The Old Lifeboat Station of the first phase of RNLI lifeboats being operated from Little Haven stands in a ruinous state under the cliffs in the shelter of Gouldtrop Roads, around 1.5km west southwest of Little Haven.
The RNLI station at Little Haven was opened in 1882, when the lifeboat was kept on a mooring at Gouldtrop. The first lifeboat was a pulling/sailing vessel named the FRIEND; 33ft in length, 8ft wide, with 10-oars. In 1893 the DAVID PICKARD was placed on service at Little Haven, a 39ft pulling/sailing lifeboat. That vessel was followed by the CHRISTOPHER NORTH GRAHAM between 1901 and 1903. Facilities were improved with the construction of a boathouse within Goultrop Roads in 1903 to allow a slipway launched lifeboat, and the WILLIAM ROBERTS, a 40ft Rubie-class, was placed at the station between 1903 and its closure in 1921.
Historic photographs of the slipway indicate that it was built with a timber structure extending into the sea. The boathouse itself is marked on the OS 2nd Edition 25" map as being orientated NE (slipway) to SW (cliffs), c.18m long and 7m wide, with an additional building, 7m x 4m on its southern corner. It was served by a track and steps down from the wooded cliffs above. The track is visible on the OS 1st Edition map, presumable to allow access for reaching the moored Lifeboat. A square building 5.5m x 5.5m was located midway down the track, possibly as a storehouse.
The station was closed in 1921 and much of the structure removed, although the lower walls or foundation plinth of the station may still remain, along with the track and foundations of the storehouse.
The RNLI returned in 1967 when a D-Class inshore lifeboat was stationed at Little Haven as the Little and Broad Haven Lifeboat.
Sources include:
Dyfed Historic Environment Record PRN 23817 (Storehouse): https://archwilio.org.uk/her/chi3/report/page.php?watprn=DAT23817
Dyfed Historic Environment Record PRN 32741 (Boathouse): https://archwilio.org.uk/her/chi3/report/page.php?watprn=DAT32741
The Life-Boat, Journal of the RNLI, 1882, Vol. 11, Issue 125, p. 641 https://rnliarchive.blob.core.windows.net/media/1132/0125.pdf#page=15
NAW aerial photography 2006-9
OS 1st Edition 25in
OS 2nd Edition 25in
J. Whitewright, RCAHMW, June 2024.