SEPTEMBER 6TH. - HASTINGS AND EASTBOURNE, SUSSEX. At 12.40 in the afternoon information was received from the coastguard and the police that anaeroplane was down in the sea. A fresh W.S.W. wind was blowing, with a moderate sea. The aeroplane was an American Fortress and she was reported to be a quarter of a mile off shore at Bexhill with her crew in their dinghies. With the second coxswain in charge, in the absence of the coxswain, and with the honorary secretary, Commander W. Highfield, O.B.E., R.N., on board, the motor life-boat Cyril and Lilian Bishop was launched at 1.17. She found and picked up some photographic apparatus attached to a parachute, and saw a rubber dinghy washed up on the beach. Nothing else could be seen so the life-boat returned, reaching her station again at 2.53. The Eastbourne motor lifeboat Jane Holland was also launched, but found nothing. All the crew of the aeroplane had already been rescued, some by a boat and some from the shore. - Rewards : Hastings, £16 6s. 9d. ; Eastbourne, £7 9s.

(See Bexhill and Pevensey, “ Services by Shore-boats,” page 66.).