The Teign Heritage Centre staff in Teignmouth had a surprise recently when they received a rather large parcel from the USA.

On opening it they found it contained artefacts that were last seen in Teignmouth in 1929.

Bob Kethro, archivist at the Teign Heritage Centre – home to Teignmouth and Shaldon Museum – said the Morgan Giles Shipyard would be very familiar name to a great many of people in Teignmouth, replaced now by the Morgans Quay and Leander Court Flats.

The yard produced many types of boats, and was very successful in particular building racing yachts.

One such yacht was ‘Emily II’, an eight metre class built in the yard in 1929 for Sir Ernest Roney, a successful Olympic yachtsman winning many races in the regattas that were so popular in those days.

The later history of the yacht is unclear but she did finish up in a marina in San Diego in the USA.

A yachting enthusiast, Reinhard Friede, recently purchased the sister yacht of ‘Emily II’ called ‘Hispania VI’ as a restoration project, also built by Morgan Giles in 1930 for the King of Spain Alphonso XIII and often raced against Emily II.

Reinhard went to view Emily II in San Diego for research into his own restoration, regrettably he found she had been broken up some time ago, the owner had died and the boat had been left to deteriorate.

Bob adds: ‘As luck would have it the engraved brass top to the tabernacle and the build plate had been saved, Reinhard was able to purchase these and very kindly sent them to our Heritage Centre to add to the Morgan Giles collection.

‘Imagine the surprise when the parcel was opened and these items were found that had not been seen here for nearly a century.

‘As can be seen in the photograph the tabernacle is engraved with the boat’s name and year of build and the build plate is engraved “Designed by Morgan Giles MARINA and Built by Morgan Giles Limited, Teignmouth England, 1929”.

‘Both items can be viewed in the Teign Heritage Centre,’ said Bob.