SILVER MEDAL SERVICE AT BROUGHTY FERRY DEC. 5TH. - BROUGHTY FERRY, AND ARBROATH, ANGUS. - During the evening the Bell Rock Lighthouse, off the coast of Angus, reported by radio telephony that a small steamer had run on to the Bell Rock. At eight o’clock Broughty Ferry receivedthe news from the coastguard. Seventeen minutes later the motor life-boat Mona was launched. The coastguard at Arbroath had also received the news, but, owing to the black-out, he was unable to get in touch with the life-boat coxswain at once. He did so at 8.43, and at nine o’clock the motor life-boat John and William Mudie was launched.

A fresh north-east wind was blowing, with squalls of sleet. A heavy swell was running. It was bitterly cold. The night was very dark, and on account of the war the lighthouse was showing no light, but it was specially lit to guide the life-boats.

The Arbroath life-boat had nine and a half miles to go ; the Broughty Ferry boat seventeen miles.

Arbroath reached the lighthouse at ten o’clock. She found the vessel to be the steam trawler Quixotic, of Aberdeen, with a crew of nine. She was on the Bell Rock only fifty feet northwest of the lighthouse itself. Thc life boat anchored to windward, veered down towards the trawler, and fired a line across her with her linethrowing pistol, but the line fouled something, and carried away. At the same moment the anchor ceased to hold. The coxswain brought the lifeboat out again, intending to make another attempt.

The Broughty Ferry life-boat had just arrived. As Arbroath stood out, Broughty Ferry stood in. She had switched on her searchlight. So too had an Admiralty trawler which was standing by. In this double light the Broughty Ferry coxswain could clearly see the trawler. Her bow was on the rocks. She was lying on her port bilge.

and her stern was under water to nearly amidships. Heavy seas were breaking over her. He could see her crew on the fore deck and in the fore rigging. He could see the rocks at her bow.

There was so little water that it was impossible for the life-boat to get under the lee of the trawler, so the coxswain anchored and dropped down on his cable, stern first, close to her weather side. He then threw a grapnel aboard her, and went alongside her fore end, where the crew were gathered.The life-boat was rising and falling heavily in the broken water, and in the trough of the seas she had not more than two feet under her keel.

The coxswain could see the rocks close in front of him, as he went in stern first ; and as each sea approached, he went full speed ahead on his engine to prevent the sea from carrying the life-boat on to the rocks. One of these seas, breaking over her bow, washed several of her crew aft, injured two of them, and nearly swept a third through the guard rails and overboard.

As each sea passed, the coxswain, by hauling on his cable on his port bow, and his grapnel on his starboard bow, brought the life-boat neatly alongsidc the wreck again.

In this dangerous position he held her for half an hour, and the trawler’s crew, soaked, chilled and exhausted by three hours’ exposure to the bitter winds and breaking seas, jumped aboard, one by one, as the chance came.

Just before eleven o’clock the last of them was rescued, and the life-boat weighed anchor and made for home.

She arrived at 1.30 in the morning, more than five hours after putting out, REWARDS The coxswain handled the life-boat very courageously and with such coolness and skill that he brought her out undamaged except for a few scratches and dents to her paint. He was very ably supported by the acting second coxswain, who looked after the cable and grapnel rope, and by the motor mechanic, who in the swift. manoeuvring alongside the wreck carried out his orders instantly.

The Institution made the following awards : To COXSWAIN JAMES COULL, the silver medal for gallantry and a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum ; To ACTING SECOND-COXSWAIN GEORGE B. SMITH, the bronze medal for gallantry and a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum To JOHN. GRIEVE, motor mechanic, the bronze medal for gallantry and a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum ; To each of the other five members of the crew, SAM CRAIG, G. WATSON, G. GALL, WILLIAM FINDLAY andROBERT SMITH, the thanks of the Institution inscribed on vellum ; To the coxswain and each of the other seven members of the crew, a reward of £3 in addition to the usual scale reward of £1 17s. 6d. each. Standard rewards to crew and launchers, £13 6s. ; additional rewards to crew, £24 ; total rewards, £37 6s. Rewards to Arbroath, £13 1s..