Coxswain Harry James Gawn, of Bembridge, who died on the 17th June, 1962, had served as coxswain of the Bembridge life-boat for 22$ years.

During this period Bembridge life-boat were launched on service 76 times and rescued 169 lives. He was awarded the bronze medal for gallantry for a war- time service in which the Bembridge life-boat rescued the crew of twenty- one of H.M. trawler Kingston Cairn- gorm in a blizzard on the 29th January, 1940. The life-boat was at sea for fourteen and a half hours in appalling conditions. One remarkable circum- stance of this rescue was that the trawler was under the command of the Chief Inspector of Life - boats, Lieut. - Commander P. E. Vaux, who had been recalled to the Navy on the outbreak of war..