“MAN THE LIFE-BOAT!”
The Englishman’s direct interest in the Sea—The History of the
Life-boat and its Work—Its Origin—A Coach-builder the First
Inventor—Lionel Lukin’s Boat—Royal Encouragement—Wreck of the
_Adventure_—The Poor Crew Drowned in Sight of Thousands—Good out
of Evil—The South Shields Committee and their Prize Boat—Wouldhave
and Greathead—The latter Rewarded by Government, &c.—Slow Progress
of the Life-boat Movement—The Old Boat at Redcar—Organisation of
the National Life-boat Institution—Sir William Hillary’s Brave
Deeds—Terrible Losses at the Isle of Man—Loss of Three
Life-boats—Reorganisation of the Society—Immense Competition for a
Prize—Beeching’s “Self-righting” Boats—Buoyancy and
Ballast—Dangers of the Service—A Year’s Wrecks.
The history of the life-boat is one that concerns every Englishman. In
this isle of the sea, our own beloved Britain, our sympathies are
constantly excited on behalf of those who suffer from shipwreck. It would
not be too much to say that one-half the population of the United Kingdom
have some direct interest in this matter. Let us not be misunderstood.
Pecuniary interests in shipping are held here more largely than in any
other country, but we are not all shipowners or merchants. But how many of
us have some brother or friend a seafarer! Of the writer’s own direct
relatives six have travelled and voyaged to very far distant lands, and
the friends of whom the same might be said would aggregate several score.
This is no uncommon case.
The origin of the life-boat, as now understood, is of very modern date.
Those who would study the matter in its entirety cannot do better than
consult the work(71) from which the larger part of the material
incorporated in the present chapter is derived. One of the very earliest
inventors of a life-boat was Mr. Lionel Lukin, a coach-builder of Long
Acre, who turned his attention to the subject in 1784, from purely
benevolent motives. The then Prince of Wales (afterwards George IV.), who
knew Lukin personally, not only encouraged him to test his inventions, but
offered to pay the expenses. Lukin purchased a Norway yawl, to the outer
frame of which he added a projecting gunwale of cork, tapering from nine
inches amidships to very little at the bows and stern. Hollow water-tight
enclosures gave it great buoyancy, while ballast sufficient for stability
was afforded by a heavy false keel of iron. On this principle several
boats were constructed, and found to be, as the inventor describes them,
“unimmergible.” The Rev. Dr. Shairp, of Bamborough, hearing of the
invention, and having charge of a charity for saving life at sea, sent a
boat to Lukin to be made “unimmergible.” This was done, and satisfactory
accounts were afterwards received of the altered boat, which was reported
to have saved several lives in the first year of its use. The Admiralty
and Trinity House would have nothing to do with it, in spite of the Prince
of Wales’ interest in the matter. It has been said that a committee is a
body without a conscience; it was true in those good old days. Lukin
retired from business in 1824, and went to live at Hythe in Kent, where,
ten years after, he died; the inscription on his tomb in Hythe churchyard
says that he was the first to build a life-boat.
Notwithstanding Lukin’s increasing efforts to bring his life-boats into
general use, hardly any progress had been made in their general adoption
till 1789, when the _Adventure_, of Newcastle, was wrecked at the mouth of
the Tyne. While this vessel lay stranded on a dangerous sand at the
entrance of the river, in the midst of tremendous breakers, her crew
“dropped off one by one from the rigging,” only three hundred yards from
the shore, and in the presence of thousands of spectators. This horrible
disaster led to good results, for a committee was immediately appointed at
a meeting of the inhabitants of South Shields, and premiums offered for
the best model of a life-boat “calculated to brave the dangers of the sea,
particularly of broken water.” From many plans submitted two were
selected, those of Mr. William Wouldhave and Mr. Henry Greathead. The idea
of the first is said to have been suggested by the following circumstance.
