David Butler on Saving Lives at Sea

In the early days you had a pair of overalls and a beret. No auxiliary Coast Guard had anything more than that did they?

Like I said, there was two pairs of wellies, two sou’westers, so you had to bring your own foul weather gear. You got given a pair of overalls and that was it.

As time moved on, they then started to produce I’d say better overalls, but they weren’t, they still didn’t fit very well.

They sort of were like of one size fit all and it was massive, and then they started bringing in some t shirts, like polo shirts that you would wear, and then when, as I said before about the Station Officer and Deputy Station Officer, when that came along, they then decided that Coast Guards should have white shirts, black trousers, a Coast Guard tie and Coast Guard epaulettes, so that we looked a little bit more professional when we were out on our patrols or out doing Cowes Week stuff, rather than turning up with a pair of overalls on.

It didn’t fit well with a lot of people because, as dad said, you’ve got longshoremen, builders, fishermen, they don’t do uniform wearing, but they pushed on with it and I think … so that would have been again early to mid ‘90’s with the whole uniform thing crept in. Now, up to date, they’re not even allowed out without a proper uniform.

I don’t know what it consists of now ‘cos obviously I’m not a part of it, but they’re not allowed on the calls or anything unless they’ve got their proper Coast Guard uniform on.

Andy Butler: And helmets you’ve got now haven’t you?

Yeah, that was another thing that came along was obviously the wearing of head protection which should have been done many, many years ago, so everybody has their own head protection now, has done for quite a long time.