Great Grimsby Regatta, 1866

From "The Yachting Calendar and Review", published by Horace Cox, 1866.

_________________________________________

GREAT GRIMSBY REGATTA

The rising town of Great Grimsby is one of the most wretched-looking places it was ever our lot to visit, and more resembles an Australian settlement than an English town. Its population is said to increase so rapidly that no one living has any notion how many souls are now contained in the town since the last census was taken; but this startling increase is entirely attributable to its shipping trade in coal, timber, fish, corn and bricks, and not to the migratory visitations of fashionable pleasure-seekers; and the difference between a rising water-place and a thriving shipping port is wonderfully apparent. However, the habitués of Grimsby have some notion of what the fashion is at these pleasant seaside resorts, and annually endeavour to startle the world with a regatta. And then a yacht match is their great delight, although yacht owners as a rule generally avoid the place; still a few steer their course that way just about the time of the regatta, and after securing the prizes hastily leave again. This is not very satisfactory, but what is there at Grimsby to tempt them to stay? As a yachtsman said to us after vainly attempting to discover something with an agreeable aspect, "This place isn't even fit to die in. You mustn't go a mile east of Harwich; if you do, you are out of the world." Yet still, there is a pleasant village not a mile from this, to a stranger, dismal conglomeration of red bricks, where yachting men who wish for a cheap quiet place might very well pass a month or two - we allude to Cleethorpes. The sands there are scarcely to be surpassed, the bathing is excellent, and the living cheap, if not sumptuous, and a vessel can lie comfortably under any conditions of wind at an anchorage about a mile from the shore. But as there is never any distinguished company in the place it would only suit those who wish to "live away from the world," and even here their quietude might occasionally be disturbed, for now and then Cleethorpes is overrun with those peculiarly jolly people who make day excursions from inland places. However, there are worse places on the seaside than Cleethorpes, and although a mere village, it is a paradise compared to Grimsby, where there are only two respectable buildings in the place - the Town Hall and Royal Hotel.

The regatta took place on Monday, July 23, and a large number of spectators congregated on the docks to witness the sports.................