Dave Gilmour, the Pink Floyd guitarist, helped save a man from drowning in the sea near his beachside mansion, The Telegraph reported.

The musician, 65, his wife Polly Samson, and his adoptive son Charlie rushed to the rescue after spotting the man in trouble in the freezing water off Hove, East Sussex. The trio helped police drag the man from the sea before he was taken to hospital. It is understood that the man, in his 40s, resisted attempts to be saved.

Ms Samson, 49, later commented on the incident on Twitter in a message to friends saying she felt “weirdly shaken” by the incident. “Pulled drowning man from sea who didn't want to be saved,” she wrote.

She added that she had found the man’s “prone body washing to and fro through the shingle” but that after he was rescued and revived, he leapt back into the sea.

A “brave man with earrings” stripped off and eventually pulled the man ashore, Ms Samson said.

Ray Morrow, who witnessed the incident unfold on Wednesday, Jan 25, not far from Gilmour’s £3 million seafront house, said: "The man was alive and was then handcuffed and taken away by police. Dave Gilmour and his son were on the beach and it looked like they were helping."

A Sussex Police spokesman said: "A man was seen to go into the water at Kingsway, Hove, at 1.25pm on Wednesday.

"He was pulled from the water by police officers and taken to the Royal Sussex Country Hospital. He was arrested and sectioned."

A South East Coast Ambulance Service spokesman said: "A man in his 40s was pulled from the sea and treated after nearly drowning off Kingsway, Hove."

Charlie Gilmour, 21, has not long been released from prison after serving four months inside of a 16-month sentence for committing violent disorder during a student protest in December, 2010.

The Cambridge University student swung from the Union flag on the Cenotaph in London and joined a mob that attacked the convoy carrying Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall while high on LSD, Valium and whisky.