While St. Maarten is fast growing as a charter base, Antigua has been a hub for many years. Prior to its current incarnation, Antigua’s annual expo was called the Nicholson Antigua Charter Show, named after the legendary Nicholson family, which is credited with initiating the first-ever yacht charters in the Caribbean.

Commander VEB Nicholson, ex-British Royal Navy, sailed the 70-foot 1903 schooner Mollihawk with his wife and two sons, Rodney, 21, and Desmond, 23, to Antigua in March 1949. They kept their boat in Nelson’s Dockyard at English Harbour, which was abandoned and in ruins. The family squatted in what had been the Commissioners Room and Paymasters House.

I recently learned that Desmond—81—had succumbed to pneumonia after suffering from a rare blood disorder. Desmond was a true renaissance man: a sailor, a raconteur, an amateur archeologist, an author, a photographer, a husband, a father, a brother and friend to many—including me.

Desmond Nicholson (1925-2006). (Click image to enlarge)

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With a glint in his eye, and his inimitable sense of humor, he recounted the happenstance of his first charter: "One day a wealthy man from the newly established Mill Reef Club saw me working in the dockyard and said, ‘Gee, what a lovely schooner, you wouldn’t take us for a sail down island, would you?’"

This innocent trip was the beginning of the yacht charter business in the Caribbean. Bit by bit, Desmond and his brother Rodney accumulated a few yachts that were at their disposal for charter. Desmond married his charterer’s daughter, Lisa, in 1957, and the rest, as they say, is history.

A couple of years ago, I watched a slide show that Desmond put together of his first down-island charter in the 1950s. He had made transparencies from old photos he had developed long ago in his most unusual darkroom. Fresh water was scarce, so he washed prints in an orange crate floated in the sea. He claimed that salt water washed chemicals well, and that he only needed a slight rinse to get rid of the salt. I used his evocative black-and-white photographs in a 1998 book titled Antigua and Barbuda: A Photographic Journey, which I co-authored with photographer Dana Jinkins. Desmond wrote its historical introduction.

The last time I saw him was during the Antigua show. We sat on the wall outside his hillside Falmouth Harbour home and looked over the charter yachts below. He told me of a Website where he tracked the comings and goings of yachts worldwide. His mind and curiosity were as keen as ever, and he still had that glint in his eye. Godspeed, Desmond.

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