Wouldhave had been asked to assist a woman in putting a “skeel” of water
on her head, when he noticed that she had a piece of a broken wooden dish
lying in the water, which floated with the points upwards, and turning it
over several times, he found that it always righted itself. Greathead’s
model had a curved instead of a straight keel, and he, as the only
practical boatbuilder who had competed, was awarded the premium, some of
Wouldhave’s ideas in regard to the use of cork being incorporated. This
first boat, thirty feet in length, had a cork lining twelve inches thick,
reaching from the deck to the thwarts, and a cork fender outside sixteen
inches deep, four inches wide, and twenty-one feet long, nearly 7 cwts. of
cork being fitted to the boat altogether. Greathead’s curved keel was,
however, the main point, and he is regarded as the inventor of the first
practicable life-boat. From 1791 to 1797 his first boat was the means of
saving the whole or larger part of the crews of five ships.
Notwithstanding all this, no other life-boat was built till 1798, when the
then Duke of Northumberland ordered one to be built at his own expense,
which in two years saved the crews of three vessels. Others were soon
after constructed, and before the end of 1803 Greathead built no less than
thirty-one, eight of which were for foreign countries. In the beginning of
1802, when two hundred lives had been saved at the entrance of the Tyne
alone, Greathead applied to Parliament for a national reward. Possibly it
is more remarkable that he obtained it. £1,200 was voted to him, to which
the Trinity House, Lloyd’s, and the Society of Arts added substantial
presents. The Emperor of Russia sent a diamond ring to the inventor.
After this, one might have reasonably thought that life-boats had become a
recognised institution and a national necessity. Not so. For years
afterwards there was hardly an advance made, and there was no organised
society to work them. The Government was apathetic. In 1810, one of
Greathead’s life-boats, carried overland to Hartley on the coast of
Northumberland, rescued the crews of several fishing-boats. On returning
toward the shore, the boat got too near a fatal rock-reef, and was split
in halves; thirty-four poor fellows—a moment before the savers and the
saved—were drowned. The authority before cited says that even now several
of Greathead’s boats—exclusively rowing boats—are to be found on the
coast; the oldest one is that in the possession of the boatmen at Redcar,
it having been built in 1802. On seeing this fine old life-boat, which had
saved some scores of lives, Viscount Stratford de Redcliffe composed some
years ago the following verses, which were set to music:—
“The Life-boat! Oh, the Life-boat!
We all have known so long,
A refuge for the feeble,
The glory of the strong.
Twice thirty years have vanished,
Since first upon the wave
She housed the drowning mariner,
And snatched him from the grave.
* * * *
The voices of the rescued,
Their numbers may be read,
The tears of speechless feeling
Our wives and children shed;
The memories of mercy
In man’s extremest need,
All for the dear old Life-boat
Uniting seem to plead.”
As already stated, the important movement for saving life from shipwreck
languished for some time. To Sir William Hillary and Thomas Wilson, then
one of the Members of Parliament for London, is due the organisation of
that most excellent society which has done more in the cause of humanity
than, perhaps, any other whatever, and has done it on means which even
to-day are too limited. Sir William Hillary was not a talker or subscriber
merely, but had been personally active in saving life. When a Government
cutter, the _Vigilant_, was wrecked in Douglas Bay, Isle of Man, where he
was then residing, he was one of the foremost in rescuing a part of the
crew. Listen to our authority: “Between the years 1821 and 1846, no fewer
than 144 wrecks had taken place on the island, and 172 lives were lost;
while the destruction of property was estimated at a quarter of a million.
In 1825, when the _City of Glasgow_ steamer was stranded in Douglas Bay,
Sir William Hillary assisted in saving the lives of sixty-two persons; and
in the same year eleven men from the brig Leopard, and nine from the sloop
_Fancy_, which became a total wreck. In 1827-32, Sir William, accompanied
by his son, saved many other lives; but his greatest success was on the
20th of November, 1830, when he saved in the life-boat twenty-two men, the
whole of the crew of the mail steamer _St. George_, which became a total
wreck on St. Mary’s Rock. On this occasion he was washed overboard among
the wreck, with other three persons, and was saved with great difficulty,
having had six of his ribs fractured.” No wonder that a genuine hero of
this character should have succeeded in obtaining the assistance and
encouragement of His Majesty King George IV., and any number of royal
highnesses, archbishops, bishops, noblemen, and other distinguished
people,(72) when the formation of a “Royal National Institution for the
Preservation of Life from Shipwreck” was mooted. The Society was
immediately organised, and the receipts for the first year of its
existence were £9,800 odd. The Committee, in their first report, were able
to state that they had built and stationed twelve life-boats, while,
doubtless, from their good example, thirty-nine life-boats had been
stationed on our shores by benevolent individuals and associations not
connected with the Institution. In its early days, the Society assisted
local bodies to place life-boats on the coast, such being independent of
its control. The good work done by the Association in its early days is
indicated in the following statement. In the second annual report the
Committee showed that up to that period the Society had contributed to the
saving of 342 lives from shipwreck, either by its own life-saving
apparatus or by other means, for which it had granted rewards. And its
total revenue for the second year was only £3,392 7s. 5d.!(73) For fifteen
years afterwards the annual receipts were still smaller.
