The Men of Littlestone-A Plea.

Lo, the signal! Soaring through the angry sky rose rockets red,
As the hellish waters chafed beneath the storm kings thunder-tread,
And the mad foam-crested billows surged both pitiless and vast.
And death grimily road along the pinions of the blast!
Round the rock-bound coast of Albion wilder night was never known,
On the night was launched the lifeboat by the men of Littlestone!

“Man the lifeboat!” Well they answered, on that bitter stormy night,
Stirred to action, fearlessly they braved the elements to fight-
Fight for life. To death and duty they were sailors staunch and true,
By their fellow-creatures’ peril stirred to do of derring-do!
By the hurricane’ undaunted, life to save, was theirs alone,
So to answer duty’s summons went the men of Littlestone.

Danger- was their watchword; help- their battle cry; and the storm
Was their music on the battle-valour theirs of purist form!
All the dear ones-wives and children, joys of home, behind were left.
Now alas! - Of husbands, fathers- wives and children are bereft.
Hearken, to a child’s deep sobbing, and a grief-wrung widow’s moan,
There is mourning in some erstwhile homes at Littlestone.

Three of those who, with hearts willing, went poor shipwrecked souls to save,
Ne’er came back to tell the story, With the bravest of the brave
They shall be for ever numbered, They have done their work-how well
Annals of our stormy sea-shore shall in golden letters tell;
For the lives of fellow-creatures they have nobly risked their own;
Now are left the widows, children, of the men of Littlestone.

Listen to the plaintive pleading, lovers of heroic deeds!
Loud and clear the voice of mercy through the length of England pleads-
Give the children food and shelter, you whose children snugly lie,
  Never feeling pangs of hunger that you cannot satisfy!
Be a friend unto the widow; now be acts of kindness shown
To all the dear ones who deeply mourn the men of Littlestone.

Who will aid the sad-eyed mourners? Who will aid this noble cause?
Dear are husbands, fathers-heroes, whose brave deeds have gained applause.
We, who sit in happy homesteads by our firesides bright and warm,
By the lifeboat may have dear ones succoured in the raging storms;
We, in fact may be in peril, and brave heroes risk their own
Lives for us upon the oceans, like the men of Littlestone!

A poem written by Annie Brown in 1891 to commemorate the three New Romney Lifeboat men
From the Sandal magna, who died in 1891 whilst attempting a rescue from a foundered ship.


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