TRIP OUT ON THE NEWHAVEN LIFEBOAT

How long were you in Newhaven Robin ? My family moved there in 1964 and my father Len was an auxiliary coastguard before joining the lifeboat as signalman. If I remember correctly Edgar and Joyce lived at the very end of the row of coastguard cottages next to Geneva Road (Chalky Hill). My uncle, George, was Edgar's 2nd coxswain. 

Rob - we moved to Newhaven in summer 1963 and left in spring 1970.  Your father would have been an auxiliary when my father was one of the coastguards.  We lived in the 3rd house along from Chalky Hill. Edgar and Joyce lived next door in the 4th house. After the new Coastguard houses were built in 1970s the first house in the terrace was divided into 2 flats and Edgar and Joyce moved into one of them, which is why you remember them living next to Chalky Hill.

Edgar was lifeboat coxswain during the seven years we lived in Newhaven. He was also a boat builder and had a small yard on Denton Island.  Joyce worked on Denton Island too, at Fergusons. She died in 1979. Edgar remarried and continued living in the flat next to Chalky Hill until he died sometime in the early 1990s. 

Hi Robin. My father Len, who moved from Aux Coastguard to lifeboat signalman, took over from Edgar as lifeboat coxswain in 1976 when Newhaven received a new class of boat. My uncle George was Edgar's 2nd coxswain. Edgar was a frequent visitor to our house and, as a crewmember myself, I had the privilege to take part in lifeboat 'shout' as crew to Edgar, when the reserve lifeboat was launched to assist the station lifeboat, in a search in December 1981. Edgar was press ganged from the fisherman's club to take the helm one last time of the Watson class Tynesider, stored in the old boathouse, as the Newhaven lifeboat was already at sea off of Brighton marina assisting a yacht. He was quite the sight to a newbie lifeboatman in his flat cap and fisherman's jacket, hands firm on the wheel and with his one good eye taking in every detail and nuance of the waves and swell. We automatically clipped our safety harnesses onto the boat, but was told by Edgar to unclip as if the lifeboat capsized she would not likely self right. A dose of reality to a nipper (17) like me, or as my late father would say, "Character Building".