[Illustration: LIFE-BOAT SAVING THE CREW OF THE “ST. GEORGE.”]
Between 1841 and 1850 the Institution lost three life-boats, and this was
the smallest part of the loss. In October, 1841, one of the boats at
Blyth, Northumberland, while being pulled against a strong wind, was
struck by a heavy sea, causing her to run stern under, and to half fill
with water. A second sea struck her, and she capsized. Ten men were
drowned. The second case occurred at Robin Hood’s Bay, on the coast of
Yorkshire, in February, 1843. The life-boat went off to the assistance of
a stranded vessel, the _Ann_, of London, during a fresh northerly gale.
The life-boat had got alongside the wreck, and was taking the crew off,
when, as far as can be understood, several men jumped into her at the
moment when a great wave struck her, and she capsized. Many of the crew
got on her bottom, while three remained underneath her, and in this state
she drifted towards the shore on the opposite side of the bay. On seeing
the accident from the shore, five gallant fellows launched a boat and
tried to pull off to the rescue, but had hardly encountered two seas, when
she was turned _end over end_, two of her crew being drowned. An officer
of the Coastguard service and eleven men lost their lives on this
occasion; a few were saved, coming to shore safely on the bottom of the
life-boat, and even under it, in its reversed condition.
[Illustration: LOSS OF A LIFE-BOAT AT THE SHIPWRECK OF THE “ANN.”]
A still worse accident occurred, in December, 1849, to the South Shields
life-boat, which had gone out with twenty-four experienced pilots to the
aid of the _Betsy_ of Littlehampton, stranded on the Herd Sand. She had
reached the wreck, and was lying alongside, though badly secured. The
shipwrecked men were about to descend into the boat, when a heavy sea,
recoiling from the bows of the vessel, lifted her on end, and a second sea
completed the work of destruction by throwing her completely over. She
ultimately drifted ashore. Twenty out of twenty-four on board were
drowned. On seeing the accident, two other life-boats immediately dashed
off, and saved four of the pilots and the crew of the _Betsy_.
The year 1850 marked an epoch in the history of life-boats, for then the
Institution was thoroughly re-organised. It was arranged that the boats
should be periodically inspected by qualified officers, and that a fixed
scale of payment, both for actual service or quarterly exercise, should be
made to the coxswains and crews.(74) His Grace the late Duke of
Northumberland offered a prize of one hundred guineas for the best model
of a life-boat, and a like sum towards constructing a boat on that model.
No less than 280 plans and models were sent in, not merely from all parts
of the United Kingdom, but from France, Holland, Germany, and the United
States. After some six months’ detailed examination on the part of the
committee, Mr. James Beeching, of Great Yarmouth, was awarded the prize.
That gentleman constructed several boats shortly afterwards, embodying
most or all of the leading improvements, and was the first to build a
“self-righting” life-boat. All of the Institution’s modern boats are on
this principle.
“The chief peculiarity of a life-boat,” says our authority, “which
distinguishes it from all ordinary boats, is its being rendered
unsubmergible, by attaching to it, chiefly within boards, water-tight
air-cases, or fixed water-tight compartments under a deck.... Especially
it is essential that the spare space along the sides of a life-boat,
within boards, should be entirely occupied by buoyant cases or
compartments; as when such is the case, on her shipping a sea, the water,
until got rid off, is confined to the midships part of the boat, where, to
a great extent, it serves as ballast, instead of falling over to the
lee-side, and destroying her equilibrium, as is the case in an ordinary
open boat.” The Institution’s self-righting boats are ballasted with
_heavy_ iron keels (up to 21 cwts.), and _light_ air-tight cases, cork,
&c. The advantage of employing a ballast of less specific gravity than
water is, that in the event of the boat being stove in, the buoyancy of
the material itself then comes into play.
