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Last updated 18
October2008 |
| Henry Francis Greathead #
4352
27 January 1757 - 1818 |
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Henry
built the first purpose-built lifeboat in 1789. By 1804 he had made
thirty more and did much to propagate lifeboat use.
There seems to be quite a bit of mystery and discussion
around this gentleman.
It would appear that Henry was born to John Greathead
who was the Supervisor of Salt Duties at Richmond in Yorkshire. He
spent some time in the merchant and naval services between 1777 and 1783. |
| Far better researchers than I have spent time trying to
unravel his life, so I will not presume to know. However no
Greathead website would be complete without his mention. |
| A
Greathead-type boat was built in 1802, having the
builder's number of eleven was 31 feet by 10 foot 6 inches. |
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| The
fishermen of Redcar raised £200 to bring the lifeboat to the fishing
village of Redcar, as it was then. She was christened the "Zetland"
in honour of the Lord of the Manor, and remained in service until 1880,
saving over 500 lives with the loss of only one crew member. The
lifeboat was housed in what is now Granville Terrace, and was launched
from a wooden carriage pulled by horses. She was crewed by
volunteers, mainly fishermen, who were alerted by a boy beating a drum to
the rhythm "Come along brave boys, come along". It is
the only surviving boat built of this type and has been
preserved. It can be viewed at the RNLI museum in Redcar along with
many other details of Henry's life and work. |
| Dr David J Greathead is in the process of collecting much information on this gentleman |
| See also my
article
which was published in "Your Family Tree" magazine February 2004
and a superb humorous video
created by Sheila She has
kindly give me permission to add this link and she says that Tyne Tees
TV who commissioned it will be fine about this too. |
