BRONZE MEDAL SERVICE AT BOULMER MARCH 27TH. - BOULMER, NORTH SUNDERLAND, AND HOLY ISLAND, NORTHUMBERLAND.

During the night of the 26th of March a large steamer was seen to be on fire off the Northumbrian coast.

Early the following morning three motor life-boats went out to her help, the W.R.A., of North Sunderland, the Milburn, of Holy Island, and the Clarissa Langdon, of Boulmer. North Sunderland reached the steamer at five o’clock and Holy Island and Boulmer at 6.30. They found that she was the S.S. Somali, of Glasgow.

She had been burning since nine the previous evening, and her crew had already been taken off by a patrol boat. She was seven miles south-east of North Sunderland Point.

A naval tug had also come out, and at the request of her commander each of the three life-boats put two men on board the Somali to help to make fast cables for towing her. This done they took off their men, and the tow began, with the Somali moving stern first. It was now about 9.30 in the morning. The Holy Island lift-boat returned to her station. The other two stood by to help. At the beginning the tug towed southward, butafter a time she turned north to reach the shelter of the Farne Islands. The salvage vessel Iron Axe, of Aberdeen, now arrivcd on the scene, and the Boulmer life-boat put an officer and two seamen from her on board the Somali. She then made fast to the stern of the Somali to help with the tow.

Until about mid-day the work of towing went went on. Then the Boulmer life-boat took the officer of the salvage vessel off the Somali and put him back on his vessel, leaving on the Somali the two seamen. A strong flood tide was now making, and was slowing down the tug, so the captain of the salvage vessel decided to help with the tow and asked the Boulmer life-boat to bring a wire rope to him which had been got ready on the Somali. The vessels were now off Beadnell, and about a mile and a half from the shore.

All this time the Somali had been burning fiercely from the bridge forward.

As the Boulmer life-boat swung round to go alongside her, the fore part blew up with a terrific explosion.

The Boulmer life-boat was about 70 yards away from her. The explosion, her crew said, lifted the life-boat clean out of the water. It blew the men flat.

It whirled away their caps, which were not seen again, and it emptied the jacket pockets of several of them.

Five miles away, at North Sunderland village, windows were broken. Then pieces of metal, the largest of them two feet by one foot, rained down on the Boulmer life-boat, and also on the Sunderland life-boat (which was 200 yards away), damaging both boats, cutting open the head of the Boulmer bowman, and slightly injuring two of the North Sunderland men.

The stern of the Somali was still afloat, with the two men from the salvage vessel on board. Without hesitation - though there might at any moment have been a second explosion - the Boulmer coxswain went in through the smoke and fumes and took the life-boat alongside. The two men, one of them injured, had already slid down a rope into the sea. They were hauled aboard the life-boat and she made all speed to get clear beforeanother explosion should come, but when she had gone only a few yards, her propeller was fouled by some wreckage. The coxswain set sail, but the North Sunderland life-boat came at once to his help and took the Boulmer boat in tow.

As she was being towed her crew opened the propeller inspection hatch and cleared away the wreckage. The Boulmer life-boat then continued under her own power to Scahouscs, where she arrived at 1.20 in the afternoon.

An ambulance and first-aid parties were waiting, and the two rescued men were given into their care.

It was a rescue carried out with great courage and promptitude, and the Institution made the following awards : To COXSWAIN JAMES CAMPBELL, of Boulmer, the bronze medal for galantry, with a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum ; To him and to each member of his crew a special reward of £2 in addition to the ordinary scale reward of £1 8s. 6d. ; standard rewards to crew and launchers, £15 6s. 3d. ; additional rewards to crew, £14 ; total rewards, £29 6s. 3d. ; To the coxswain and each member of the North Sunderland crew a special reward of £1 in addition to the ordinary scale reward of £2 16s. 6d. ; standard rewards to crew and launchers, £26 11s. 6d. ; additional rewards to crew, £7 ; total rewards, £33 11s. 6d. ; Rewards on the ordinary scale to the crew and launchers at Holy Island, £23 3s.

Total of rewards for the service, £86 0s. 9d.