LIFEBOAT MAGAZINE ARCHIVE

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St. Pierre Eglise

Douglas, Isle of Man.—At 10.-12 on the night of the 24th of March, 1953, the Ramsey coastguard rang up to say that a vessel south of Douglas Head was blowing short blasts on its siren, and at eleven o'clock the Douglas Head Lighthouse keeper also telephoned. It was thought that the vessel had hit rocks in the dense fog, and at 11.25 the life-boat Millie Walton was launched.

There was no wind, and the sea was smooth. The life-boat found the trawler St. Pierre Eglise, of Boulogne, at anchor four hundred yards south- west-by-south of Douglas Head, and the coxswain boarded her. She had a crew of eighteen. The skipper said they had been in collision that day, and that he wanted to bring his ship to Douglas for inspection. The second coxswain then went aboard and helped to take the trawler to Douglas, but early on the 25th she ran on the rocks at Port Skillion, just outside the entrance to Douglas harbour. The life-boat tried to tow her clear, without success, and then took the eighteen people on board and laid off. Thetrawler began to regain an even keel as the tide rose, and the life-boat put her crew aboard again. She was not making water and, at four o'clock in the morning, when the tide had risen sufficiently, the life-boat pulled her clear and took her to the harbour, arriving at 4.45.—Rewards. £18..