Henry Blogg (1876–13 June 1954) was a famous lifeboat man from Cromer on the north Norfolk coast of England.
Henry Blogg of Cromer is referred to as "the greatest of the lifeboatmen". From the epic rescue of the crew of the Pyrin and then of half of the crew of the Fernebo in 1917, through to his near drowning in the service to the English Trader in 1941, he would win the gold medal of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution three times and the silver medal four times, the George Cross, the British Empire Medal, and a series of other awards.
Born the son of Ellen Blogg, he was brought up in the family of James Davies, himself coxswain of the Cromer lifeboat. He first went to sea as a lifeboatman in the rowing lifeboat Benjamin Bond Cabbell and then served in the Louisa Heartwell under Jimmy 'Buttons' Harrison. When coxswain Harrison retired in 1909, Blogg narrowly won the vote to take on the leadership role.
At the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century lifeboats around the coast of Britain relied on the strength of the oarsmen and the power of the wind. The Cromer boat was launched from an open beach, and judgement and determination were the prime requirements of the coxswain. In the early hours of a fierce January morning in 1917 the Cromer lifeboat was launched to aid a vessel just in sight off Cromer, the Pyrin. The Cromer men rowed their boat through the breakers, succeeding in coming alongside the stricken vessel, and taking off her crew. They rowed back to Cromer. As they reached the beach the Swedish vessel the Fernebo sturck a mine and was blown in half. The two halves drifted towards the beach.
From one half, about 16 men set out in a ship's boat. As they reached the edge of the breakers onto the beach, their boat was capsized. Teams of men, grasping each others arms, had walked into the water, and they were able to help the men from the boat, and aid them ashore. Meanwhile the lifeboat was rehoused on its trailer and was pushed again into the breakers, to launch to the other half of the Fernebo.
The ferocity of the sea threw the boat back onto the beach. Recarriage and try again. This happened at least three times. It was not until midnight, under the light of searchlights from the clifftop, that the lifeboat finally reached the stricken half-vessel and took off its crew. Blogg had led his men for nearly 24 hours of heroic effort.
The services to the Georgia and the Crawford Castle, the Monte Nevosos and the Sepoy, the Cantabria and the Mount Ida, the English Trader and Convoy 559 are all the stuff of legend. The service to the English Trader in 1941, aground on Hammond's Knoll, nearly led to disaster when the motor lifeboat H.F.Bailey rolled onto her side, throwing five of her crew in the water. Blogg was one of them.
Still on board, crewman William H.Davies grasped the wheel and steered the lifeboat towards the men in the water. One by one they were picked up. Signalman Walter Allen would not survive long; his heart was failing. Blogg turned the lifeboat from the English Trader and headed for the nearest harbour at Great Yarmouth.
At three a.am the next morning, Blogg awoke his crew, ready to try again. They slipped from the wartime harbour and were soon back at the sands. The sea had abated, and forty-four men on the English Trader, who had not expected to live through the night, were saved.
When Henry Blogg retired in 1947, the new lifeboat at Cromer was named after him. In 2005 a new museum opens on the seafront at Cromer, dedicated to Henry Blogg, "the greatest of the lifeboatmen".
Further reading
"Henry Blogg, the Greatest of the Lifeboatmen", Jolly, C., Pub: Poppyland Publishing, new edition 2002, ISBN 0946148597
