BARGE WAS TOWED At 2.30 p.m. on 8th November, 1964, the coxswain told the honorary secretary that a boat had fired a red flare while in a choppy sea on the Outer Carrs. At 2.40, three hours before high water, the lifeboat Richard Ashley was launched into a light south-easterly breeze. The vessel, the river barge Crescent Brand with a crew of two, was less than a mile from the life-boat station. The life-boat towed the barge to Blyth and returned to her station at 7.5..