Story of the Lifeboat

Horowhenua Chronicle, 15 April 1910, Page 4

Story of the Lifeboat

This is the jubilee year of the charter of tho Koyal \ational Lifeboat Institution, and in a paper ca the subject of "Tho Lifeboat airi its Work," read before- a meeting of the Royal Society of Arts in Loudon, Sir John Cameron 1/ainb, de-puty-chairman of the institution, naturally dipped into the history of the work of life-saving on the Itrili"h coasts. It was impossible, he .-:11 si 1, to assign to any ono person the merit of inventing the lileboal. Lionel Ltikin, a ooaohbiiildor in Long Acre-, with his plans for increasing the buoyancy and stability of boats, was lirst in the fiel ' in this country. Uaving purchased a .Vorway yawl, he conveiile:! her into what he called raw "unemniergilil; , - boat," tested her on the •iii'i viiiik ;nit a parent. The earliest knawn ntte:iipt to establish a hfe-.sa"* ing .service was made- in WS'S, when Aivhdwicon Sharp, one of tilt; trustees of tho estate of Hnion Crewe of Stone, sent a cible to lidiMlun to be converted by Lukiii into a safety-bcrat, which was afterwards employed for some years at Hamburgh in saving life from shipwreck. The humane plans of Archrleaoon Sharp had been varied from time to timp, but they liad never been interrupted, and tho lifeboat cause now received from the trust substantia] support in the shape contributions towards the mniiito-n----nnce of lifeboats in the iieig'iboiirliood of Hamburgh. At a preliminary meeting in tho City of London Tavern promoted by Sir William Hillary, a resident in thy Tsle of Man, there was foundod in 1821 the. National Institution for the Preservation of Life- from Shipwreck, which was the parent of the present institution. In tho early years of the movement the nation was pnraing through a time of deep distress nnd agitation, with the result that the cause received little nubile attention. But it kept the flickering flame of pity for the shipwrecked mariner alive, and in. its worst times was the means of encouraging and rewarding heroic deeds. At tht> present time there were. 184 selfrighting boats in the service, which showed how popular tbey were with the lifeboat crews. Tho institution also possessor! four steam lifeboats, which were very useful nt the carefully selected stations where they had bseni placed, but it did not seem that their number should bo iuereisecl. Eight sniliinig lifeboats bad been fitted with petrol motors and screw, and as the experiment was proving successful, the institution was proceeding with the building of some now boats. ;