75 years ago From THE LIFEBOAT of 1921 The Ladies' Life-boat Guild.

THE Institution has owed in the past, and still owes, so much to the generous and devoted service of women, that the Committee have long thought that it would be most desirable to form a Ladies' Life-boat Guild. Their idea has been that in this way they could best show their sense of the value of the services of women to the Institution, and at the same time give the many thousands of women who act as missionaries of the Lifeboat Cause, and help it to raise its indispensable funds, a greater feeling of personal fellowship in their work.

With this end in view, the Guild has been formed; the Duchess of Portland, who has been an active worker for the Cause, has consented to act as President of the Guild, and its formation was announced by the Prince of Wales at the Annual Meeting with his cordial approval and support.

The Constitution of the Guild is very simple, and is not intended to alter in any way the excellent organisation of the Ladies' Auxiliaries which already exist in connexion with many of the larger Branches of the Institution. All women will be eligible for membership, and all Presidents, Honorary Treasurers, Honorary Secretaries and working members of the present Ladies' Auxiliaries or Committees will automatically become original members of the Guild. A badge of membership, in the form of a brooch, with a bar and ribbon for office-holders has been specially designed, and also a card of membership signed by the President, which sets out that the object of the Guild is "to continue and extend the work of the Institution." The one qualification for membership is a readiness to help by personal service in the Guild's task of interesting and educating the public in the work of the Life-boat Service, and of raising the funds to maintain it.

The Guild has been formed at a time when the Institution is in more urgent need of the generous help of its workers, and the generous support of the public, than any previous time in its history. For it not only has to meet the enormous increase in the cost of all labour and commodities caused by the war, but it is carrying out the greatest developments in the work of saving life from shipwreck, which have been made since the Institution was founded nearly a hundred years ago.

The Committee of Management very earnestly hope that the Guild will not only prove a pleasure and a new encouragement to all those ladies who are already doing such splendid work for the Life-boat Cause, but a means of bringing many thousands more to the ranks of the Institution's workers. They look forward, indeed, to seeing the number of existing workers doubled, and the Guild established everywhere throughout the United Kingdom by 1942, when the Institution will celebrate its Centenary.

The Duchess of Portland, in a personal letter which she has sent to all the Branches, has written: "I think it will be an immense satisfaction and incentive to us all, in our work for this great Cause, to feel that we are united in a single body, and to know that, wherever we may go, we shall find new friends who are members of he Guild, and who have with us a common interest, duty and pleasure in its work." If everywhere the Guild is received in this spirit, its success will be assured, and it should become an organisation of the greatest value to the Life-boat Cause..