Dyson Family of Worcestershire
© Jeff Dyson - November 2006
Bill Day, a 37-year-old Hove plumber who dived into the gale lashed seas, told today of his part in the dramatic rescue from the storm tossed yacht.
Force eight seas had hurled the £1,000 blue-sailed yacht repeatedly against the shore. Mr. Day said: " I heard a woman screaming." Mr. Day, of Shirley Street, Hove, said he helped the police to pull a man out.' "One man who was being tossed about in the water was very near drowning and ' I should think we got there just in time," he said. First words spoken by this man after P.C. Jeffrey Dyson swam out to him were: " Where am I ? "
P.C. Dyson, aged 22, was back on his West Street beat, after going to his Hollingbury Park
Avenue home for dry clothes. He spoke about his rescue plunge. He said: " I was at the town hall when the call came through: ' Yacht believed in difficulties.' " Some officers went to the end of the pier, and I went along the front. I saw the yacht about 30 yd. out, obviously in difficulties. People were struggling out there, and I stripped down and dived in.
VERY WEAK
" Sgt. Roy Lane and I were first there. While. I was swimming out to grab the man others arrived, civilians and other officers, and formed a chain. " They worked there way out towards me as 1 swam back. We pulled the man out." Artificial respiration was unnecessary, he said. But the man collapsed. " He was very weak. The first thing he said was ' Where am I ? ' but he did not speak much English. " He was very tired, anyone would have been after being out in that sea all night." P.C. Dyson, three years a policeman, holds the bronze medallion for life saving.
Earlier this afternoon a Royal Sussex County Hospital spokesman said the four were " all sleeping."
That was the press version, in actual fact as I got the man to the ‘human chain’ he was grabbed and I was just left floundering in the surf tired out. When I got out the sea the first thing that happened was a good telling off by Insp. Bill Cowan for going into the sea without a lifeline! At least I received a Commendation for my work.
After four years on the beat I was given an Aide Attachment to CID and there I worked for the next seventeen years In 1968 the six police forces of Sussex were amalgamated into one force, Sussex Police. All officers were protected by their original conditions of service and you could not be moved from your original force area without consenting. In an attempt to unite the new force officers were encouraged to ‘waive their rights’ and be available to be moved. We had purchased our own property and had a low Council fixed rate mortgage so I was reluctant to acceed to these requests. It did my promotion chances no good but I always told the Chief Constable, that if he wanted to promote me I would waive my rights.
Force eight seas had hurled the £1,000 blue-
P.C. Dyson, aged 22, was back on his West Street beat, after going to his Hollingbury Park
Avenue home for dry clothes. He spoke about his rescue plunge. He said: " I was at the town hall when the call came through: ' Yacht believed in difficulties.' " Some officers went to the end of the pier, and I went along the front. I saw the yacht about 30 yd. out, obviously in difficulties. People were struggling out there, and I stripped down and dived in.
VERY WEAK
" Sgt. Roy Lane and I were first there. While. I was swimming out to grab the man others arrived, civilians and other officers, and formed a chain. " They worked there way out towards me as 1 swam back. We pulled the man out." Artificial respiration was unnecessary, he said. But the man collapsed. " He was very weak. The first thing he said was ' Where am I ? ' but he did not speak much English. " He was very tired, anyone would have been after being out in that sea all night." P.C. Dyson, three years a policeman, holds the bronze medallion for life saving.
Earlier this afternoon a Royal Sussex County Hospital spokesman said the four were " all sleeping."
That was the press version, in actual fact as I got the man to the ‘human chain’ he was grabbed and I was just left floundering in the surf tired out. When I got out the sea the first thing that happened was a good telling off by Insp. Bill Cowan for going into the sea without a lifeline! At least I received a Commendation for my work.
After four years on the beat I was given an Aide Attachment to CID and there I worked for the next seventeen years In 1968 the six police forces of Sussex were amalgamated into one force, Sussex Police. All officers were protected by their original conditions of service and you could not be moved from your original force area without consenting. In an attempt to unite the new force officers were encouraged to ‘waive their rights’ and be available to be moved. We had purchased our own property and had a low Council fixed rate mortgage so I was reluctant to acceed to these requests. It did my promotion chances no good but I always told the Chief Constable, that if he wanted to promote me I would waive my rights.