SICK MAN TAKEN OFF MOTOR VESSEL Southend-on-Sea, Essex. At 12.45 early on the morning of the 2nd January, 1962, the coastguard told the honorary secretary that he had received a message from the motor vessel Devonbrook of London, which was bound for London, that one of her crew was ill and that she would be off Southend about 1.45. The message asked if the life-boat would take out a doctor, and at 1.40 the life-boat Greater London II (Civil Service No. 30) was launched with a doctor on board.

There was a moderate northerly wind, the sea was slight, and the tide was ebbing. The life-boat found the vessel a mile and a half to the south-east of her station and put the doctor and three men with a stretcher on board. The sick man was then transferred to the lifeboat, which wirelessed for an ambulance to meet her at Southend, where she arrived at three o'clock..