Island Life Magazine Ltd February/March 2008 | Page 51

ISLAND HISTORY
on a pontoon barge where
she now rests in a berth at
Damhead Creek. In 2006 the
Medway Queen Preservation
Society were awarded a Lottery
Heritage Fund grant of over
£l.8m to restore the ship.
The Ryde’s story is a sadder
one. Two years after she
was launched in 1937 on the
Clyde on St. George’s Day,
the ship was requisitioned
along with her sister ship, the
Sandown, by the Royal Navy
to serve as a minesweeper
in the Dover Straits and the
North Sea where the two
ships had menacing references
made to them by the German
propaganda broadcasts. HMS
Ryde, was refitted later as an
anti-aircraft ship and in 1944
joined the invasion fleet off the
Normandy coast.

She returned to Southern
Railway in 1945 and along
with the remaining paddlers,
Whippingham and Sandown,
worked as a relief and summer
vessel in the Solent. Islanders
have fond memories of
her during this time, Steve
Lamonte, a long-time admirer
of the Ryde, remembers going
on board with his family,
sliding down the handrail
to the lower deck where he
could watch the gleaming
cranks in the engine room
rise and fall. But in 1968
she was taken out of service
and used an Edwardian Gin
Palace by Gilbeys Gin on
the Thames. Finally, in 1969
when she was brought back to
the Island, her future looked
bleak – she seemed destined
for the breakers’ yard.
Once again A.H. and C.B.
Riddett stepped in at the
eleventh hour and she was
brought to Binfield to be a
night cl V"