They get the anchor up, and passing a hawser on board the lugger, seek to tow the brig away from the Sands; knowing the Sands as well as they do, they hope to be able to get clear of them and get the brig into deep water; but it is very difficult work, for with her rudder gone there is no power of steering her, and the weight of the lugger is scarcely sufficient to keep her head straight: they make a little progress, however, the tide being somewhat in their favour, but the tide is on the turn, and they will soon be driven back into their old position, if not in worse, and the men begin almost to despair of saving the vessel, when to their great satisfaction they see the Ramsgate steamboat and life-boat making their way round the North Foreland.
The coastguard officer at Margate, when he saw that the Margate life-boat could not reach the brig, and knowing that if any sea got up where the vessel was, that the luggers could be of no use, telegraphed to Ramsgate that a vessel was on the Knock Sands.
The steamer and life-boat get under weigh at once, and proceed as fast as possible to the rescue; there is a nasty sea running off Ramsgate, but it is not until they get to the North Foreland that they feel the full force of the gale—here the sea is tremendous, and as the steamer pitches to it, the waves that break upon her bows fly right over her funnel—indeed she buries herself so much in the seas that they have to ease her speed considerably to prevent her being completely overrun by them.
No one on board the boat knows where they are being towed; "a telegram from Margate," was the first news "the life-boat wanted;" and then in the hurry and excitement to get under weigh with all possible speed, no one on board had thought of asking for further particulars.
The life-boat plunges on, and her crew are ready for the work whatever it is, and wherever it is. As they round the North Foreland they see a brig, with her foremast gone, in tow of a lugger.
The boatmen cast off the steamer's tow-rope and make for the brig; they run in close under her lee, and venture too near to her; she is rolling so heavily that her yard-arm comes right over the boat, and the loose ropes swaying about catch in the boat's mast; they cannot get the mast down, and the brig hangs so heavily they fear that she is going to capsize right upon them; an active fellow severs the entangled rope with a hatchet, the brig slowly rolls up again, and the life-boat drops astern.
The boatmen get on board the brig; there are six of the lugger's men on board; they find that the lugger is quite unable to make any way with the wreck, and as the tide is on the turn, the vessel is in great peril, for the Sands are just under her lee; no time must be lost, they signal to the steamer to come at once, the life-boatmen take a hawser on board her, and she begins to tow the brig away from the Sands; but the brig's rudder is gone, and she is sheering right and left, jerking the hawser at the end of each sheer with a strain hard enough to break it, and the foremast being cut away, the men cannot carry sail to steady her; she must be steered by the boats.
The life-boat and lugger drop astern, each having a rope from the opposite quarter of the wreck. The steamer moves ahead, and as the brig begins to sheer in one direction, both boats steer in the opposite direction, and turning their broadsides to the vessel as much as possible, hang with all their weight, and try and keep her stern straight; then as the vessel sheers again in the other direction, away the boats immediately make across her stern, to check her on the other side.