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“Thank you also for posting the fine photograph. I have purchased the replacement lifeboat for the Lady Carrington which is named theAlice Rawson. I hope to restore it and return it to Watson's Bay as a tribute to all of those connected to both the lifeboat and pilot services. Any further information that you may have I would be grateful to find out and credit you accordingly.”

Thank you , David Sheedy 2010

David’s research into maritime history was lifelong and he was determined to capture the past by campaigning tirelessly for the preservation of the Alice Rawson. The account given by Roger Baylis (2012) summed up the Alice Rawson as Watsons Bay’s last lifeboat built in 1905 to replace theLady Carrington. She was built entirely of Australian hardwood at Cockatoo Island Dockyards and was the prototype for future Sydney Lifesaving surf boats.  

The Alice Rawson was stationed at Gibson’s Beach, Watsons Bay for forty years and another 60 years in private hands with David Sheedy being the last owner. Respecting maritime history with a view for a permanent memento of Sydney’s shipping lanes, sea travel, and fishing movements, the necessity for rescue craft was an indispensable aspect of harbour life.  

The Alice Rawson dimensions were length 37 feet (1127.7cm) breadth 9ft 3 inches (283.5cm) and depth amidship 3ft 6in (109.7)cm.

Below are the lifeboat Alice Rawson specifications as per V Evans (1990)

The Alice Rawson “was diagonally planked with two thicknesses of ¾ inch best selected cedar, and strengthened inside with eight spotted gum stringers, the keel and keelsons also being of this timber, and the stem and sternposts of swamp mahogany. She had two swing-drop centreboards ingenuously designed so that in case of injury, by simply removing a toggle on the lifting chain, the whole board can be dropped through the centre case, clear of the boat.

She had the ordinary watertight bulkheads fore and aft, packed with light wooden floats filled with cork shavings, as was the space under the main floor, to give her buoyancy equal to 17 tons displacement. She had eight 4 inch relieving valves and two 4 inch pumps to discharge the water from two ballast tanks constructed on the centre line of the vessel. She was self- righting and if capsized could come back on an even keel after only thirty-five seconds. The keel was of cast iron and weighted 16cwt.

The actual cost of £606 included all necessary fittings for immediate service with two sea anchors, oil bags, water beaker, lifebelts, lifebuoys, lamps, speaking trumpets, grappling irons, rocket lines, spirit compass, tomahawks, a special keg for brandy and a special case for sea biscuits “

Evans (1990) continues to describe how the rescue boat Alice Rawson was named after the untimely death of Lady Rawson who died at sea on her returning voyage from London to Sydney. The boat was berthed on Gibsons Beach at the boat shed located near Salisbury Street. The Alice Rawson was manned by 12 oarsmen, a coxswain and assistant coxswain, and crewed from the Watsons Bay community.

The David Sheedy Foundation welcomes any further research and support that will benefit the mission respecting, restoring and repurposing practices to ensure maritime artefacts are conserved for generations.

_{Roger BaylissThe Bay Times Issue 1 November 2012}

_{The Alice Rawson and Port Jackson lifeboat service Woollahra}

_{Vaughan Evans, Lifeboats and rocket brigades in New South Wales, supplement to theNewsletter of Australian Association for Maritime History. No 43 July 1990.}

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