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Former lighthouse keeper Harold Taylor, who was stationed at Bardsey Lighthouse from 1st June 1984 to 13th February 1986, describes his 18 months of service there:--
The time came for me to travel to Holyhead Depot, my first trip I went by car as I had so much gear to transport, but I found that parking facilities were not very good there and the vehicle was subject to a lot of salt spray.
I do not remember how often I used the car but I certainly recall using the train several times, which turned out to be very inconvenient. Especially Christmas Eve, 84. Due to the lateness of the relief I did not leave the town very early.
When I got to Leeds I caught the last train travelling east, this was because they had ceased running trains after mid-night at Christmas. There was in fact a strange sequel to this.
For my bus driver to Withernsea was Dave Tilley, it was his father who had been the P.K. at Lundy South, and had also retired as keeper at Withernsea living just round the corner from the lighthouse. Dave had been appointed to Skokham the same time I had first gone to Bardsey in 1958. He had resigned.
Arriving at the depot for my first turn I found that Lewis was still D.C. and one of the secretaries, Kathy Williams was still there. Many of the lads going off on the relief to Skerries and our own were new to me although I had been familiar with their names for some years.
That night we congregated at the Conservative Club, which was the hang out of Lewis who was a very sociable type of chap. I believe there were other Trinity workshop people there as well but I forget who. I met the chap who was to accompany me, Les MacSalley.
We all shared the same lodgings that night, but for future occasions I found myself another billet. Some of the others did also, in fact I believe the next occasion Les came to the abode I had found.
The following morning we travelled out of town to Valley, the R.A.F. station in that area, from where our flight would take place. It seemed rather strange being in the duty room with the on duty aircraft pilots and station control.
It was all very on top line because this was also the place where visiting aircraft would arrive and these sometimes included the higher echelon of the air force and visiting dignitaries. All the time; because this was a training station, streams of aircraft would be taking off and touching down I suppose in general doing the 'bumps'.
Once we had been given a slot for take off we would have to manoeuvre around the perimeter and take off across this flow of aircraft, which at times seemed very 'hairy' and we did not escape the now accepted 'buzzing'.
Our flight to Bardsey was about 25 minutes, flying along the coast most of the way before flying over the island and eventually landing. I am not sure who went ashore that relief, other than the P.K. Harry Whitehouse, but in subsequent reliefs Tom Parker went with him. On station when we arrived was Martin Wild, who I had met at the Royal Sovereign when he was an S.A.K.
In fact he was about to leave the station and return there. The relief was carried out in the morning. In the afternoon we were expecting an E.B. on the Annual inspection.
It turned out to be Capt. Smith. When he arrived I apologised and explained that we had only arrived on station that day and bearing that in mind did he mind if I let Martin show us both round. Unfortunately Martin found himself unable to master all questions, but between us we ironed out any difficulties.
I am not certain where the chopper went to afterwards, but normal practice was for it to go south to St. Ann's for the Skokham and Smalls relief before heading for Swansea and thence Cornwall.
Martin was able to 'gen.' us up very well on the station as he was a caring and intelligent bloke as was Les. Les had also come off for his first month on a new station. They would have been a good crew to have kept. The station was more or less in the state that I had left 23 years before. At that time a programme of automation was began, which obviously had not been successful, because Trinity was not as capable as they would like everyone to believe.
The systems intension was so that equipment installed could be controlled remotely using the V.H.F. telephone link from Holyhead depot. In fact before I had left they were in operating the Fog Signal at North Stack under such a system.
There was therefore, to all intents and purposes, a modern station which did not work. Coupled with this was also a Radio Beacon, with which we found problems. An electric fog horn that worked on the basis of a multiple speaker output.
There were electric generators, for the fog and light, and a battery system for the beacon, but the domestic lighting was still supplied by the lighting plant that had been installed when I had been there previously for the bird lights. The bird lights still operated, but not under the same premise that I had known them.
The island was now controlled by the Bardsey Island Trust, and most of the time they had a resident warden who was trying some agricultural experiments with trees and crops. There was now only one island farmer, Arthur Strick and his wife Jane. he bred sheep and she bred horses, Connemara ponies. The latter being a great bonus, because now there was acres of mushrooms everywhere.
Just after I had left previously, the Island had been bought from Lord Newborough, by Michael Pearson, one of the sons of Lord Cowdray. He had tried to turn it into an island paradise without success, having come foul of some traditionalists. He had in a small way improved the island but in others destroyed it.
He tore down all the field walls, where the Manx Shearwaters, and the Little Owls had nested. With the stones he had built a substantial quay for boats to load at high water. In this he had been aided by the Prince of Wales, who used his name to misappoint certain procedures. In order to get a suitable landing place built, the American forces were persuaded to built it as a military exercise.
It cost around £750000, but cost the island nothing. It consisted of a concrete apron from the beach to low water with rail tracks embedded in it for hauling up a trolley loaded with stores or a boat launcher. All the material being transported by Chinook helicopters.
The bird watching activity on the island was still active, but the warden now lived in a small shack, whilst visitors were still housed in the two cottages as before. The farmyard buildings had been adapted for storage of records etc., but for the winter vacation their books were all brought up to the old building of the lighthouse, where there was central heating for these months.
I was no happier with the set up at this lighthouse than other I have been on for some years. Since double manning the cooperation had run down. There were three keepers each day preparing their own meals separately, three and four times a day, rarely even having the occasional cup of coffee or pot of tea together.
Half of the gardens had been taken away to provide the helipad. I did start one garden and Les played at another. He was always going to do big things but never got round to it. I always felt that he was probably a drop out from a University. He gave the impression that he had studied either agriculture or horticulture.
Our dwelling now contained a bathroom and flush toilet plus an electric pumping system for getting the water out of the catchment tanks. There was central heating so we were not in a bad situation these days. The larder had been incorporated into the kitchen which now had a bottled gas cooker.
The sitting room however still housed not only the Medium wave transmitter but also a V.H.F. Transmitter and another air communications radio for use with the helicopters. They took up one side of the room leaving little space for the telly.
We also still did weather reporting at this station, and probably more than at any other station. It included all the usual three hourly reports, plus climatic report three times a day which included rain gauges three times, and none of the stuff was on remote ' read out ' apparatus.
The television I found did not have good reception due to the mountains, but it improved a little when I had made a few adjustments to the aerial mounted on the roof. It would have been nice to have two aerials as we could get Irish T.V. quite well.
The old cottages which had been turned into quarters for 'out station' staff was well appointed with a large sitting room and adequate kitchen and bathroom. Their T.V. was black and white, but I was able to get a better reception on that, so often if I fancied a different programme to that which the others wanted I would go over.
I also used to make a point of having my bath over there as it saved our water supply. It had an independent supply, this was now a really comfortable station.
Continued in part 7.
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