Qualla: Mullion Lifeboat Station

Mullion Lifeboat Station: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data, CC BY-SA 3.0. On 11 January 1866 the SS London sank in the Bay of Biscay on her way from Gravesend to Melbourne. Among the dead was the Reverend Daniel James Draper, a Wesleyan preacher whose obituary became, in a sense, the founding document of a small lifeboat station in Cornwall. Methodists across Britain donated to a memorial fund through the Methodist Recorder. The money went west - to a cove on the Lizard Peninsula where, the previous winter, four men had drowned on a schooner called the Margaret and another whole crew had gone down with the Cherub. The RNLI named the new station's first boat Daniel J. Draper. Mullion Lifeboat Station was open for business.

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Image: Nilfanion, created using Ordnance Survey data | CC BY-SA 3.0

Mullion Lifeboat Station: The Case for a Boat

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dr Neil Clifton, CC BY-SA 2.0. Even before any RNLI station existed in 1867, the rescue ethic ran strong in the cliffs north of Mullion. In a hurricane on 27 April 1824, the brig Olive of Tenby was driven ashore under a cliff at Halzephron, just north of Mullion. Two men, William Rowe and John Freeman, got a r...

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Image: Dr Neil Clifton | CC BY-SA 2.0

Mullion Lifeboat Station: A Methodist's Memorial

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dr Neil Clifton, CC BY-SA 2.0. On 10 September 1867 the new boathouse stood ready at Mullion Cove, built on land donated by T. J. Agar-Robartes, MP for East Cornwall, at a cost of £183 and 4 shillings. The lifeboat, a 33-foot self-righting Pulling-and-Sailing model with ten oars and a sail, had been shipped do...

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Image: Dr Neil Clifton | CC BY-SA 2.0

Mullion Lifeboat Station: Forty-One Years, Three Lives

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dr Neil Clifton, CC BY-SA 2.0. The Daniel J. Draper served until 1887, replaced by the 37-foot Edith, paid for by an anonymous lady in London. In 1894 came the 38-foot Nancy Newbon, funded by the bequest of E. A. Newbon of Islington, whose estate ultimately paid for five new lifeboats across the RNLI. Then on ...

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Image: Dr Neil Clifton | CC BY-SA 2.0

Mullion Lifeboat Station: What Remains

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dr Neil Clifton, CC BY-SA 2.0. Nancy Newbon was transferred east, where she served another four years before retiring. The boathouse Lord Robartes had funded still stands at Mullion Cove, now a private residence with the bones of a 19th-century launch facility tucked inside its walls. Lifeboat coverage of this...

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Image: Dr Neil Clifton | CC BY-SA 2.0