The History of Selsey Lifeboat Station

The Friend was in service in Selsey for just four years and only launched to a rescue twice in this time, the first on 23rd January 1863 to a schooner stricken by south-westerly gales and the second on 5th September 1864. This time a brig, “Governor Maclean” was wrecked on the Owers, a rock formation approximately 11km off the coast of Selsey. The crew of the lifeboat rescued 7 members of the ships personnel with the 5 remaining being helped by a passing sailing ship.

Between 1861 and 1913, lifeboats were launched by manually pulling the boat over wooden skids laid over the beach which was both heavy work and enormously time consuming. In order to ease these problems, it was decided that a new wooden slipway would be constructed, sited to the west of the brick-built boathouse and have the lifeboat sitting on the top of this slipway, in the open air. This solution did not prove ideal however and in 1919 a new concrete slipway was built, leading out from the lifeboat house and running slightly uphill for 75 yards until out over deep water before the launching slip started. The lifeboat itself sat on a trolley which ran on rails and was hauled using ropes. Once at the top, the trolley would tip and the boat would be released to slide smoothly into the sea.

Both before and after the war, as more and more of the land was eaten away by the sea, the gangway out to the boathouse had to be extended, reaching 229 metres out to sea by 1958 when the beach was finally stabilised by a programme of sea defences, begun by West Sussex County Council in 1953. At this point, the piles supporting the structure, originally being at a depth of 7.9 metres, now had a depth of less than 0.6 meters. In view of the stabilisation, the RNLI decided to build a new boathouse and slipway, closer to the shore and this became operational in April 1960, officially opened by His Grace the Duke of Richmond in July of that year.

This boathouse and slipway were a well-known and much-loved sight until 2016 when they were demolished to make way for the new, onshore station which opened in 2017. And so, after 104 years of slipway launches, Selsey Lifeboat is now back to its starting point of launching across the beach – however this time using the latest technology, a long way from the rope and manpower of 1861.

This piece is courtesy of Dave Fotheringham, RNLI Selsey Lifeboat.