Douglas Lifeboat Station
| All-Weather Lifeboat | |
|---|---|
| Launch Method | Moored afloat |
| Address | Battery Pier, Douglas Head, Douglas, Isle of Man, IM1 5BB |
| Telephone | 01624 621367 |
Explore two centuries of RNLI lifeboat history, heroic rescues, and the enduring tradition of saving lives at sea.
In the capital of the Isle of Man, Douglas holds a unique place in lifeboat history: this was the home of Sir William Hillary, founder of the RNLI, who won four Gold Medals for gallantry from the waters of Douglas Bay. The station runs a Trent-class all-weather lifeboat. A lifeboat has served here since the earliest days of the organised service.
The first Douglas lifeboat, funded by the Duke of Atholl, arrived in 1802. Sir William Hillary, who had settled on the island, witnessed terrible wrecks in Douglas Bay and in 1823 published his appeal that led to the founding of the National Institution in 1824. The first lifeboat the Institution ever ordered, the Nestor, came to Douglas in 1825.
Hillary himself crewed the lifeboat. He received the Gold Medal as the Institution’s founder, and won it again in gallant services — most famously on 20 November 1830, when the mail steamer St George was wrecked on Conister Rock; Hillary, washed overboard during the service, was among those who saved the entire crew, and he and Lt Robert Robinson RN each received the Gold Medal.
The station was re-established by the RNLI in 1868. After the 1920s boathouse on Battery Pier was found unsafe in 2024, the lifeboat moved to a pontoon mooring; in 2025 a Trent-class lifeboat, the Betty Huntbatch, arrived to take over from the Mersey-class boat. The Tower of Refuge on Conister Rock, built at Hillary’s instigation, still stands in the bay.
