HLW (D) 3

Milford Haven Waterway  

2002  

Outstanding  

Designated  

The Haven is a ria or drowned valley flooded after the end of the last Ice Age; its deep yet sheltered waters extend 30km inland of its mouth, before dividing into the Eastern and Western Cleddau which continue as tidal rivers for some distance. Tributaries such as the Pembroke, Carew and Cresswell Rivers and several smaller pills flowing into the Haven, significantly increase the length of its meandering and incised shore and coastline. On either side and extending to the Dale and Angle peninsulas at the Haven’s mouth, the low coastal plateau of south Pembrokeshire seldom rises above 80m above OD. The littoral landscape of Milford Haven encapsulates the whole chronological range of maritime conquest, settlement, commerce, fishing and defence from the 11th century to the changing realities of the late 20th century. This is a highly articulate and distinctive land and seascape; its integrity is its highest factor. It exhibits both continuity and adaptation and its overall setting and range of features make it unique in Wales if not in Britain. Yet, despite its robust adaptation to the modern industrial and maritime operations of the oil and power industries, the integrity of this multiperiod coastal landscape also depends on the conservation of its historic elements. Iron Age promontory forts are sited on several of the headlands at the entrance and along the course of the Haven and the Daugleddau. Early medieval, Christian and Viking sites are evidenced on place-name, documentary and epigraphic grounds, such as Early Christian Inscribed Stone monuments, but are no longer visible in the landscape. By contrast, the Norman conquest, achieved by coastally sited castle-boroughs, is still dramatically present at Pembroke, at Haverfordwest, and at Carew, all sited on the upper reaches of the rivers. Carew did not develop into a borough, and excavations, combined with a historic landscape study of Carew parish, has shown that a Dark Age stronghold and possible Romano-British site preceded the Norman castle, an indicator perhaps of similar pre-Norman foci at Pembroke and Haverfordwest. The precocious growth of these boroughs by the 13th century was partly because of their use as springboards for the Norman invasions of Ireland. In more recent times, the construction of the Cleddau bridge marked the end of a network of cross-Haven ferries, which explains the historic pattern of communications and settlements on the shores of the Daugleddau still visible in surviving traces of landing places, piers and jetties. Early cross- Haven routes led to St Davids and Dark Age embarkation and landing points. At the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, two new towns were constructed, Milford in 1790 by Sir William Hamilton, and Pembroke Dock in 1802 when the Royal Naval Dockyard was transferred from Milford. Both towns have regular planned layouts, both have experienced a history of boom and slump in shipbuilding, fishing and as railheads and ocean terminals. Despite some major changes in the late 20th century, they both preserve distinctive townscapes and waterfronts and much still remains of the Naval Dockyard. Changes in the ship sizes and technology meant that with the construction of these two towns, an earlier pattern of more dispersed coastal trade from places like Dale and Angle at the mouth of the Haven, and gradually from Pembroke and Haverfordwest, was relocated and concentrated in the new docks. This has to some extent preserved, even fossilized, quays, jetties and landing places and small settlements like Pennar, Lawrenny, Landshipping or Cosheston (which had two shipbuilding yards in the 18th century) further up river. These small ports served the coal mines of the Pembrokeshire coalfield located on both shores of the Daugleddau, and also the large limestone quarries at West Williamston, where a remarkable series of short canals through the tidal flats allowed direct barge access to the working faces at high tide. The Daugleddau ports flourished in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries, but continued to work through the 19th century by changing to using barges to tranship cargoes down river to bigger vessels at the mid-Haven ports. Medieval castles in the upper reaches of the Haven like Benton, Picton and Carew became transformed into gentry residences. Medieval ecclesiastical establishments, mainly small like Pill Priory or the Slebech Preceptory, survive as ruins or were adapted into residences. Only Picton Castle has an unbroken history of occupation and transformation into a great mansion with parks and gardens utilising the foreshore of the confluence of the Eastern and Western Cleddau Rivers. Conversely, well preserved sites of earlier, abandoned 17th century gardens and parks are still being recognized, notably the recently discovered terraced gardens of the vanished Landshipping House. The most complete of the military and naval fortifications and service structures in the Haven are the mid to late 19th century Palmerstonian Forts. The development of naval defence and weaponry can be appreciated in its entirety by viewing the forts both from the waterway and from the shores together with barracks and inland forts, stores and depots. These military dinosaurs present problems of conservation and use, and the same fate is beginning to overtake some if not all of the late 20th century’s legacy to the Haven, namely the jetties, oil terminals and shore processing facilities of the oil and power industries. This industry reached its zenith in the 1970s when Middle Eastern supply difficulties forced oil transport to use ocean routes in the VLCCs (Very Large Crude Carriers) for which the Haven, with its deep waters and westerly position on the north west European seaboard, was particularly suited. Visually, and in terms of the impact on the present landscape, the oil industry and the regulatory shore installations of traffic control and sea navigation systems run by the Milford Haven Port Authority cannot be ignored.