George Cockshott
Marine architect
George Cockshott (7 May 1875 in Preston, Lancashire – 1953 in Hampshire) was born into a legal and sporting family in Southport, where he practised as a solicitor in the family firm of Bucks, Cockshott and Cockshott. His brother Francis was an Athletics Blue in each of his three years at Cambridge as well as working for a time in the family firm. George served as a justice of the peace and was also an active and gifted amateur yacht designer. His claim to fame comes through his design of the 'International' 12 Foot Dinghy. Although the international status of the class was revoked by the IYRU (now World Sailing) in 1964, it is still raced actively across the world. George retired to Hampshire in later years, dying there in 1953.
Early life
George was educated at Uppingham School and King's College, Cambridge. As a boy he took a keen delight in building and sailing model yachts, and while at school built for himself a rowing and sailing boat. He joined the Cambridge University Cruising Club shortly after its formation in 1893. On coming down from Cambridge and commencing practice as a solicitor in the family firm, he spent several seasons as ‘forward hand’ racing in the Southport ¾-rating class and the Menai Straits 1-rating class.
“George Cockshott” enters the record as marine architect. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what George, Cockshott and Marine can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jun 29, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q50365075. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1875, 1953, 1964 and 1893.
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This entry incorporates text from “George Cockshott” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.