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Otago Witness, Issue 4028, 26 May 1931, Page 28

The deed adjudged by the Royal Humane Society to be the most gallant of last year at Home was recognised by the award of the Stanhope gold medal to Lieutenant Colin H. C. Singleton, R.N., at the annual meeting of the society under the presidency of General Sir William Adair. On the night of August 13 last, Lieutenant Singleton was returning to his ship, H.M.S. Peterel, in a motor sampan, together with six of the crew who had been on shore. The ship was anchored off Hankow, on the Yantsekiang River, which is notorious for its dangerously fast current, its powerful undertow, and the fact that its water is so contaminated as to be dangerous even to bathe in. Stoker O’Brien, as he was about to step on the gangway, fell backwards into the river. O’Brien was the one man in the ship who was unable to swim, and he quickly drifted astern on the current in to the darkness. Lieutenant Singleton, without pausing to remove any of his clothing, dived ovai'board, and was able to catch hold of the drowning man before he had drifted more than 20 yards astern of the vessel. O’Brien, however, struggled so violently that Lieutenant Singleton was forced temporarily to let him go, and was then unable to find him again in the darkness. The motor sampan had now joined in the search, but when it came alongside Lieutenant Singleton he very gallantly instructed it not to stop for him, but to go on downstream in an attempt to find O’Brien. The body of Stoker O’Brien was discovered three days later some three miles and a-half from the spot where H.M.S. Peterel was anchored.