LIFE SAVING AWARDS 1352


INDIAN CHIEFMEDAL, 38mm, silver, the obverse featuring a scene of the Vulcan towing the life-boat Bradford towards the wreck of the Indian Chief, the reverse inscribed, ‘Ramsgate Harbour Tug and Lifeboat, Honor to the Brave. Presented for Conspicuous Gallantry in Rescuing Eleven Survivors of the crew of the ship “Indian Chief” wrecked on the Longsand Jan. 6th 1881’ (Henry Meader) with silver slip bar, dated ‘1881’ and bearing the shield of the Cinque Ports, complete with silver suspension and top riband bars, minor edge nicks, good very fine, scarce


£600-800


In the early morning of 5 January 1881 the 1,238 ton barque, Indian Chief, four days out from Middlesborough, bound for Yokohama, was wrecked during a gale on the Long Sands in the outer reaches of the Thames Estuary close to Knock Light. During the day she began to break up and the survivors took to the rigging. Following unsuccessful searches for the casualty by the Harwich and Clacton lifeboats, the Ramsgate lifeboat, Bradford (Coxswain Charles Edward Fish) was brought on to the scene, towed by the tug Vulcan (Alfred Page, Master).


The lifeboat, Bradford, a 44ft self-righter, had been towed by the paddle steamer Vulcan for 30 miles in the biting gale and heavy seas. Arriving in the dark it was impossible to find the wreck so the coxswain and crew remained there for the night cruising about between the Sands, the lifeboat crew exposed to the whole fury of the storm and the steamer continuing to sustain damage. In the morning Coxswain Fish cast off from the Vulcan and positioning the lifeboat, skilfully veered a piece of wood attached to lengths of rope, towards the wreck. This enabled a hawser to be dragged aboard the wreck by the survivors by which the lifeboat crew hauled their vessel close under the Indian Chief’s quarter. The lifeboat then took off the 11 survivors, transferred them to the tug which then towed them back to Ramsgate. The lifeboat had been at sea for some 26 hours in heavy broken water.


A detailed account of the rescue, given by the Coxswain of the Bradford, to a reporter from the Daily Telegraph reads: ‘News had been brought to Ramsgate, as you know, sir, that a large ship was ashore on the Long Sand, and Captain Braine, the harbour-master, immediately ordered the tug and Life-boat to proceed to her assistance. It was blowing a heavy gale, it came much harder some hours afterwards; and the moment we were clear of the piers we felt the sea. Our boat is considered a very fine one. I know there is no better on the coasts, and there are only two in Great Britain bigger. She was presented to the Life-boat Institution by Bradford, and is called after that town. But it is ridiculous to talk of bigness when it means only forty-two feet long, and when a sea is raging round you heavy enough to swamp a line-of-battle ship. I had my eye on the tug -named the Vulcan, sir -and when she met the first of the seas, and she was thrown up like a ball, and you could see her starboard paddle revolving in the air high enough for a coach to pass under; and when she struck the hollow she dished a sea over her bows that left only the stern showing. We were towing head to wind, and the water was flying over the boat in clouds. Every man of us was soaked to the skin, in spite of our overalls, by the time we had brought the Ramsgate Sands abeam; but there were a good many miles to be gone over before we should fetch the Knock Lightship, and so you see, sir, it was much too early for us to take notice that things were not over and above comfortable. We got out the sail-cover-a piece of tarpaulin -to make a shelter of, and rigged it up against the mast, seizing it to the burtons; but it hadn't been up two minutes when a heavy sea hit and washed it right aft in rags; so there was nothing to do but hold onto the thwarts and shake ourselves when the water came over. I never remember a colder wind. I don't say this because I happened to be out in it. Old Tom Cooper, one of the best boatmen in all England, sir, who made one of our crew, agreed with me that it was more like a flaying machine than a natural gale of wind. The fell of it in the face was like being gnawed by a dog. I only wonder it didn't freeze the tears it fetched out of our eyes. We were heading N.E., and the wind was blowing from N.E. The North Foreland had been a bit of shelter, like; but when we had gone clear of that, and the ocean lay ahead of us, the seas were furious -they seemed miles long, sir, like an Atlantic sea, and it was enough to make a man hold his breath to watch how the tug wallowed and tumbled into them. I sung out to Dick Goldsmith, 'Dick', I says, 'she's slowed, do you see, she'll never be able to meet it, for she had slackened her engines down into a mere crawl, and I really did think they meant to give up. I could see Alf Page -the master of her, sir-on the bridge, coming and going like the moon when the clouds sweep over it, as the seas smothered him up one moment, and left him shining in the sun the next. But there was to be no giving up with the tug's crew any more than with the Life-boat's; she held on, and we followed.


Somewhere abreast of the Elbow Buoy a smack that was running ported her helm to speak to us. Her skipper had just time to yell out, 'A vessel on the Long Sand!' and we to wave our hands, when she was astern, and out of sight in a haze of spray. Presently a collier named the Fanny, with her foretopgallant yard gone, passed us. She was cracking on to bring the news of the wreck to Ramsgate, and was making a heavy sputter under her topsails and foresail. They raised a cheer, for they knew our errand, and then, like the smack, in a minute she was astern and gone. By this time the cold and the wet and the fearful plunging were beginning to tell, and one of the men called for a nip of rum. The quantity we generally take is half a gallon, and it is always my rule to be sparing with that drink for the sake of the shipwrecked men we may have to bring home, and who are pretty sure to be in greater need of the stuff than us. I never drink myself, sir, and that's one reason, I think, why I manage to meet the cold and wind middling well, and rather better than some men who look stronger than me. However, I told Charlie Verrion to measure the rum out and serve it round, and it would have made you laugh, I do believe, sir, to have seen the care the men took of the big bottle -Charlie cocking his finger into the cork-hole, and David Berry clapping his hand over the pewter measure whenever a sea came to prevent the salt water from spoiling the liquor. Bad as our plight was, the tug's crew were no better off; their wheel is forrard, and so you may suppose the fellow who steered had his share of the seas; the others stood by to relieve him; and, for the matter of water, she was just like a rock, the waves striking her bows and flying pretty nigh as high as the top of her funnel, and blowing the whole length of her aft with a fall like the tumble of half-a-dozen cart loads of bricks. I like to speak of what they went through, for the way they were knocked about was something fearful, to be sure.


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