A new lifeboat named the WMC, after an anonymous donor from Manchester, was installed at Huna, Caithness in 1878.  In December of that year the WMC was launched for the first time, when the Wick fishing boat Margaret Gunn was being sucked into the breakers on the south side of the Pentland Firth, her mast broken and in the face of a westerly gale.  The WMC plunged into the rough sea at 1 am and brought the seven-man crew of the fishing boat to safety before their vessel sank.