A small fishing smack, with a crew of five people, was wrecked off
Bacton, near Great Yarmouth, on the 27th of November 1859. The poor men
were in the rigging, without food or drink, for 60 hours before they
were rescued from the mast of their sunken vessel, to which they had
been clinging for more than 60 hours. For three nights and two days
they held on to this uncertain support, about 8 feet above the raging
sea, without food, and almost without clothing. One of the men took off
his shirt and held it out as a signal of distress, till it was blown
from his feeble grasp. The vessel struck upon the Harborough Sand on
Friday evening at nine o'clock, and they were not rescued till ten
o'clock on Monday morning--a case of most remarkable endurance. The
vessel was but a small one, a smack with four hands. The fourth hand, a
boy, climbed the mast with the others, and held on till the Saturday,
when he became exhausted, and, relaxing his hold, slipped down into the
sea. One of the men went down after him, seized him, and dragged him up
the mast again; but there was nothing to which to lash him, and no
crosstrees or spars on which to rest; so that during the night, when
almost senseless with cold and fatigue, the poor boy slipped down again,
and was lost in the darkness. On Sunday they were tantalised with the
hope of immediate succour. A vessel saw their signals and heard their
cries, and sent a boat to their relief; but after buffeting with the
wind and tide, they had the mortification to see her give up the
attempt, and return to the vessel. Then it was that black despair took
possession of them, and they gave themselves up for lost; but clinging
to their frail support for an hour or two longer, they heard a gun fire.
This gave them fresh courage, for they took it to be a signal, as in
fact it was, that their case was known, and an attempt would be made to
save them. The vessel stood in and communicated with the shore, and a
boat put off to search for them; but they were such a speck on the
ocean, that, night coming on, they could not be seen, and the boat
returned to shore. For the third night, therefore, they had still to
cling on, expecting every moment that the mast would go over and bury
them in the deep. On the Monday morning the Bacton boat made another
attempt, fell in with them at ten o'clock, and landed them at Palling,
more dead than alive, whence, as soon as they could be moved, they were
brought to the Yarmouth Sailors' Home, their swollen limbs, benumbed
frames, and ghastly countenances testifying to the sufferings they had
undergone. At this Home the poor men remained several weeks, receiving
every attention from the officers of the establishment.
To conclude our short account of the services of lifeboats, we may state
that in the year 1860 the lives of no less than 326 persons were saved
by those stationed on the British coast, every one of which would have
been lost.
We will give another example, to exhibit more clearly the nature of the
work the brave crews undertake.
In the early part of that year, as the day closed, it was blowing a
heavy gale off Lyme-Regis. About eight o'clock at night the alarm was
given that a vessel was in distress in the offing. It was pitchy dark;
indeed, the intense darkness, the strong gale, and the heavy surf on
shore were enough to appal any man entering the lifeboat. After some
short delay, however, the boat was manned by a gallant crew--her
coxswain, Thomas Bradley, being early at his post. Tar barrels were
lighted up on shore, and the boat proceeded on her mission of mercy. So
truly awful was the night, that nearly everyone on shore believed she
would never return again. However, after battling with the fury of the
storm, and after an absence of about an hour and a half, the lifeboat
did return, laden with the shipwrecked crew of three men of the smack
_Elizabeth Ann_, of Lyme-Regis.