Mealsgate.org.uk - The George Moore Connection

The employees of the firm, Copestake, Groucock and Moore at Bow Churchyard also presented their memorial. They subscribed upwards of five hundred pounds. They first thought of erecting a marble tablet in St. Paul’s Cathedral, but they finally determined that their memorial should be something that George Moore himself would have admired. They presented a lifeboat to the National Lifeboat Institution. It was placed where it was likely to be of the greatest use-at Porthdinllaen, near Pwllheli, on the wild and rocky coast of Caernarvonshire, North Wales.

It was named the “George Moore Memorial Lifeboat.”

History of the lifeboat.

In fact there were two boats donated in all. (Click on the boat to view its service history)

GEORGE MOORE LIFEBOAT - 1877-1888 39 Launches (shouts) - 70 Lives rescued

GEORGE MOORE II LIFEBOAT - 1888-1902 11 Launches (shouts) - 22 Lives rescued

By strange coincidence, the first crew which came out of Silloth Docks, and was saved by the George Moore lifeboat was that of the schooner, 'Velocity'. The rescue took place during the evening of Sunday, March 24^th 1878 during a heavy gale and blinding snowstorm, when the schooner ran into serious difficulties off Porthdinllaen Bay and had called for assistance. Fortunately the lifeboat was able to put to sea and save the crew without any lives being lost.

There have been eight main lifeboats at Porthdinllaen since the first one named 'Cotton Shepherd' went into service in 1864. 'George Moore' replaced 'Cotton Shepherd' in 1877 whilst 'George Moore II' was succeeded by 'Barbara Fleming' in 1902. The current lifeboat at this R.N.L.I. station, 'Hetty Rampton', a 47' x 15', steel hulled 'Tyne Class' self-righting lifeboat powered by two 425 h.p. diesel engines giving a top speed of 18 knots. She has been in service since 1987 after being built at Cowes in the Isle of Wight at a cost of about £560,000. More information can be found on the RNLI Porthdinllaen site.