A TABLET has been placed on the side of the life-boathouse at Walmer, Kent, commemorating the Walmer luggers which were, in the words of the Institution's honorary secretary at Walmer, " the cradle of the life-boat- men " of the Downs. This tablet, " in memory of former WTalmer luggers of the XlXth century," contains the names of twenty, from 1854 to 1894, and records that " by the bravery and skill of those who manned these and other Walmer luggers, of which no record remains, many ships were rescued and many lives were saved." The luggers at one time had three masts, with big sails, the mizzen mast being stepped as far aft as possible.

They were to be found all round the coast from Lowestoft to Brighton.

Their descent is probably from the Mediterranean lateens, by way of the French luggers in the Channel. Later the main mast was given up. They were large boats very broad in the beam. Forty feet by thirteen was a common size, and some were even larger. From them in turn came another smaller and lighter boat, the galley punt, which was from twenty to thirty feet long with seven-foot beam, and a single mast and lug sail.

The tablet has been presented by Mr. Charles Northcote Latter, who, as a boy in the seventies of last century, had helped to launch the luggers. On returning to Walmer after a fiftv years' absence he found that the last of them had gone, and wished to commemorate their work.

The tablet was unveiled on 25th August by Sir Gerald Woods Wollaston, M.V.O., Garter King of Arms, who recalled as a boy sailing in the old Walmer galley punts, of which now only one remains. The chair was taken by Mr. H. W. Pearson, vice- chairman of the Walmer Urban District Council, and coxswain of the Walmer motor life-boat, who with his father had been the owner of the last of the luggers, the second Cosmopolite..