“The Ramsgate Home for Smack Boys Founded 1881”
Living quarters provided for young apprentices working in dangerous and arduous conditions on traditional fishing boats (smacks).
The home was founded in 1881. Its use slowly changed to receiving sailors that had been rescued, mostly from wrecks on the Goodwin Sands. Later some 3,300 survivors of the First World War are known to have been fed, clothed, sheltered and medically treated there.