This poster stamp shows Lieut-Col Sir William Hillary, Bt., founder of the lifeboat service. A remarkable and versatile man, he had been equerry to one of the sons of George III, had traveled, had sailed round Sicily and Malta in an open boat, had raised a battalion for home defence in the Napoleonic Wars (an early Home Guard), and had been made a baronet for his services. In middle age he settled in the Isle of Man, at Douglas, and went out with other men in open boats to help many shipwrecked mariners off the island. It was these experiences which made him publish, in 1823, an appeal for a national lifeboat service.As a result of this appeal a meeting was held in the City of London on March 4, 1824, and the society which is now the Royal Life-Boat Institution was founded. Hillary outlined a complete plan for the service, which was responsible for the rescue of the shipwrecked, should have branches all around the coast, with volunteers enrolled ready to go to the rescue.
It should reward those volunteers for their work and if they lost their lives should see that their families were not left in want, and should be financed by the free gifts of all classes of the nation. His plan is in its essentials the basis of the R.N.L.I. today. But Hillary was more than an armchair planner. He was 53 when he founded the institution, but he continued to go out to the rescue of shipwrecked mariners in Douglas Bay for another 10 years. He was nearly 60 when he was washed overboard, dragged back with his chest crushed and six ribs broken – and went on with the work. He took part in the rescue of 305 lives, and three times won the Lifeboat Service's Gold Medal for gallantry. He was made a Chevalier of St John of Jerusalem in 1836. Hillary died in 1847, aged 76. A great lifeboatman!
Sea Breezes January 1952