“Self-righting” is, of course, a most important principle in life-boats,
and out of some 250 boats of the Institution there are scarcely more than
twenty which do not possess it. Up to twenty years or so ago it was
derided by many otherwise practical men. Yet as early as 1792 we find the
Rev. James Bremner, of Walls, Orkney, proposing to make all ordinary boats
capable of righting themselves in the water by placing two water-tight
casks, parallel to each other, in the head and stern sheets, and by
affixing a heavy iron keel. The self-righting power of to-day is obtained
by the following means. The boat is built with considerably higher
gunwales at the bows and stern than in the centre, while four to six feet
of the space at either end are water-tight air-chambers. A heavy iron keel
is attached, and a nearly equal weight of light air-cases, and cork
ballast cases are stowed betwixt the boat’s floor and the deck. “No other
measures are necessary to be taken in order to effect the self-righting
power. When the boat is forcibly placed in the water with her keel
upwards, she is floated unsteadily on the two air chambers at bow and
stern, while the heavy iron keel and other ballast then being carried
above the centre of gravity, an unstable equilibrium is at once effected,
in which dilemma the boat cannot remain, the raised weight falls on one
side or the other of the centre of gravity, and drags the boat round to
her ordinary position, when the water shipped during the evolution quickly
escapes through the relieving tubes, and she is again ready for any
service that may be required of her.”
Nearly all life-boat stations are provided with a transporting carriage,
built especially for the particular boat. The use of this, in many cases,
is to convey the boat by land to the point nearest the wreck. On some
coasts the distance may be several miles. In addition to this, a
boat-carriage is of immense service in launching a boat from a beach
without her keel touching the ground; so much so, indeed, that one can be
readily launched from a carriage through a high surf, when without one she
could not be got off the beach. The carriage is often backed sufficiently
far into the water to enable the boat to float when she is run off.
[Illustration: A life-boat and carriage—latest form.]
The foregoing will give a sufficient idea of the boat itself, and now to
its work. Courage and ability are required to put it into action, and the
dangers to which the crew of a life-boat are exposed entitle those who
encounter them to the greatest honour. “It is impossible to exaggerate the
awful circumstances attending a shipwreck. Let us picture the time, when,
after a peaceful sunset and the toils of the day are over, the hero of the
life-boat has retired to rest, and the silence of the night is unbroken
except by the murmur of the winds and the noise of the sea breaking on the
shore. With the approach of the storm, however, the winds and waves rise
in fury upon the deep, and with their mingled vengeance lash the cliffs
and the beach. A signal of distress arouses the coxswain and his men;
crowds rush in curiosity to the cliffs, or line the shore, heedless of the
driving rain or the blinding sleet. Barrels of tar are lighted on the
coast, and the signal gun and the fiery rocket make a fresh appeal to the
brave. The boat-house is unlocked, and the life-boat with her crew is
dragged hurriedly to the shore. The storm rages wildly, and the mountains
of surf and sea appal the stoutest heart. The gallant men look dubiously
at the work before them, and fathers and mothers and wives and children
implore them to desist from a hopeless enterprise. The voice of the
coxswain, however, prevails. The life-boat is launched among the breakers,
cutting bravely through the foaming mass—now buried under the swelling
billows, or rising on their summit—now dashed against the hapless wreck
still instinct with life—now driven from it by a mountain wave—now
embarking its living freight, and carrying them, through storm and danger
and darkness, to a blessed shore. Would that this was the invariable issue
of a life-boat service! The boat that adventures to a wreck meets with
disaster itself occasionally; and in the war of the elements some of its
gallant crew have sometimes been the first of its victims.” And when we
consider that the number of wrecks on the coasts of the United Kingdom
alone, averaged 1,446 per annum for the twenty years between 1852 and
1871, we can form an idea of the importance of life-boat work on these
shores. In the succeeding chapter some special instances of perilous and
successful rescues will be presented.