THE third volume in Cyril Noall's and Grahame Farr's series Wreck and Rescue around the Cornish Coast (D. Bradford Barton Ltd., Truro, 28s.) tells the history of life-boat stations on the south coast of Cornwall. These are: Mullion, Lizard-Cadgwith, Coverack, Falmouth, Mevagissey, Fowey, The Lizard, Cadgwith, Porthoustock, Portloe, Polkerris and Looe.

The consistently high standard shown in the earlier volumes is fully maintained, and the three volumes must be regarded as a standard work on the history of Cornish life-boats.

Most of the rescues recorded were carried out by members of life-boat crews, but the authors also pay appropriate tribute to the gallantry shown by Cornish fishermen, so often described in the past as wreckers, in putting out to the rescue before there were life-boats available for this purpose.

Many of the rescues described make exciting and, in some cases, tragic reading. There was, for instance, the wreck of the steamship Mohegan of Hull in October, 1898. The Porthoustock life-boat put out and found an overturned boat, underneath which there were two women. The bowman jumped into the water and cut away the thwart with an axe to release one of them.

The life-boat put up signals for further help, and a volunteer crew, including the second coxswain and honorary secretary, put out in a boat. They were unable to give help directly, but the second coxswain soaked his necktie in paraffin to make a torch to attract the attention of the survivors. He then told them to remain where they were until he could direct the life-boat to their help.

THE HENRY BLOGG TRADITION A modern rescue, the service to the motor vessel Citrine, in the course of which the acting Coverack Coxswain Reginald Carey drove the life-boat over the port quarter of the motor vessel, is also vividly described.

The book contains many other interesting facts and comments. At one time it was the regular practice for the Lizard life-boat to be transported through fields before being launched from the various coves.

We learn too that the first Cadgwith life-boat was provided by a fund raised by commercial travellers in the West of England.

The inaugural ceremony of the Mullion life-boat station in 1868 seems to have been a colourful occasion. It took place at Penzance, where ten thousand people were assembled. Other life-boats were present, their crews tossing their oars and cheering lustily. The six life-boats then took part in a race. The Institution came to the conclusion in 1872 that life-boat races, which had been popular events, ought to be discouraged, as they tended to take life-boats away from their stations when they might be needed for more important purposes.

Like the earlier volumes, the book is attractively illustrated and carefully documented.—P.H.

In the Battle of Britain, when the German air force threw its whole weight on the coasts and counties of southern England, life-boats from the mouth of the Humber to Weymouth were launched to friendly and enemy aeroplanes over 100 times.

As the radar stations along the east and south coasts detected the Luftwaffe massing over the continent, so this message was flashed to life-boat stations likely to be affected: 'Expect air battle in this area within next hour. Arrange life-boat stand by.' Now Richard Collier in Eagle Day (Hodder and Stoughton, 355.) has taken a new look at the Battle of Britain for the period 6th August to I5th September, 1940, and inevitably, as in most books about the R.A.F., the work of R.N.L.I.

life-boats is mentioned.

But clearly, to start with, the lightning strokes of aeroplanes fighting at speeds of over 300 m.p.h. gave the life-boatmen many problems, and one was that, no matter how quickly they launched or how hard they drove their boats, they were often too late to be of service. That they were always willing, despite the risk, there is no doubt. In three July weeks of 1940, before the Battle of Britain really got going, R.A.F. casualties were '220 killed or missing over the sea'. For the Air Ministry had provided only 18 high speed rescue launches to cover Great Britain's entire coastline—just two craft more than the 1936 establishment.

THE PRIME MINISTER WAS CONCERNED Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who was concerned about the high pilot losses due to drowning, was told that '60 per cent of all fatal air battles were taking place over the sea'.

Thus, for many weeks, a great burden fell on the life-boats of the R.N.L.I.

How lucky some pilots were is well illustrated in the following account from the book: 'Pilot after pilot could tell the same alarming story. Baling out over St. Margaret's Bay, Kent, Flying Officer Paul Le Rougetel was saved by the merest fluke; still drifting as night fell, the tiny luminous dial of his wrist watch caught the eye of Margate life-boat's Coxswain, "Sinbad" Price in the instant the pilot heeled over, unconscious.' On August 19, as the two air forces struggled over the approaches to Essex, Kent and Sussex, Lord Dowding, who commanded R.A.F. Fighter Command, greatly worried at the mounting casualties due to drowning, had to order his sector controllers to refrain from sending his fighters beyond the coastline to tackle small formations. Three days later, however, the Air Ministry stepped up its meagre air-sea rescue effort with Coastal Command spotter aeroplanes, a dozen Army Co-operation Command Lysanders, and naval patrol boats.

So some of the burden was eased from the shoulders of the weary lifeboatmen.

Meanwhile, Assistant Mechanic Alfred Lacey, of the Margate lifeboat, who saw a good few German airmen lifted from the sea although, without success, some sections of the public had pressed for them to be left to die, noted: 'If they could stand at all, they stood at attention.' Richard Collier mentions Pilot Officer Richard Hillary, author of The Last Enemy, who fell in flames off Margate in early September, 1940, and who, like Pilot Officer Paul Le Rougetel, was saved by the same life-boat in the nick of time. Pilot Officer Hillary was the great-great-great-great nephew of Sir William Hillary, founder of the life-boat service.—C.R.E..