'Jack after he was upset'

This watercolour depicts a capsized lifeboat, tipped towards the viewer. Five of its crew, dressed in orange and blue, sit atop its broadside, jubilantly raising their hats, while four figures in the water appear to swim towards them. Other vessels are visible on the right; one appears close with two figures joining the crew’s celebration. The shore to the left is filled with more overjoyed onlookers atop a tall harbour wall and crane. The image is inscribed ‘Jack after he was upset’ in the bottom left corner. It continues the events depicted in the previous watercolour in this sketchbook, PAG3481.

In October 1850, after a spate of fatal lifeboat incidents, the Duke of Northumberland offered a prize of 100 guineas for the best model lifeboat design. Teignmouth Lifeboat Station, which opened in 1851, planned a trial of their lifeboat model on a stormy morning at sea. Having previously failed to capsize the boat in calm waters, the crew set the sails and successfully capsized the boat with their collective physical force, throwing out some of the crew who were equipped with life jackets. The boat righted at once and soon picked up the overboard crew who were pleased and confident in the boat’s abilities, but, after scoring 86 of a possible 100 points, they were not awarded the prize.

This drawing is part of an album containing thirty-six drawings (PAG3476–PAG3511) by Harry Edmund Edgell (1809–1876), dated between 1851 and 1852. During this time, Edgell was living in Torquay, Devon, with his wife Caroline, with whom he had a daughter in June 1852. Edgell entered the Royal Naval College in 1821 and was involved in forcing the passage of the Bocca Tigris in China while serving as Lieutenant on HMS ‘Imogene’ in the 1830s. He became Captain in 1846 and commanded HMS ‘Siren’, in which he assisted in the removal of the sculptured remains of the Tomb of Mausolus (Canning Marbles) from Bodrum Castle, Asia Minor (now Türkiye), to the British Museum. After returning from the Mediterranean in 1847, Edgell did not serve on board a ship again until 1855. This sketchbook primarily contains landscapes and coastal scenes depicting everyday life in and around Devon. Some of the later pages depict places in China and other locations in Asia, suggesting Edgell may have used this album outside of the dates recorded. The final page contains a note in Edgell’s hand, titled ‘India’, recording the details of six ships involved in the Second Anglo-Burmese War, which began in April 1852.