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Harold Taylor decided, at the age of 30 in the mid 1950's, to follow a different career - lighthouse keeping. He therefore had his initial training at a school in Harwich and from there was posted to Hartland Point. Harold tells us of his days there.
Having completed my initial training at Harwich, which I describe as learning to boil water without burning it, I was sent home. Eventually I received notice to report to Hartland Point for engine training.
Arriving at the Lighthouse, I was invited by the Principle Keeper to tea with his wife. They appeared to be a pleasant couple, but she had an over inflated opinion of the position of her husband. She, you might say, ran the station. Ted was completely 'under her thumb'. What she did not approve was not done.
I was shown to my quarters, which were two large rooms off the tower and over the engine room. They were very dirty, and the range, which was the only means of cooking and heating, was in a very dilapidated condition.
I went down to the engine room for lighting up time to see how this function was carried out. Here I met Martin Biddle, who was on watch. The Lighting engines were twin cylinder semi-diesel engines.
The principal of starting was first of all to light a blowlamp to warm up the cylinder head. This blowlamp was in a fixed position for the purpose. Having played the flame onto the head for a given amount of time, one opened a port (a small screw) to allow gas to escape the cylinder. Depending upon the colour of the gas escaping, one decided if the chamber was warm enough to allow combustion. The lever was then pressed to allow a blast of compressed air to turn the engine, which would cause the compression of gasses to start the engine driving itself.
Sometimes the one blast might be enough to start the engine, but at others it was necessary to use more. To enable one to inject this blast at the right position of the turning of the engine, a white mark was made on the flywheel. If you missed this mark by only a fraction you could get the engine running in a reverse direction, far easier than in its correct direction. This resulted in the exhaust fumes being discharged into the engine room instead of into the exhaust pipe that would take it outside.
The light was put on display, by the keeper going to a distribution board and throwing some switches to make the buildings live. I think I am right in saying that until the engines were started, the houses had no lights. I may be wrong, but that is what happens on island lighthouses. The keeper then went to the top of the tower and started the lens rotating, after taking down the curtains that shielded the suns rays from striking the prisms and theoretically setting light to the paintwork.
In practice I only found that the rays might set light to the curtains. This could happen in the short time that elapsed if you took the curtains down on the sun side of the lantern first.
A switch would then be thrown to start the lens revolving, and another to turn on the bulb which was of 3,000 watts and larger than a football. The light projected was reputed be over 6,000,000 candlepower.
I was not required any more that night and spent some of the evening with Martin and his family, who were busy packing. They were on transfer to Portland Bill, being replaced by Frank Harris, who was due to arrive shortly. The other keeper on the station was Bert Smith and his wife, who had recently had a baby daughter.
I was not required for any duty the following day, but made myself useful in learning as much about the station as I could. I soon realised that each keeper had their own ideas about the engines etc, so I requested Ted to get out the manuals for me to study. Initially he did not seem to know where to find them!
One of the jobs I volunteered for was to go up to the farm on top of the cliff and collect the milk. There had been a period earlier when, due to a rock fall, the station had been considered a 'rock station', because of the difficulty of approach. Families were moved out until repairs were completed and a new road cut.
I am not certain of the date of this, but because of this there was a permanent staff of a mason and labourer attached to the station, although not coming under the control of the PK. They were engaged in building reinforcements to the rock base below to prevent erosion. When the station was affected, a path had been cut from the coastguard station across to a suitable place, where they then built a staircase down the cliff side to meet the road below the rock fall.
On the third day the PK. called me in for a cup of tea and told me he had received a letter telling him that I was supposed to be there, so he would set me to learning the engines. He also produced the manuals I had requested. So much for Trinity's efficiency in communication! Their incompetence I was later to learn of in greater detail.
I put the manuals to work, and realised that the keepers were only putting into practice what they had learned by word of mouth. The main thing I learned was that they were making too much use of the blowlamp, and this was to be put to good use at a station later on.
The practice was to let the blowlamp burn for 10 minutes. The manuals did not disagree with this time factor, except that the blowlamp was obviously a newer contribution to the engine since its invention. The manual referred to a slow wick heater, which was just a wick soaked in paraffin and allowed to burn over the bulb of the cylinder head. Hence a lot less heat was available than from the blowlamp.
The fog signal engines were of the four-cylinder variety. One did not have the same difficulty with the air blast starting with these, as they were controlled by a synchronised system of blasts. All one had to do was turn on the air once the domes were hot enough and the right colour gas being produced from the ports. For the use of the fog signal it required two huge tanks to be filled with compressed air.
