LIFEBOAT MAGAZINE ARCHIVE

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Minehead, Somerset. At 6.5 on the evening of the 20th of March, 1958, the police told the honorary secretary that a young man had fallen on to the rocky shore about three miles west of Mine- head and was seriously injured. A rescue from the shore was impossible, as it was high water. At 6.25 the life- boat B.H.M.H. was launched in a moderate sea, with a moderate east- south-easterly wind blowing. There was a doctor on board, and the life- boat had a dinghy in tow. The life- boat reached the position, and two members of the crew tried to row the dinghy ashore, but because of breaking seas over half submerged rocks they failed to reach the beach. It was growing dark, and the doctor asked to be taken in the dinghy as far inshore aspossible. Forty yards from the beach he stripped to his underclothes, and wearing a life-jacket waded the rest of the way, only to find that the young man had died. The doctor swam back to the dinghy, and shortly after being helped aboard the life-boat he collapsed.

The life-boat immediately returned to her station, where the doctor was landed at 8.40. He was taken to hospital and later recovered. The body of the man was removed by the police at low water, and the action of the doctor was referred to the Royal Humane Society. Rewards to the crew, £9 ; rewards to the helpers on shore, £7 6s..