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Published: Wednesday, 20 November 2024 at 09:52 AM

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Historically, ships have been indispensable for delivering people and cargos around the British coast, as well as connecting the UK to the rest of the world. However, shipwrecks were alarmingly frequent because of the weather, poor navigation, busy waterways, and the dubious seaworthiness of some vessels. Between 1867 and 1871, for example, there were 7,062 incidents where a ship got into serious difficulty. Of these, 2,598 ships were lost and 8,807 people died. And yet these figures relate only to vessels on the UK coastline, because statistics for areas such as the Atlantic, Mediterranean and North Sea were not collected.

For shipwreck victims, early attempts at rescue relied upon the organisation and goodwill of the local coastguard service, or on volunteer lifesaving teams. For example, fishermen in a community might band together to go out to wrecks if enough men would come forward. However, these rescuers were not properly equipped or trained, and it was often difficult to gather support quickly enough. 

Quite a few coastal communities developed rudimentary lifeboat services at the beginning of the 19th century in that they had a dedicated rescue boat and a list of volunteers. Some of these locally organised services persisted for decades. The first purpose-built lifeboat was designed by Lionel Lukin in 1785, but the first man to pioneer lifeboat provision at multiple locations was Henry Greathead of South Shields who also successfully created a lifeboat and by 1811 had supplied 31 of them to various ports. These lifeboats were strong and buoyant, and would resist being turned over in heavy seas – and would right themselves again if the worst happened. 

In 1822, the philanthropist William Hillary witnessed the tragic wreck of HMS Racehorse off the Isle of Man. Crewmen on the ship died but so did local fishermen who did their best to rescue them, leaving families with no breadwinner. Greatly moved, he advocated that the nation adopt a system of coastal lifeboat stations to ensure that communities were ready to stage properly organised rescues. His appeals to the Admiralty fell on deaf ears, so he determined to create a national charity to fund it instead. 

Private finance led to the establishment of the National Institution for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck in 1824. His idea captured the public’s attention and earned the ruling sovereign George IV as its patron (a tradition that continues to this day), and the institution grew rapidly, establishing lifeboat stations all over Britain. On 5 October 1854, during the patronage of Queen Victoria, the organisation changed its name to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI).

Each station had three senior roles – the coxswain who was in charge, the assistant coxswain and the bowman. The bowman surveyed the water ahead of the lifeboat looking for survivors or wreckage, and he also had a grapnel-line to hook onto a wreck. In the 20th century the role of mechanic was added, who tended to the engines of powered lifeboats. Every lifeboat station had a list of volunteers who were called out by the firing of a rocket or mortar. Men were generally selected for a mission according to who arrived most quickly at the chosen rendezvous.

The courage of lifeboat crews was much admired, and the cause of considerable local pride. As a result the arrival of a new lifeboat often provoked a whole day of local celebration and much newspaper coverage. The fame of some lifeboat coxswains reached extraordinary heights. For example, the bravery of James Haylett from Norfolk was such that in 1902 he dined with Edward VII at Sandringham where the king presented him with the RNLI’s Gold Medal. In the words of the Norwich Mercury, Haylett “conversed with his monarch without diffidence or restraint, bearing himself manfully and as becomes one who is really one of the greatest storm heroes England has ever possessed”. Henry George Blogg (1876-1954) is the RNLI’s most decorated lifeboatman, and has a museum named after him in Cromer, Norfolk. He served for 53 years, and helped to save 873 lives.

Since the RNLI is a charity and its crews are volunteers, there has never been a comprehensive set of service records for each person based at a lifeboat station. It wasn’t a waged role, so you also won’t usually find “lifeboatman” listed as an occupation in census records. So, to research the career of an ancestor who served on a lifeboat you will need to look in several different places. Note that crew members had to be over 18 years of age and were exclusively male until 1969, when the first woman served with a lifeboat. However, long before that time, women have often assisted with preparing and launching the lifeboat.

Generally speaking, coxswains have attracted more contemporary documentation than other members of the crew so they tend to be a little easier to track down. A good place to start is by looking at local newspapers. They typically cover every lifeboat call-out, and if the rescue attempt was particularly dramatic then it’s common to find every crew member named. The press may also interview crewmen, shipwreck survivors and witnesses. Plenty of rescues reached the national press as well. Another advantage of using historic newspapers is that not all lifeboat services in the UK came under the auspices of the RNLI, so you might not find your forebear if you rely exclusively on RNLI records. Historic newspapers can be accessed online via the British Newspaper Archive and Findmypast, and in person at local archive services.

Ancestry has now digitised a huge range of RNLI records that may provide a unique insight into your ancestor’s work with the lifeboat service. The RNLI supported crewmen and their families in financial difficulty whenever it could. Its registers of pensions and gratuities (c1890s–1920s) and grants to widows, orphans and persons injured (1897–1932) are included in the collection. These records may reveal dates of birth, occupations and family relationships, in addition to dates of service.

Looking for medal recipients can be a good way to start your research. Ancestry has a medal book listing recipients between 1824 and 1986 including name and rank of individual, place, date, name of wreck, and nature of award. The RNLI also issued testimonials on vellum for bravery as well as certificates of thanks, statuettes, badges, binoculars, inscribed photographs and inscribed barometers (“aneroids” in the earlier registers). The honorary presentation books (1905–2000) hold details. 

Once you know the lifeboat station where your ancestor was based then you can look for information about the rescues in which they may have been involved. The Ancestry collection includes the service records for all its stations (1824–1993). These do not include information about named personnel, but they do reveal the names of wrecks attended in date order, the weather conditions and often the number of people saved. 

You can sometimes find similar information by visiting the station where your relation was based as it may be displayed there on the walls, especially if the station is now a museum. There are also many books written about individual stations – past and present – which often include lists of personnel, descriptions of rescues, and photographs. 

Ancestry’s collection also includes appointment books for honorary secretaries to lifeboat stations, crew cards identifying volunteers from the 1940s and 1950s, and details of legacies left to the RNLI before the mid-1920s.

The RNLI journal The Lifeboat began in 1852, and back issues are online. It often mentions coxswains by name, awards of medals, and significant call-outs. The index is not entirely reliable, so search it separately by name of lifeboat station as well as ancestor’s surname. 

Finally, if your forebear died trying to rescue others at sea then the RNLI Memorial may assist you. It is situated near the RNLI’s headquarters in Poole, Dorset, and names all lifeboatmen who have died in service since 1824, even those who did not serve on the organisation’s own lifeboats. These names are also available on the RNLI’s website, together with date and location.

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