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Royal Vancouver Yacht Club

Last modified: 2006-08-19 by phil nelson
Keywords: royal vancouver yacht club | blue ensign |
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The Royal Vancouver Yacht Club has used the Blue Ensign since 1906. The flagpole at their Downtown Vancouver location (10th March 2006) flies the BC flag and the Canadian Blue Ensign (Red Leaves) on the yardarms and the Canadian flag at the gaff. None of the boats I could see were wearing the Blue Ensign. The current burgee (per saltire, Blue at the hoist with a crown; White top and bottom; Red fly, devised 1906 when the prefix "Royal" was granted) and the old burgee (Light Blue with a Black Diamond, used 1903-1906) are visible at the top of http://www.royalvan.com/sites/iom/issue_4col.pdf.

The Black Diamond represents coal, since the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club is based in Coal Harbour, on Burrard Inlet, in Downtown Vancouver. Coal was actually found in the area in the late 19th Century, but the operation was short-lived. There is another location at Jericho further west which also belongs to the Royal Vancouver Yacht Club.

The details of which Blue Ensigns were flown from 1906, I shall have to track down another time.
Dean McGee, 12 March 2006

It was a plain undefaced Blue Ensign.

The other Canadian clubs that had a plain Blue Ensign as their special ensign were:

  • Royal Cape Breton Yacht Club, Sydney, Nova Scotia. 1901.
  • Royal Kennebeccasis Yacht Club, St John, New Brunswick. 1899.
  • Halifax Yacht Club. 1862. Became Royal Nova Scotia YS in 1880.
  • Royal St Lawrence Yacht Club, Montreal. 1894.

Clubs with a defaced Blue Ensign were:

  • Royal Canadian Yacht Club, Toronto. 1878.
  • Royal Hamilton Yacht Club, Ontario. 1891.
  • Royal Lake of the Woods Yacht Club, Winnipeg. 1924.
  • Royal Victoria (BC) Yacht Club, Victoria. 1911.

In 1937 the nine Canadian yacht clubs were authorised to fly the Canadian Blue Ensign, and responsibility for Canadian special ensigns was transferred from the Admiralty to the Canadian Department of National Defence. Use of the Canadian Blue Ensign ended in 1965, but some yacht clubs continued to use their old special ensign, either the Canadian Blue Ensign, or the pre-1937 Blue Ensign defaced with the club badge, as a club-house land flag.
David Prothero, 13 March 2006

According to the Royal Victoria Yacht Club the Blue Ensign they used for the was defaced with a crown above the letters "VI" for Vancouver Island.
Dean McGee, 12 March 2006