THE STANHOPE GOLD MEDAL.
In this Journal for June 6, 1885, we gave our readers some account of the ‘Heroes of Peace’ whose gallant acts had been rewarded in the course of the previous year by the Royal Humane Society. The Stanhope Gold Medal—‘the “blue ribbon” of the Society’—is awarded early in each year to the hero of the most praiseworthy instance of bravery brought to the notice of the Society during the preceding twelve months. In the beginning of this year, then, the Stanhope Medal was awarded to Alfred Collins, a young fisherman of Looe, Cornwall, for an act of bravery of such signal daring as to deserve special notice here. On a dark stormy night of December 1884, a boy named Hoskings fell overboard from the fishing lugger Water Nymph, then seven or eight miles south-east of the Eddystone lighthouse. The captain of the boat, Alfred Collins, immediately jumped overboard, hampered though he was by his oilskins and sea-boots, and holding on to his boat with one hand, endeavoured to clutch the boy with the other. He failed in this attempt; but clambering into the boat again, he secured the end of a line, and carrying this with him, he jumped overboard once more, and swam in the direction of the sinking lad. There was a heavy gale blowing, and the night was dark, with heavy rain. By the time Collins reached the boy, he was eighty feet from the Water Nymph, and already three feet under water; but Collins managed to clutch him, and the two were with great difficulty pulled on board. Such self-sacrificing heroism as this needs no commendation; but the Royal Humane Society do well to recognise it by the award of their medals. In addition to the Stanhope Medal, the Society awarded during last year fifteen silver medals, and one hundred and thirty-nine bronze ones; and to ten heroes who already wore the medal for previous acts of bravery, the clasp was given; while the minor awards, of testimonials on vellum and parchment and of money, numbered no fewer than two hundred and twenty-seven. In the cases reported to the Society during the twelve months, out of four hundred and thirty-nine persons attempted to be rescued, four hundred and six were actually saved.