LIFEBOATS IN EAST ANGLIA
The picture below shows Caister lifeboat in RNLI days.
There are 10 RNLI lifeboat stations between Hunstanton and Aldeburgh. There are other independently run lifeboats, most notably at Caister, but also at Sea Palling and Mundesley. The independently operated lifeboats tend to be the smaller inshore types of craft, but the Caister lifeboat is much grander.
Sea rescue has been made much quicker and more efficient by the use of helicopters, but with the reduction in the number of stations from which the helicopters fly, we may well see a resurgence in the use of lifeboats. Time is of the essence in sea rescues, and whatever the politicians may say, the further a helicopter has to fly the longer it takes to arrive. Fast inshore lifeboats may well get to an emergency first.
An old lifeboat has recently been restored at a cost of £100,000, largely thanks to the Heritage Lottery Fund. Newly built in 1940, its first voyage was to Dunkirk where it rescued many soldiers from the beach. The lifeboat, the Lucy Lavers, took part in the 75th anniversary celebrations, starting from her base at Wells-next-the-Sea. The lifeboat spent most of her working life at Aldeburgh in Suffolk, from where she was retired in 1958.
Another East Anglian lifeboat that took part in the evacuation of Dunkirk was the Louise Stephens from the Gorleston and Great Yarmouth Lifeboat Station. This vessel too is being restored but she will be kept at Hoylake in Cheshire. A third East Anglian lifeboat which participated in the evacuation of troops in 1940 was the Mary Scott of Southwold. Engine failure caused her to be abandoned on the beach at Dunkirk after she had ferried many men to the deep water vessels lying offshore. Her crew were brought back to Suffolk by the Gorleston lifeboat. The boat was recovered after the war and returned to RNLI service, but not to Southwold, which had no lifeboat after the war for over 20 years. It now has one again.
There are various lifeboats around East Anglia. At Hunstanton there is an inshore Atlantic 75 B class lifeboat, but also one of only four hovercraft lifeboats belonging to the RNLI. This is particularly useful on the mudflats of the Wash, where a conventional lifeboats is unable to operate during at least half of the 24 hours. Beach launched lifeboats operate from Wells and Sheringham but at Cromer the lifeboat is launched from the end of the pier. The Trent Class lifeboat at Gorleston is designed to be kept afloat and its station is at the seaward end of the harbour on the river Yare at Gorleston. The harbour mouth on the river Blyth is the site of the current lifeboat station at Southwold, although this lifeboat is launched when needed rather than being berthed in the river. Finally Aldeburgh is another beach launched station.
There have been many memorable rescues carried out around the East Anglian coast, but perhaps the most famous were those carried out by the Caister lifeboat. Jimmy Haylett became a national celebrity and was taken to Sandringham to meet King Edward VII. It was the proud history of the base which made the Caister lifeboatmen unwilling to accept the decision of the RNLI to close their station in 1969. The disaster of 1901 that led to the drowning of so many lifeboatmen makes Caister memorable, but the many rescues undertaken by Henry Blogg of Cromer make that lifeboat station in many ways its equal. Blogg had a career that spanned almost the whole of the first half of the 20th century and did not retire until he was over 70.
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