Hythe Lifeboat Stations Hythe, England

Text courtesy of Historic England. © Crown Copyright, reprinted under the Open Government License.

HYTHE

687/0/10009 RANGE ROAD 13-OCT-10 Hythe Lifeboat Stations

II Two lifeboat stations. The northern lifeboat station was built in 1893 with a circa 1940 northern addition. The southern lifeboat station was built in 1934, probably supplied by the firm of Lewis and Lewis (later Lewis and Duvivier) of Haywards Heath.

NORTHERN LIFEBOAT STATION:

MATERIALS: Polychrome brick, mainly yellow with red brick dressings, cement bands and cement rendered north west gable. Welsh slate roof with terracotta ridge tiles.

PLAN: Rectangular lifeboat house of four bays with splayed northern addition divided into two rooms.

EXTERIOR: The north west end has a gable with moulded stone coping with kneelers and ball finial. Most of this front is now concealed beneath the c1940 yellow brick addition with flat concrete roof. The taller part of this has nearly full-height double doors facing west and two small square window openings facing north west, the lower part with a flat-arched entrance. The side elevations of the lifeboat station have moulded brick cornices, two cement bands and cambered brick window openings with wooden casement windows. The east side has a ledged and braced door. The south-east or seaward end has a gable with late-C20 brickwork but retains the original cement kneelers to the gable and sliding wooden doors below. The opening behind the wooden doors has been filled in by later C20 breezeblocks.

INTERIOR: The lifeboat house is divided into four bays with a wooden kingpost roof. The south eastern bay is floored and approached by a steep wooden ladder. The 1940 addition has a separate chamber.

SOUTHERN LIFEBOAT STATION:

MATERIALS: Steel framed on a concrete plinth, the walls and roof clad in corrugated iron and with a boarded wooden interior.

PLAN: Five bays with barrel-vaulted roof, the south-east bay of two storeys, the remainder of one storey.

EXTERIOR: The south-east or seaward elevation has a first-floor oriel window, probably of circa 1940. The original large doors for launching the lifeboat have been replaced by smaller late C20 doors. The side elevations have nine-light continuous casements. The north west or landward elevation has one window at the top and a ledged and braced pedestrian entrance.

INTERIOR: Exposed roof structure of steel trusses with wooden boarding above, the steel wall frame concealed by wooden boarding. The south-eastern bay has an upper room with concertina braces to the floor, approached up a steep wooden staircase. The first floor room has identical wooden boarding to the rest of the building but a late-C20 partition wall has been erected at the top of the stairs with late-C20 six-panelled door. The north-eastern side has a small office with boarded walls.

HISTORY: The original Royal National Lifeboat Institute (RNLI) lifeboat station at Hythe was established in 1876 on a site at the junction of Princes Parade and Seabrook Road. In 1891, as the result of the loss of the Benvenue in November 1891 it was decided to move to another site. The Seabrook Road lifeboat station was converted into a house and was demolished in 1956.

The 1893 Lifeboat House was built on a site adjacent to the Hythe and Sandgate Gas Company premises at the end of The Parade, Hythe. The existing lifeboat from Seabrook Road, the Meyer de Rothschild, was moved to the new lifeboat house. Three successive lifeboats were named The Meyer de Rothschild after the donor, as was customary. In 1929 the City of Nottingham came into service, a gift from Nottingham Lifeboat Fund. In 1934 a new larger lifeboat called The Viscountess Wakefield was donated by Viscount Wakefield, who lived in Hythe and was made a Freeman in 1930. Unfortunately the new lifeboat was too large for the existing lifeboat house so a new lifeboat house with a pre-fabricated steel frame, clad in corrugated iron and a