These were pumped up to a pressure of somewhere around 100 lbs. for storage, although the sounding tank was kept at something like 30lbs for the actual fog horn. The 100 lbs. was for starting purposes. For emergency purposes, in case the air tanks had blown down, there were 4 compressed air cylinders. These could be pumped up from the engines, but I rarely saw it done.
One of my first jobs was to get the kitchen range in my quarters working properly. It was soon apparent that the main cause was that the stove had been burnt too fiercely and some of the components had warped or melted from the heat. The firebricks were also worn out, probably from the same cause. With the aid of quite a lot of fire cement and some spares from the store, I was able to make a reasonable repair job.
The room was a different problem. Partly due to the range not working properly, and also, as the result of adverse winds, the walls were thick with smoke blackening. I took lots of supplies of cleaning materials and white powder, and scrubbed the walls of both living room and bedroom, the latter being almost as bad. The filth was so great that I got a skin infection from the mess - a mild dose of dermatitis I suppose.
I was not on any watch keeping duties, so had plenty of spare time. Especially on wet and miserable days, which were many at that time of the year.
When Frank arrived, I was called on to do duty in order to give him ample time to settle in and get all his furniture straight. I covered the watches for ten days. After that period I got quite friendly with Frank, his wife and two children.
After 5 weeks on the station, the question came up from time to time as to how much longer I would stay at the station. Eventually we put it to Ted, that having covered the watches for those ten days and coped with the engines satisfactorily, I must be proficient. This resulted in approaches being made to Swansea Depot, which condescended and told me I could return home and await instruction.
I had had plenty of experiences in my time on Hartland Point. The nearest village was 4 miles away. The keepers were allowed a taxi once a week to go shopping, but as the PK and his wife went, it meant that only one of each of the families could also go. I used to walk into the village anyhow, just to pass the time.
One day I decided on my day off, to go to Clovelley, which would be a round trip of about 15. As my hobby was race walking, this distance meant little to me. I set out, but on the return trip had decided that I would call in at the village, which on that evening would be having a travelling cinema show. Whilst the performance was on, there was terrific rain and hailstorm which rattled down on the roof of the building.
After the show I set out to walk home, but before I had gone far, heavy snow fell and I was saturated by the time I reached the farm gate. There was rarely any traffic on that road although there was the coastguard station above the lighthouse, and opposite the farm gates was an RAF guard dog base for the various stations nearby. I was very pleased to get into my bed that night with the large boulder I had left in the oven to act as my hot water bottle.
One other incident comes to mind. At the top of the hill before the entrance gate was an enclosed plot of land, which was the gardens for the lighthouse. It was quite a substantial plot, which I suppose gave each keeper about 20 rod of garden and a pigsty. The ground was largely uncultivated, but the P.K did keep a pig. Frank intended to get his plot under cultivation and asked me if I would help, which I was pleased to do in order to pass the time.
Sometime during the period after his arrival, the PK decided that their pig would be killed and engaged a roving licensed slaughterer to do the job. He arrived and we all went up the hill to the lock-up garages where the dastardly deed was to be carried out. Hot water and a galvanised bath were all prepared. The shot was fired and the pig was dead.
The butcher went to slit the pig's throat to bleed the carcass, and his knife broke. What to do? None of the others were fit to hurry all the way down the hill and up again before the blood congealed in the veins. I therefore volunteered to run down and offered to bring back a sharp sheath knife, which I had.
This task I carried out as quickly as possible, and the operation proceeded in an orderly manner. I was intrigued with the razor type instrument with which the butcher shaved the carcass in the hot water. It was reminiscent of an inverted tin lid with the handle fixed centrally on the sharp side, so that as it was drawn forward it shaved off the bristle. For my part in the operation, Mrs PK arrived at my door the next day with part of the liver, which saved me buying meat for a couple of days.
There transpired to be some funny anomalies with Trinity pay. As I was on a shore station, I was not allowed any of the food or other allowances that a rock station man would get. Neither was I allowed any house allowance, but I was given a quarter's allowance, which amounted to about half of that of house allowance for my family.
There were some very weird and wonderful conditions concerning the pay. For instance, I had my fare paid to Hartland from home, and also to my next station, but after that I was expected to pay my own fare, as my base was Swansea.
On an ornithological note, one day when I was walking back to the lighthouse, just at the top of the hill I noticed a flock of about 20 small birds which I did not recognise. Having noted details, I later discovered them to be Ortoland Bunting. Several years later when I was on Bardsey, Chris Milne, the photographer for the RSPB, was highly delighted to have the opportunity to film a solitary bird in the lighthouse garden. I told him my tale, but he seemed highly sceptical that I had seen such a large number of the birds.
So, there ended Harold's days on Hartland Point. Let's hope his days at his next posting (Lundy) were more enlightening for him.
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