It's a strange piece of JC history: a model lifeboat, presented in memory of one-time JC editor Michael Henry, is being auctioned in London next week by Charles Miller Ltd.

Mr Henry, who had started a fund for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, died aged 45 in 1875, after a fire in his office. At the time, the JC wrote of the "popular, amiable, most kind-hearted and truly religious Editor".

"His clothes accidently caught fire, and he succumbed to the terrible shock which his delicate nervous system thereby sustained."

The lot is a miniature model of the RNLI lifeboat "Michael Henry" which the editor had funded. It is estimated to sell for up to £3000.