MAY 17TH . - FRASERBURGH, AND PETERHEAD, ABERDEENSHIRE. At 1.18 A.M. the naval authorities at Rosyth asked, through the Fraserburgh coastguard, that the Fraserburgh life-boat should he got ready to launch. A few minutes later the station was given a position ten or twelve miles from Kinnaird, and at 2 A.M. the motor life-boat John and Charles Kennedy was launched. A light N.W. wind was blowing, with a moderate sea. The life-boat found nothing at the position given, so she altered course to the eastward, and half an hour later found the troopship S.S. Archangel, of Harwich.

She had been bombed by German aeroplanes, and a destroyer and tug were standing by. The life-boat prepared to take wounded men off the steamer, but a trawler arrived and took over this work, so the life-boat, in company with the destroyer, went to look for drifting boats. Several boats were found, but all were empty except one, with one soldier on board. He was rescued and put on the destroyer. At about 6 A.M. a tug took the Archangel in tow, in a southerly direction.

The life-boat went with them, for the Archangel had no life-boats left, and was making water. At 8.15 A.M. the Fraserburgh honorary secretary sent a message to the Peterhead station through the coastguard, asking if the Peterhead life-boat could be launched to relieve the Fraserburgh boat, and at 8.55 the Peterhead motor life-boat Julia Park Barry of Glasgow put out. She met the Archangel when she was five miles N.E. of Peterhead, and took over from the Fraserburgh life-boat, which returned to her station, arriving at 11.40 A.M.

For a time the Peterhead life-boat escorted the Archangel southward, and then it was decided to abandon her as she seemed likely to sink. She had been so badly damaged amidships that there was no communication between the after and fore ends, so the lifeboat went alongside the after end and rescued eighteen men, while the tug took off the remainder from the fore end. The Archangel was then beached at Belhelvie, and the lifeboat returned to her station at 1P.M. - Rewards : Fraserburgh, £14 9s. 6d. ; Peterhead, £4 7s.