Auction Catalogue

25 September 2008

Starting at 10:00 AM

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Orders, Decorations and Medals

Washington Mayfair Hotel  London  W1J 5HE

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Lot

№ 179

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25 September 2008

Hammer Price:
£700

Tayleur Fund Medal, silver, reverse inscribed, ‘Presented to Charles Smart, for prompt courage in saving life from the wreck of the Ada at Portrane, 2nd Febry. 1875, Lord Talbot de Malahide Chairman’, scroll suspension, cleaned, good very fine £350-450

Ref. Spink Exhibition 1985, No. 179 (incorrectly listed as ‘Stuart’).

The
Ada departed Liverpool for Dublin on 1 February 1873, with a cargo of superphosphate manure. The following day, after being caught in a savage storm, she was sighted by the Portrane coastguard drifting out of control towards the rocky shore. The ship struck and the coast guard immediately gathered rocket apparatus equipment to rescue the crew of four. The rockets failed to reach the stricken vessel and she began to break up, forcing the crew into the rigging. With further efforts to reach the ship by rocket failing, it was decided by the coastguard to wait until the tide went out to enable the apparatus to be brought closer to the wreck. This having been done, the rockets still fell short and with the gale still blowing, the coastguard adjudged it unsafe to launch a rescue by boat. Joseph Davis, a resident of Portrane, had witnessed the continued failures of the rescue attempts by rocket and had decided he would make a rescue attempt by boat. With his brothers, John and William, together with Charles Smart and a volunteer from the coastguard, Richard Twohig, they went out into the still stormy sea. Reaching the remains of the Ada, they cut down the men that had tied themselves to the rigging and taking them into the boat brought them to shore. The men, who had been clinging to the rigging for some seven hours, were all suffering from exposure; sadly, one of them, the Captain’s 14 year-old son had died.

To reward the gallantry of Joseph Davies and his companions, the Committee of the Tayleur Fund bestowed their Silver Medal on each of them. This was the fourth rescue for which medals of the Fund were issued.

Sold with copied extracts from
The Freemans Journal, 3, 4 and 5 February 1873, and The Tayleur Fund Medals, by John Wilson, L.S.A.R.S.J. No. 22.