Christopher Watkin Williams OBE (1947-1951) died on 30th January 2026 aged 92 after a fall  at his home in Bishops Waltham, Hampshire. A Commodore in the Royal Navy, he leaves a wife Jennifer, two children Julian and Harriet, and two grandchildren. His funeral took place at the end of February; his coffin was draped with a White Ensign, and a Royal Marine Sergeant Bugler played the Last Post.

At the Nautical College Chris became Chief of both Hesperus and Port Jackson Divisions in successive terms, an unusual distinction and played left half in the 1951 Hockey 1st XI where he was described in The Log as “sound if unspectacular.” Always destined for the Royal Navy after a voyage in a minesweeper with an RNVR uncle captured his imagination, he fluffed the Dartmouth entry exam and instead enlisted in 1951 as an Ordinary Seaman in the communications branch.

Quickly selected for training as an officer, he served five years as a Leading Seaman before being commissioned in 1956. Various RN appointments both on land and at sea as a communications specialist followed over the next two decades, including in Cyprus and the Far East, until in 1977 he joined the staff of the British Naval Attaché in Washington DC. In this role he had responsibility for coordinating CCIS (Command and Control Information Systems) with the US Navy.

After nearly three years in Washington, he returned to the UK, passed several refresher courses and took command of a newly-refitted Type 21 frigate HMS Antelope in 1979. “These days one is fortunate to get sea command at all. To have a 21 as well is really the icing on the cake,” he said at the time. Antelope was to be sunk in the Falklands War in 1982. By that time, he was on the staff of the RN Commander-in-Chief, Admiral John Fieldhouse, at Northwood as Fleet Communications Officer, the role for which he was later awarded the OBE. Promoted Commodore in 1984, he spent two years at Kolsaas, Norway as Chief of CCIS on the staff of NATO’s Commander-in-Chief, Allied Forces Northern Europe followed by four years back in the U.K. at the Ministry of Defence. He retired from the RN in 1990.

Over the following decade Chris held a variety of jobs in the defence sector including work with Hunting Communications and Marconi Communications. He also became Chairman of the Naval & Maritime Council of the Federation of Electronics Industries, and Regional Vice President (UK) of the US-based Association for Communications & Electronics Professionals. In parallel he was instrumental in setting up the Gwennili Trust in 1995, a charity providing sailing on the South coast for disabled and disadvantaged veterans. Running the organisation for 22 years, he was awarded the Royal Yacht Association’s highest volunteer honour for his efforts.

Meantime he became a tireless advocate, administrator and self-confessed addict of the extreme and potentially dangerous sport of ice yachting, said to be the fastest non-powered sport in existence. Speeds of 70mph are routinely achieved and developmental boats have reached 150mph. Safety is paramount with boats often approaching each other at a closing speed over 100mph; any contact between competitors results in disqualification of the guilty party. Given that a minimum requirement is six inches of ice spread over an area of one mile by half a mile and a 15-knot wind, however, the sport is largely unknown in the UK. The result was that the vast majority of Chris’s competitive involvement took place abroad in Sweden, Poland, Canada and the USA.

Chris first encountered ice yachting in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1969 while on an exchange with the Royal Canadian Navy. “One of those late-night conversations in a bar led to me building a DN boat in the evenings and weekends over a three-month period,” he recalled later in life. He was immediately hooked; within five years he had won the DN class at the world championship in Poland but by his own admission, as a late starter, more often came last. “At 70mph on a reach you’re right on the edge of control yet still trying to think about tactics and the race you’re competing in,” he informed the magazine Yachts & Yachting in 1999. “It’s fantastically exhilarating and really gets the adrenalin pumping.”

During his naval attaché posting to the USA Chris had been granted the first-ever British ice sail number, K1. In retirement he became the tireless European Secretary of IDNIYRA (International DN Ice Yacht Racing Association). A message posted by American colleagues after his death described him as “a steady and influential presence in DN sailing for many years…He helped shape the class, support the sailors, and strengthen ties across countries and regions…He will be missed.”