As it is Cowes Week, Obiter has pleasure in introducing a 'lawyers and their yachts' special.

First up we have Our Boys, a classic Looe Lugger that is 75-ft long when fully rigged and enjoyed a former life going out catching pilchards.


Owned by London lawyer Christopher Parr, his brother and some friends, Our Boys is one of 155 boats on the National Register of Historic Vessels' designated vessels list, rated as being of 'substantial heritage merit'. During World War II, she had her own machine gun.


A second entry comes in the shape of another boat on the register, Hilfranor, a - ahem - 41-ft twin-screw gentleman's motor yacht owned by Simon Palmer of Kent firm Brachers. Film footage taken at the time of WWII reveals that she also had a Bren gun fitted astern of the wheelhouse. Hilfranor has something in common with last week's entry Mahalia too - she is a Dunkirk little ship.


But what sets her apart is that Hilfranor was sunk at Dunkirk after being straddled by two bombs from German dive bombers. According to one version of events, some French soldiers bailed her out and got her engines going as they sought to get away from France - only to sink again at Ramsgate, where she was rescued by a minesweeper.


Meanwhile, a reader has contacted us to ask whether it is true that the Law Society Yacht Club's burgee - or flag, for the uninitiated - has a shark on it 'or is that a figment of the imagination of some disgruntled client?' Intensive research suggests that there is indeed a shark, and Obiter hopes to have the photographic evidence to demonstrate this shortly.