Auction Catalogue

4 July 2001

Starting at 12:00 PM

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Miniature Medals

Grand Connaught Rooms  61 - 65 Great Queen St  London  WC2B 5DA

Lot

№ 703

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4 July 2001

Hammer Price:
£310

Royal National Lifeboat Institution, G.IV.R., silver, 2nd type (James Burne, Voted 30th Jany. 1851) extremely fine £200-250

James Burne, Commissioned Boatman, H.M. Coastguard, Penzance. ‘12-13 January 1851: On the morning of the 11th, the 250 ton Whitby brig New Commercial struck the Brisons rocks off Cape Cornwall, four miles north of Lands End, and broke up immediately in thick fog and high seas. The nine men aboard and the Master’s wife managed to scramble on to a rock shelf, but a massive wave swept seven of the men to their deaths. Captain Sanderson and his wife managed to get back on the rocks. The other man, a mulatto, grasped a piece of wreckage and was later saved by fishermen from Sennen Cove. Captain Davies [Inspecting Commander, H.M. Coastguard, Penzance], meanwhile, had ordered the Sylvia out from Penzance in atrocious conditions and, on arrival at the scene, an unsuccessful attempt was made to take off the two survivors by a small boat; she only just made it back to the cutter which then lay off all night to give the victims hope. Next morning, with the wind having veered a little and the seas slightly calmer, five other boats arrived, one manned by the coastguard, three by fishermen and the fifth was a preventative boat containing Captain Davies and a rocket apparatus. Using this, he managed to fire a line which the two on the rock secured and the Master’s wife was hauled aboard but, sadly, she died very quickly from exposure and the buffeting. The other survivor, Captain Sanderson, was brought aboard safely and landed at Sennen Cove together with the bodies which had been recovered.’ Gold awards to Captain Davies and Thomas Forward, Commander of the Sylvia, and Silver awards to four members of the Penzance Coastguard, and to six crew of the cutter Sylvia.