Sad husband holds private memorial for missing yachtswoman
PUTTING on a brave face, UKborn yachtsman Peter Hill, 63, walked the few hundred metres from his boat at the Durban yacht mole to the Royal Natal Yacht Club for a memorial for his wife, Carly, yesterday.
Carly, 58, is missing at sea after apparently falling off the couple’s catamaran, the Oryx, about 14km from the mouth of the Tugela River.
An air and sea search by the National Sea Rescue Institute and other volunteers, failed to find any trace of the missing woman, and the search was called off after two days.
A gaunt Hill was supported by family friends.
He declined to speak to the Sunday Tribune, maintaining the silence he has observed since the tragedy occurred. A Union Jack fluttered at half mast on the vessel.
Hill had asked that the memorial ceremony be closed to the press, but it was well attended by members of the yachting fraternity.
Carly Hill’s children, Irene and Dylan (who lives in Durban), both paid tribute to their mother, a former nurse and a writer of romantic fiction. Carly’s maiden name was Du Preez).
In a post in Yachting Monthly earlier this week, Hill recounted the events of June 19, and thanked the hundreds of people who had expressed sympathy and sadness for his loss.
“We set sail for Madagascar and by Friday morning we were about 50 miles NE of Durban,” he wrote. “After breakfast together I turned in at 8 o’clock to catch up on my sleep and woke again at 10 o’clock. The sailor’s worst nightmare, Carly was no longer on board.
“The wind was blowing westerly at 10 to 12 knots with a moderate sea on a clear sunny day and Oryx was sailing at about 5.5 knots under the self-steering. I dropped the sails and tried an all-ships mayday on the VHF (marine radio channel), but with no replies and no ships in sight. We were 6.5 miles off the coast and no mobile phone reception. The navionics tablet app had been running our course so I decided to run back along our track under engine to try and find her. I searched until I arrived back at our pre-0800 position and then went inshore to call for help by telephone.”
Hill said it was of some consolation that his wife had spent close time with her family and treasured 3-year-old granddaughter, Hannah, in the two weeks the couple were berthed at Durban before setting sail for Madagascar.
The loss of Carly Hill comes after the disappearance in January of two Durban men, Anthony Murray, 58, and Reginald Robertson, 59, as well as 20-year-old Capetonian Jaryd Payne aboard the catamaran, Sunsail.
It is believed that the men may have died during a cyclone en route to Phuket, Thailand.
An upturned hull of a vessel believed to be the Sunsail, has since been spotted drifting at sea by a number of ships, but it has yet to be salvaged.
The grieving families of the three men hope it will yield some clues to help them begin finding closure for their loss.
This week Hill’s personal agony was inflamed when, as reported by a UK newspaper, so-called “internet trolls” posted comments online suggesting that he was behind his wife’s death.
While Hill refused to be drawn into the fray, his ex-wife, Annie, 59, defended the former Royal Navy midshipman in The Times, saying: “I pray he never reads these comments because they will haunt Peter for the rest of his life.
“He is a very gentle man. He hasn’t got a vicious or violent bone in his body. He is absolutely devastated by what has happened.
“Peter was very happy with Carly and all he wanted in life was Carly and his boat.
“Now the bottom has fallen out of his world.”