Lifeboat Cottages On Spurn Head

A Memory of Spurn Head.

My great-great-grandfather Fewson Hopper was one of the first lifeboatmen to be housed in the Spurn Head cottages shown. They were built in the mid 19th century for the lifeboat crew members. Fewson (the maiden name of his mother) was lifeboat master (coxswain) from 1865-77, joining Britain's only professional resident lifeboat crew in 1846 and progressing to mate before being appointed master. On retirement from the boat, he became lighthouse keeper at Salt End, further down the River Humber.
Many of Fewson's ten children became involved in the lifesaving operations, including daughter Eliza who was Spurn's only postmistress, serving more than 50 years until 1920. She operated the electric telegraph for her father.
As a retired lifetime journalist, now author, I am currently researching and writing a history of my ancestral family on Spurn's lonely peninsula.