| Official Number: | ON 670 |
| Donor: | Legacy of Henry Francis Bailey, Brockenhurst, Surrey. |
| Station | Cromer |
RNLB H F Bailey (ON 670) was the first Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) lifeboat powered by a motor, that served from Cromer Lifeboat Station.
The lifeboat was built in 1923 by J. Samuel White at Cowes on the Isle of Wight. The lifeboat was powered by an 80 bhp Weyburn DE6 engine and was a Norfolk and Suffolk-class lifeboat. She was 46feet and 6inches long with a breadth of 12inchesft9inchesin (ftin)
The Cromer station had four motor-powered lifeboats all called H F Bailey, after the donor, a Mr Henry Francis Bailey of Brockenhurst,[1] a London merchant who was born in Norfolk and had died in 1916.
To accommodate this new motor lifeboat a new lifeboat house and slipway were built on the end of the Cromer Pier.[2] The planning and building of this new boathouse was carried out three years before the arrival of H F Bailey and was ready[2] on the day that the new lifeboat arrived in the town. The new house was 60feet long and 21feet wide.[2] The house had a solid concrete[2] floor. The placing of this house at the end of the towns pier allowed the new lifeboat to be launched at all states and conditions of the tide, and with the pier itself 500feet from the shore line plus the 60feet of the boathouse and a further 165feet of slipway meant that the lifeboat when launched would be well clear of the rocks and groynes along Cromer's beach front.[2] The new lifeboat house cost £32,000.[2] This boathouse remained in constant use until 1995 finally being replaced with a new station in 1999.[2] The 1923 station now resides at Southwold.
H F Bailey (ON 670) was the Cromer No. 1 boat on station for just one year but due to problems with her launch and recovery, on the slipway, she was transferred to Great Yarmouth & Gorleston on 5 May 1924, where she served until 1939
| Year | Date | Casualty | Lives saved |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1923 | 19 July | Smack Hepatica of Lowestoft, assisted to save vessel | |
| 1924 | 1 January | Steamship Nephrite of Glasgow, assisted to save vessel | 12 |