11th December 1997

Royal Yacht Britannia is retired to Edinburgh

The Royal Yacht Britannia is permanently berthed in the Port of Leith, behind Edinburgh’s Ocean Terminal. Formerly Queen Elizabeth II’s official floating palace, the 126m-long, 17m-wide yacht was build by John Brown & Company at its shipyard in Clydebank. It is now a museum.

Royal Yacht Britannia
Royal Yacht Britannia

Britannia was ordered on 5 February 1952 and work on her construction began a little over four months later. She was launched in April 1953 and took her maiden voyage, from Portsmouth to Malta, in April 1954, with the then Prince Charles and his sister Princess Anne aboard. Charles would later use the yacht on his honeymoon after marrying Princess Diana, and Anne did the same after her marriage to Captain Mark Phillips.

As well as carrying the royal family, the yacht had a considerable crew, which at times numbered around 300. These comprised not only personal staff for the family, and those involved in the running of the yacht, but band members and military personnel.

The Royal Yacht remained in service for 45 years, by which point she was becoming too costly to maintain. It was decommissioned in December 1997.

Royal Yacht Britannia
Royal Yacht Britannia

 

 

Other events that occured in December

  • 01

    Burke and Hare’s best customer dies
    Edinburgh-born Robert Knox was an anatomist and customer of serial killers William Burke and William Hare.

  • 02

    Fife-born ‘Robinson Crusoe’ dies
    Fife-born Alexander Selkirk was abandoned on a desert island when he fell out with the captain of the boat on which he was travelling.

  • 03

    St Columba is born
    Saint Columba was born in Ireland, came to Scotland around 563, and founded the abbey at Iona, where he died in the 590s.

  • 04

    The Stotfield fishing disaster
    The entire fishing fleet, on which the town of Stotfield relied for income, was lost in a storm on Christmas Day in 1806.

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