GOLD MEDAL SERVICE AT THE HUMBER JANUARY 6TH. - THE HUMBER, YORKSHIRE. At 7.57 in the evening the station received a request from the extended defence officer for the life-boat to go to the help of Phillip’s defence unit No. l*, which was reported to have gone ashore, inside the boom defence, on the north side of Trinity Sand. The motor life-boat City of Bradford II was launched at 8.10. It was then blowing a full gale from the east, against a strong ebb tide. The night was heavily overcast and very dark. There were frequent snow showers. The life-boat passed the gate in the defence boom ten minutes after launching and the defence-boom vessel, which was connected by telephone with the shore, called to her by megaphone that a tug had already gone to the help of the Phillip’s defence unit, and the life-boat returned to her station at 8.35.

No sooner had she been housed than word came to the coxswain that a vessel was aground on the Binks. As the tide was ebbing the coxswain knew that he could not approach her and that she would lie quiet on the sands until the flood tide. He and his crew stood by.

Then at 10.50 the port war signal station telephoned that Phillip’s defence unit No. 3 had broken adrift from her moorings and was entangledon the inner side of the boom defence.

From the life-boat station the men on the Phillip’s defence unit were seen to be firing red rockets and making signals for help. They were in grave danger of being swept out to sea by the strong ebb tide. Ten minutes later the life-boat was launched and found the Phillip’s defence unit now thoroughly entangled in the boom.

The life-boat approached from the seaward side by the light of searchlights from the shore which, at times, were of help to her and, at other times, blinded her crew. She approached the boom bow on. She did this four times and the five men on the Phillip’s defence unit jumped aboard her.

The life-boat herself had her stem and bow planking damaged by the long steel spikes of the boom, which were there expressly for sinking small boats. At 11.20 the life-boat landed the rescued men at the life-boat slipway, and then tied up alongside a patrol vessel to wait for the flood tide in order to go to the help of the vessel on the Binks.

At 3.10 next morning she cast off and found H.M. Trawler Almondine lying on her side on the sands. Her port side was under water and she was smothered with the heavy seas.

The night was still overcast and very dark, and there were still heavy snow showers. A strong spring flood tide was now swirling over the Binks at the rate of five or six knots, and the seas were breaking from all directions.

The Almondine signalled the lifeboat and asked her to take off her crew. At 3.35 in the morning the coxswain made his first attempt. He ran the life-boat, head to tide, alongside the trawler’s lee side and passed a rope to her. The rope was secured, but almost immediately the swirling tide swung the life-boat round, the rope was broken, the life-boat’s mast fouled the trawler and was broken. With the breaking of the mast her wireless was put out of action. The life-boat again approached the trawler. She did it no fewer than twelve times, first from one end and then from the other. She did it in swift dashes, remaining alongside just long enough for a man to jump aboard her, and then sheering off again so as not to be smashed on the trawler’s sunken side. All the time the heavy seas were sweeping over her.

They twisted and tossed her about at will, and several times they flung her against the trawler. Five feet of her oak stem, already damaged against the boom in the earlier service that night, was splintered right back to the planking of the boat, and the planking itself was holed just above the water-line. Sometimes she sheered off with no one rescued. Sometimes one man jumped ; was grabbed ; was dragged aboard. Sometimes as many as three jumped at once.

By 4.20 - forty-five minutes after the first attempt - nineteen men had been rescued in this way. The tide was rising, and as it rose the trawler seemed to be righting herself. She seemed now to be water-borne again and her captain hailed the life-boat’s coxswain to ask if he and his officers should now abandon ship or remain by her. Before the coxswain could reply the trawler’s lights went out and nothing more was seen of her in the darkness and driving snow. By the help of the life-boat’s searchlight, and of searchlights from the shore, the coxswain searched the sandbanks and the entrance to The Humber for an hour and a half, but he could find no sign of her. The life-boat returned to her station at 6.15 in the morning.

There she landed the nineteen rescued men, and the coxswain at once telephoned to the port war signal station. Here he learned that word had just been received that a tug had found the Almondine drifting in the entrance to The Humber and had taken her in tow.

Though damaged the life-boat was still seaworthy, and four days later she went out, though her broken stem had not been replaced, and rescued eight lives from another vessel.

The rescue of the men of the Almondine had only been made possible by the fine seamanship and great determination of the coxswain, who was very ably supported by his crew, and the Institution made the following awards : To COXSWAIN ROBERT CROSS, G.M.,a clasp to the gold medal for conspicuous gallantry, which he already held, with a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum ; To GEORGE RICHARDS, reserve motor mechanic, the silver medal for gallantry, with a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum ; To each of the other five members of the crew, GEORGE STEPHENSON, bowman; SAMUEL CROSS, assistant motor mechanic ; and WILLIAM MAJOR, SIDNEY HARMAN and GEORGE W. SHAKESBY, life-boatmen, the bronze medal for gallantry, with a copy of the vote inscribed on vellum ; To the coxswain and each of the six members of the crew a special reward of £5.

The crew are permanent paid men, and the ordinary rewards to launchers amounted to £2 5s. ; special rewards to crew, £35 ; total rewards, £37 5s.