Qualla: Baltimore Lifeboat Station

Baltimore Lifeboat Station: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jerryaquav, CC BY-SA 4.0. Bull Point sits on the western shoulder of Baltimore Harbour, with the open Atlantic on one side and Sherkin Island fading off into the haze on the other. The boathouse here is small and serviceable rather than picturesque, but the mooring pen alongside it holds the 16-22 Alan Massey -- a 16-metre Tamar-class lifeboat that since 2012 has been the standing answer to almost any emergency along this stretch of coast. The Baltimore station has been at it since 1919, although the work that earned it the station began three years earlier, when a country archdeacon improvised a rescue with no lifeboat, no funding, and absolutely no obligation to be on the water.

Image: Jerryaquav | CC BY-SA 4.0

Baltimore Lifeboat Station: The Rescue Before the Station

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Charles W Glynn, CC BY-SA 2.0. On 29 December 1916 the steamship Alondra ran aground on Kedge Rock outside Baltimore Harbour. Sixteen of her crew got away in one of her own lifeboats and were drowned when the boat capsized. The Venerable Archdeacon John Becher, who had been appointed Honorary Secretary of a Ba...

Image: Charles W Glynn | CC BY-SA 2.0

Baltimore Lifeboat Station: Shamrock, Not Duke of Connaught

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jug81, CC BY-SA 4.0. The lifeboat that finally arrived at Baltimore was funded by the United Grand Lodge of Freemasons of England, in commemoration of the safe return of Queen Victoria's seventh child, the Duke of Connaught, from a tour of Canada. She was to be named Duke of Connaught. Then the Easte...

Image: Jug81 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Baltimore Lifeboat Station: The Fastnet, 1979

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jerryaquav, CC BY-SA 4.0. On 13 August 1979, the shipping forecast for Fastnet went from a routine south-westerly 4 to 6 at 13:55 to a storm force 10 imminent by 23:00. The Fastnet Race fleet, strung out across the southwest approaches, was caught by a depression that had been only modestly forecast. The ...

Image: Jerryaquav | CC BY-SA 4.0

Baltimore Lifeboat Station: A Taoiseach in the Water

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jerryaquav, CC BY-SA 4.0. In October 1985 the lifeboat went out to a yacht sinking off Mizen Head. The yacht turned out to belong to Charles Haughey, then Leader of the Opposition and shortly to be Taoiseach for the third time. He was pulled out of the Atlantic and put down at Baltimore alive. In August 2...

Image: Jerryaquav | CC BY-SA 4.0