27 Medals for Sea Heroes: The Ellen Southard Rescue
Twenty-seven gold medals for one shipwreck. When the American merchant ship Ellen Southard broke apart in a Liverpool storm, lifeboat crews pulled her sailors from the water at enormous personal risk. Congress, deeply moved, awarded each rescuer a gold Lifesaving Medal — the most ever granted for a single event. The medals were struck in the United States and shipped to England. Britain had its own honors system. But America insisted on saying thank you anyway.
September 27, 1875
151 years ago
What Else Happened on September 27
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