• MAJOR John Showell-Rogers, R.M., is the station honorary secretary at Poole, Dorset, where there is a 35-foot 6-inch Liverpool type life-boat, the George Elmy, and a Dell Q.uay dory inshore life-boat with the hull number 17-003.

The local station was founded in 1865.

As a young man he was a keen oarsman and rowed in the Cambridge trial eights. He started sailing at the age of 14 on the Norfolk Broads and has been sailing ever since. In 1955 he sailed in the Fastnet Race with Francis Chichester in the original Gipsy Moth. Major Showell-Rogers is the owner of a 22-foot Westerly Cirrus yacht named Sarah Ann after his daughter.

Born in 1921 in London, the son of a doctor, Major Showell-Rogers, who has two children, was educated at Shrewsbury School and Trinity College, Cambridge. He volunteered for service in the Royal Marines on 3rd September, 1939, the day war was declared, but was not called up until September, 1940.

In 1943 the Royal Marines Division, of which he was a member, was disbanded and reformed into commandos and landing craft crews. In 1944, after a period in hospital, he joined 42 Commando in the Far East, later becoming adjutant of the unit and taking part in several amphibious landings in the Arakan, including that at Kangaw, which was comparable to the ferocity of the battle of Kohima.

After the war he was accepted for a permanent commission and remained in the service. Since World War II he has taken part in anti-guerilla operations in Malaya, where he was wounded in 1951, Cyprus, Sabah and Sarawak. Major Showell-Rogers has had considerable experience of both amphibious and helicopter operations.

In 1955 he qualified at the Army Staff College.His last appointment in the Royal Marines was as second-in-command at the Amphibious Training Unit, Poole. He is a qualified military parachutist.

Retiring in the normal course after nearly 26 years' service in 1966, he settled in Poole. For a time after leaving the forces he did fund-raising work for The Missions to Seamen, later joining the Civil Service. He accepted the post of honorary secretary of the Poole station in November, 1969, and has since become a member of the Central Appeals Committee.

T have always been interested in the R.N.L.I.', explained Major Showell-Rogers, 'and I am convinced that, so long as it is possible to do so, the service should be run on a voluntary basis.' As part-time activities he teaches driving and sailing. His wife, who is a keen member of the Poole ladies' life-boat guild, is responsible for R.N.L.I, souvenirs in Poole. And, interestingly, her uncle, Sir Arthur Rose, had a life-boat named after him. Now in the reserve fleet, the Sir Arthur Rose, which is a 46-foot Watson type built in 1938, has to date saved 109 lives.— C.R.E..