Milford Haven (harbour)

Milford Haven Waterway (Welsh: Dyfrffordd Aberdaugleddau) is a natural harbour in Pembrokeshire, West Wales. The Haven is a ria or drowned valley flooded at the end of the last Ice Age formed by the Pembroke River and the Daugleddau estuary, and winds west to the sea. As one of the deepest natural harbours in the world, it is a busy shipping channel, trafficked by ferries from Pembroke Dock to Ireland, oil tankers and pleasure craft. Admiral Horatio Nelson, visiting the harbour with the Hamiltons, described it as the next best natural harbour to Trincomalee in Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) and "the finest port in Christendom".

From the 790s until the Norman Invasion in 1066, the waterway was used occasionally by Vikings looking for shelter. During one visit in 854, the Viking Chieftain Hubba wintered in the Haven with 23 ships, eventually lending his name to the district of Hubberston. Evidence of metal working in the area was recently excavated, suggesting a level of industrialisation in the period 750 – 1100.

A Benedictine priory (Pill Priory) was established at the head of Hubberston Pill in 1170, as a daughter house of St Dogmaels Abbey. Built on virgin land, it stood alongside the priory on Caldey Island as part of the Tironian Order in West Wales, and was dedicated to St Budoc. Founded by Adam de Rupe, it stood until the Dissolution under Henry VIII. In 1171 Henry II designated the area the rendezvous for his Irish expedition. An army of 400 warships, 500 knights and 4,000 men-at-arms gathered in the haven before sailing to Waterford, and on to Dublin, which marked the first time an English king had stood on Irish soil, and the beginning of Henry's invasion of Ireland. St Thomas a Becket chapel was dedicated in 1180, a structure which looked out over the Haven from the north shore of the town. In later years it was used as a beacon for sailors in foul weather, and ultimately as a pig sty, until it was reconsecrated in the 20th century.

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