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Victoria Cross winners in Peacetime

bcbarman

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I am giving the toast to the Rifles (formerly the Royal Green Jackets) at my upcoming mess dinner. 

Through my research, I found one of their VC winners was awarded his decoration for putting out a fire on a munitions truck in Quebec.

I was wondering if anyone has come across another peacetime VC winner
 
Campbell Mellis Douglas VC, who later served as the CO of 1 Field Hospital during the NW Rebellion...

http://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/collections/cmdp/mainmenu/group01/cnd-vc/dr-douglas
 
Between 1858 and 1881, the Victoria Cross could be awarded for actions taken "under circumstances of extreme danger" not in the face of the enemy. Six such awards were made during this period - five of them for a single incident off the Andaman Islands in 1867. I'll assume that the other award was to Private O'Hea who put out the fire in the railcar.  In 1881, the criteria were changed again and the VC was only awarded for acts of valour "in the face of the enemy".

The VCs awarded to the group were gazetted on 17 December 1867:

http://www.london-gazette.co.uk/issues/23333/pages/6878
THE Queen has been graciously pleased to signify Her intention to confer the decoration of the Victoria Cross on the undermentioned Officer and Private Soldiers of Her Majesty's Army, whose claims to the same have been submitted for Her Majesty's approval, for their gallant conduct at the Little Andaman Island, as recorded against their names, viz. :—

2nd Battalion, 24th Regiment: Assistant-Surgeon Campbell Millis Douglas, M.D, Private Thomas Murphy, Private James Cooper, Private David Bell, Private William Griffiths.

For the very gallant and daring manner in which, on the 7th of May, 1867, they risked their lives in manning a boat and proceeding through a dangerous surf to the rescue of some of their comrades, who formed part of an expedition which had been sent to the Island of Little Andaman, by order of the Chief Commissioner of British Burmah, with the view of ascertaining the fate of the Commander and seven of the crew of the ship " Assam Valley," who had landed there, and were supposed to have been murdered by the natives.
The officer who commanded the troops on the occasion reports : About an hour later in the day Dr. Douglas, 2nd Battalion, 24th Regiment, and the four Privates referred to, gallantly manning the second gig, made their way through the surf almost to the shore, but finding their boat was half filled with water, they retired. A second attempt made by Dr. Douglas and party proved successful, five of us being safely passed through the surf to the boats outside. A third and last trip got the whole of the party left on shore safe to the boats. It is stated that Dr. Douglas accomplished these trips through the surf to the shore by no ordinary exertion. He stood in the bows of the boat, and worked her in an intrepid and seamanlike manner, cool to a degree, as if what he was then doing was an ordinary act of every-day life. The four Privates behaved in an equally cool and collected manner, rowing through the roughest surf when the slightest hesitation or want of pluck on the part of any one of them would have been attended by the gravest results. It is reported that seventeen officers and men were thus saved from what must otherwise have been a fearful risk, if not certainty of death.
 
Blackadder1916 said:
I'll assume that the other award was to Private O'Hea who put out the fire in the railcar.

The only person to receive the Victoria Cross on Canadian soil, and an excellent story surrounding the ordeal
that is shared with provisions of The Copyright Act.

Timothy O'Hea, Victoria Cross 1866
by Susanna McLeod 

Part of the 1st Battalion of the Rifle Brigade of the British Army, Private Timothy O'Hea was one of a four-member squad that found themselves guarding a boxcar load of ammunition bound for Montreal from Quebec City. The train also contained several locked carriages with 800 German immigrants inside.

Born in Ireland's Bantry of County Cork in 1846, the young O'Hea had joined the British army and came to Canada to fight against the Fenian rebellion. On the late afternoon of June 19, 1866, with the train stopped at Danville, Quebec, noted Mysteries of Canada, a fire was discovered smouldering in the boxcar carrying gunpowder.

Railway Men Fled

Sounding the alarm, O'Hea was no doubt dismayed to find that his fellow soldiers and railway men had fled the potentially explosive train. Climbing boldly into the ammunition boxcar, he "ripped burning covers off ammunition cases and tossed them outside, then for almost an hour, making 19 trips to a creek for buckets of water," O’Hea managed to put out the fire - by himself. He not only saved the British ammunition, but by putting out the fire, he rescued the hundreds of immigrants locked in their cars from an explosion of 2,000 pounds of gunpowder and weaponry. The immigrants were cheering his actions and were seemingly “unaware of their peril,” said Mysteries of Canada. With the ammunition moved to another car, the train went safely on to its destination.

For his selfless effort to protect complete strangers during peacetime, Private Timothy O’Hea was bestowed the Victoria Cross, the highest award given for valour. The 20-year-old was decorated on New Year’s Day, 1867. Since the Victoria Cross is usually a wartime honour, the wording of the award given to O’Hea required somewhat of a change from the usual “acts of valour in the face of the enemy”. In his case, an exception was made to reflect his great bravery, and the inscription changed to “conspicuous courage under circumstances of great danger”.

O’Hea’s life after his military duty is not well documented. According to findagrave, it seems that he was struck with tuberculosis and hospitalized in London, England, then he returned home to Ireland. Though there is a gravesite in Queensland, Australia with the O’Hea name on it, there is suggestion that Timothy’s brother had borrowed his identity, and then died in Australia in 1874.

Victoria Cross Found

The Victoria Cross of Private Timothy O’Hea was missing for decades, finally located in 1950, “lying in a drawer in the Art Gallery of New South Wales. Apparently,” said Mysteries of Canada, “O’Hea had left it with a friend who had ‘presented it to the gallery’.”

Private Timothy O’Hea was the only person to receive the Victoria Cross for tremendous valour on Canadian soil. His medal is held by the Royal Green Jackets Museum in Winchester, England.


 
Thank you all, should make for an interesting speech.

Cheers
 
Am I the only person who knows about Capt. G. Meynell, MC & VC, of Queen Victoria's Corps of Guides, North West Frontier Force awarded 1935 ?
The reason I know of his story is that my father told it to me once or twice during his life, at first as a bedtime story when I was very young. My father was in the field during the campaign, Mohmand province. I have found that this heroic action was also not included in a recent publication of VCs.
The VC award to Capt. Meynell was the only peacetime occurrence of that honour up to 1950.
 
sonofagun said:
Am I the only person who knows about Capt. G. Meynell, MC & VC, of Queen Victoria's Corps of Guides, North West Frontier Force awarded 1935 ?
The reason I know of his story is that my father told it to me once or twice during his life, at first as a bedtime story when I was very young. My father was in the field during the campaign, Mohmand province. I have found that this heroic action was also not included in a recent publication of VCs.
The VC award to Capt. Meynell was the only peacetime occurrence of that honour up to 1950.

Pretty daring feat of arms but technicaly not "peacetime"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Godfrey_Meynell
 
As I recall, the only year the British Army was technically 'at peace' in the last couple of centuries was 1968?
 
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