12 PORTS: MILFORD HAVEN – DREAMS AND VISIONS

Milford Haven is one of the world’s great deep-water harbours, a ria formed by the submergence of a river valley which extends inland some 30 kilometres before rising into the Eastern and Western Cleddau rivers. The Welsh name for the harbour is Aberdaugleddau or ‘mouth of the two rivers Cleddau.’ The upper reaches are predominantly farmland and woods while the lower ria, near the mouth of the Haven is industrial and urban in character with energy industries and larger towns of Milford Haven, Pembroke Dock and Neyland.

The advantages of Milford Haven were recognised in antiquity during the Roman colonisation and Viking raids in the ninth and tenth centuries. The Haven grew in importance following the arrival of the Normans from 1093 and the arrival of thousands of Flemish migrants during the early years of the eleventh century. On account of Pembrokeshire’s strategic location as an important staging post for Ireland, the harbour witnessed the departure of several English kings including Henry II, John, and Richard II as they embarked on campaigns. In the Middle Ages ships traded to Ireland, Bristol and continental Europe exporting wool, coal, leather and agricultural produce from prosperous borough ports that existed at Pembroke and further up river at Haverfordwest.

On 7th August 1485 Henry Tudor arrived from France and landed on the Dale peninsula, near the mouth of the waterway, en route to victory at Bosworth field, which secured him the crown of England. William Shakespeare referred to Milford in two of his plays, Richard III and Cymbeline. In Act III of the latter he gave Imogen the memorable line:

‘Tell me how Wales was made so happy as
T’inherit such a haven.’

In 1753 a Bristol merchant built a large warehouse at Barnlake near Neyland to import West Indian goods, especially sugar. Both sides of the haven had various quays and communities where small-scale shipbuilding was carried out. As a port in its own right, the town of Milford Haven can be dated back to 9th June 1790 when local landowner Sir William Hamilton (1730-1803) obtained an Act of Parliament to create a new town - taking its name from the haven - to ‘provide quays, docks and piers’. In 1792 some 23 Quaker families including the Starbucks and Folgers were encouraged to settle the new community from their home on Nantucket Island in the United States, with the goal of establishing a whaling fleet. The Royal Navy Board also agreed to establish a new naval dockyard at the mouth of Hubberston Pill in 1796, although this lasted little more than a decade.

Hamilton scored a spectacular publicity coup for his new town when he secured the visit of Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson  in 1802. The great hero declared the harbour of Milford Haven to be the best harbour in the world after Trincomalee in Ceylon. Capitalising on its moment of fame, the New Inn at which the party dined was later renamed the Lord Nelson Hotel in his honour.

The port of Milford Haven grew with a Post Office packet station sailing to Ireland, and as the town grew plans were developed to build spacious docks. An Act of Parliament was secured for that purpose in 1874, but a series of engineering difficulties and contractor bankruptcies led the project taking fourteen years to complete rather than the anticipated three years. During the work on the docks Brunel’s last and most ill-fated ship, the Great Eastern, was berthed at Milford Haven from 1875 to 1886, laid up and with no purpose until she weighed anchor to steam to Liverpool to be used as an exhibition ship. It had been intended to attract transatlantic passenger ships to call into the haven and despite the well-publicised arrival of the City of Rome (1889) with 134 passengers, such transatlantic visitors were few and far between.

The docks were finally completed in 1888 and the first vessel to enter was not a transatlantic passenger liner, as the Docks Company had long hoped, but the 127-ton trawler Sybil. This turned out to be the start of Milford Haven’s famous association with an industry which drove economic expansion, rising population, and the development of public services. By 1901 the town’s population stood at 5,102. The fishing industry enjoyed astonishing growth well into the twentieth century so that the number of fishing vessels entering the docks rose from 12 to 323 during the period 1889-1908. The tonnage of fish landed rose from 9,500 tons in 1890 to 44,283 in 1913. Around 4,000 people were employed by the fishing industry and there were 100 fish buyers living locally in the early 1920s. The industry had a dedicated railway spur, ice factory, box factory, and numerous ancillary services required for Wales’ largest fishing port and the fifth largest in the United Kingdom. Two world wars clearly impacted on the industry as trawlers were taken for national defence, although access to under-fished stocks at the end of both wars saw bumper years follow. The record catch was witnessed in 1946 with 59,000 tons, but from then on there was a slow but inexorable decline. By 1970 only 4,000 tons of fish was landed, and the number of trawlers was down to single figures by the late 1980s.

By then the focus of the port had long shifted to an industry that could take full advantage of the Haven’s deep water and undeveloped land: oil. The first refinery was constructed by Esso at a cost of £18m in 1960. Over the following decade other oil companies expended huge sums to build a further three refineries. Around the same time a 2000MW oil-fired power station was built near Pembroke and was operational 1968-2000 before it was demolished, and a second gas-fired power station opened on the same site on 19th September 2012. Between 1983 and 2014 three of the refineries closed due to international competition, over-capacity, and cost pressures. The remaining oil refinery now owned by Valero continues to play a vital role in the Pembrokeshire economy, and Milford Haven’s role as a leading energy port continues with Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) terminals replacing oil. These supply almost a third of the country’s gas requirements.

The age of oil came with a human and environmental cost. In particular local people remember the tragic incident of 2nd June 2011 when four refinery workers at Valero died in an explosion. The grounding the of the Sea Empress tanker on 15th February 1996 resulted in 73,000 tons of crude oil being spilled, devastating some of the country’s most important maritime habitats. There has since been a remarkable recovery, but the beauty of Pembrokeshire’s landscape still sits uneasily alongside the industry that sustains its economy.

Today this place continues to follow the ebb and flow of prosperity, decline and reinvention. The statutory harbour authority is an independent non-profit Trust Port which developed from the original Milford Haven Conservancy Act (1958). Transportation is at the core of operations and includes the safe navigation, cargo handling and ferry services to Ireland from Pembroke Dock. As well as LNG traffic the port still has the largest fishing docks in Wales, while leisure and tourism are vital sectors to the prosperity of the port. Leisure marinas operate at Neyland and Milford, and cruise ships are encouraged. Nine ships called in during the year 2017-18 bringing in 4,100 passengers. Perhaps the dreams of ocean liners at Milford Haven are finally being fulfilled.

Dr Simon Hancock is an author, historian, and curator of Haverfordwest Museum.