Coxswain Andrew Cunningham, of Crail, Fifeshire, who died on 15th De- cember, 1931, had been an officer of the Life-boat for twenty-seven years. In 1892, at the age of twenty-nine, he was appointed Bowman. Three years later he became second Coxswain, and in 1906 he was appointed Coxswain. He served as Coxswain for thirteen years, retiring in 1919, with a pension. The Station was established in 1884, and closed in 1923, and the eighty-four lives rescued by the Station were all rescued during Andrew Cunningham's Coxwain- ship. His outstanding service, in which he showed great courage and for which he was awarded the Silver Medal, was the rescue during the war of fifty-four lives from the torpedo-boat destroyer Success. The destroyer was driven ashore in a gale on the night of 27th De- cember, 1914. The Life-boat herself was badly holed on the rocks which sur- rounded the wreck, and Coxswain Cun- ningham himself, and one of the Crew, were washed out of the Life-boat, but were hauled back again. In spite of this he succeeded, with his damaged boat, in taking twenty men off the destroyer.

When these had been landed, he twice put out again and rescued another thirty-four. The St. Andrews Life-boat then arrived and rescued the remaining thirteen men. At the Scottish Life-boat Assembly held in Edinburgh in Novem- ber, 1929, Coxswain Cunningham was one of the Silver Medallists presented to the Prince of Wales..