969) was a British electronics engineer, businessman, and amateur sailor who disappeared while competing in the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race, a single-handed, round-the-world yacht race held in 1968–1969. He secretly abandoned the race some weeks or months after departing, remaining in the Atlantic Ocean for seven months while reporting false positions. Contemporary reporting focused on his fraudulent reports and emphasised his actions as a hoaxer or "con man". However, with the passage of time, his story has tended to be reappraised as more of a maritime tragedy that, according to one recent author, "raises essential questions about the ethics of competition, solitude at sea and the psychological limits of sailors".
Crowhurst's participation in the race, together with its ultimately tragic end, has exerted a fascination over many commentators and artists. It has inspired a number of books, stage plays and films, including a documentary, Deep Water (2006), and two feature films, Crowhurst and The Mercy (both 2017), in which Crowhurst is played by the actors Justin Salinger and Colin Firth, respectively. Teignmouth Electron ended its days as a dive boat in the Caribbean and its decaying remains can still be found in the dunes above a beach in the Cayman Islands.
Donald Crowhurst was born in 1932 in Ghaziabad, British India. His mother was a schoolteacher and his father worked in the Indian railways. During her pregnancy, his mother had longed for a daughter, and Crowhurst was dressed as a girl until the age of seven. After India gained independence, his family moved back to England. The family's retirement savings were invested in an Indian sporting goods factory, which later burned down during rioting after the partition of India.
Crowhurst's father died in 1948. Because of family financial problems, Crowhurst was forced to leave school early that year and started a five-year apprenticeship at the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farnborough Airfield. In 1953 he received a Royal Air Force commission as a pilot, but was asked to leave in 1954 for reasons that remain unclear, and was subsequently commissioned into the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers in 1956. After leaving the Army the same year owing to a disciplinary incident,[citation needed] Crowhurst eventually moved to Bridgwater, where he started a business called Electron Utilisation in 1962. He was a member of the Liberal Party and was elected to Bridgwater Borough Council.
Crowhurst, a weekend sailor, designed and built a radio direction finder called the Navicator, a handheld device that allowed the user to take bearings on marine and aviation radio beacons. While he did have some success selling his navigational equipment, his business began to fail. In an effort to gain publicity, he started trying to gain sponsors to enter the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race. His main sponsor was English entrepreneur Stanley Best, who had invested heavily in Crowhurst's failing business. Once committed to the race, Crowhurst mortgaged both his business and home against Best's continued financial support, placing himself in a grave financial situation.
The Golden Globe Race was inspired by Francis Chichester's successful single-handed round-the-world voyage, stopping in Sydney. The considerable publicity his achievement garnered led a number of sailors to plan the next logical step – a non-stop, single-handed, round-the-world sail.
The Sunday Times had sponsored Chichester, with highly profitable results, and was interested in being involved with the first non-stop circumnavigation, but it had the problem of not knowing which sailor to sponsor. The solution was to promote the Golden Globe Race, a single-handed, round-the-world race, open to all comers, with automatic entry. That was in contrast to other races of the time, for which entrants were required to demonstrate their single-handed sailing ability before entry.
Entrants were required to start between 1 June and 31 October 1968, to pass through the Southern Ocean in the summer. The prizes offered were the Golden Globe trophy for the first single-handed circumnavigation, and a £5,000 cash prize for the fastest. This was then a considerable sum, equivalent to almost £73,000 in 2023.
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Donald Crowhurst
Donald Charles Alfred Crowhurst (1932 – July 1969) was a British electronics engineer, businessman, and amateur sailor who disappeared while competing in the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race, a single-handed, round-the-world yacht race held in 1968–1969. He secretly abandoned the race some weeks or months after departing, remaining in the Atlantic Ocean for seven months while reporting false positions. Contemporary reporting focused on his fraudulent reports and emphasised his actions as a hoaxer or "con man". However, with the passage of time, his story has tended to be reappraised as more of a maritime tragedy that, according to one recent author, "raises essential questions about the ethics of competition, solitude at sea and the psychological limits of sailors".
Crowhurst's participation in the race, together with its ultimately tragic end, has exerted a fascination over many commentators and artists. It has inspired a number of books, stage plays and films, including a documentary, Deep Water (2006), and two feature films, Crowhurst and The Mercy (both 2017), in which Crowhurst is played by the actors Justin Salinger and Colin Firth, respectively. Teignmouth Electron ended its days as a dive boat in the Caribbean and its decaying remains can still be found in the dunes above a beach in the Cayman Islands.
Donald Crowhurst was born in 1932 in Ghaziabad, British India. His mother was a schoolteacher and his father worked in the Indian railways. During her pregnancy, his mother had longed for a daughter, and Crowhurst was dressed as a girl until the age of seven. After India gained independence, his family moved back to England. The family's retirement savings were invested in an Indian sporting goods factory, which later burned down during rioting after the partition of India.
Crowhurst's father died in 1948. Because of family financial problems, Crowhurst was forced to leave school early that year and started a five-year apprenticeship at the Royal Aircraft Establishment at Farnborough Airfield. In 1953 he received a Royal Air Force commission as a pilot, but was asked to leave in 1954 for reasons that remain unclear, and was subsequently commissioned into the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers in 1956. After leaving the Army the same year owing to a disciplinary incident,[citation needed] Crowhurst eventually moved to Bridgwater, where he started a business called Electron Utilisation in 1962. He was a member of the Liberal Party and was elected to Bridgwater Borough Council.
Crowhurst, a weekend sailor, designed and built a radio direction finder called the Navicator, a handheld device that allowed the user to take bearings on marine and aviation radio beacons. While he did have some success selling his navigational equipment, his business began to fail. In an effort to gain publicity, he started trying to gain sponsors to enter the Sunday Times Golden Globe Race. His main sponsor was English entrepreneur Stanley Best, who had invested heavily in Crowhurst's failing business. Once committed to the race, Crowhurst mortgaged both his business and home against Best's continued financial support, placing himself in a grave financial situation.
The Golden Globe Race was inspired by Francis Chichester's successful single-handed round-the-world voyage, stopping in Sydney. The considerable publicity his achievement garnered led a number of sailors to plan the next logical step – a non-stop, single-handed, round-the-world sail.
The Sunday Times had sponsored Chichester, with highly profitable results, and was interested in being involved with the first non-stop circumnavigation, but it had the problem of not knowing which sailor to sponsor. The solution was to promote the Golden Globe Race, a single-handed, round-the-world race, open to all comers, with automatic entry. That was in contrast to other races of the time, for which entrants were required to demonstrate their single-handed sailing ability before entry.
Entrants were required to start between 1 June and 31 October 1968, to pass through the Southern Ocean in the summer. The prizes offered were the Golden Globe trophy for the first single-handed circumnavigation, and a £5,000 cash prize for the fastest. This was then a considerable sum, equivalent to almost £73,000 in 2023.
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