Documents

Samuel Harvey VC (17 September 1881 – 22 September 1960) was an English recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to British and Commonwealth forces. He was 34 years old, Regular (soldier) a Private in the 1st Battalion, York and Lancaster Regiment, British Army during the First World War when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the VC. On 29 September 1915 in the Big Willie Trench near the Hohenzollern Redoubt, France, during a heavy bombing (grenade)attack, more bombs were urgently required and private Harvey volunteered to fetch them. The communication trench was blocked with wounded and reinforcements and he went backwards and forwards across open ground under intense fire and succeeded in bringing up 30 boxes before he was wounded in the head. It was largely owing to his cool bravery in supplying the bombs that the enemy was eventually driven back. Harvey also received the French Legion of Honour (5th Class) and the Cross of St. George (Russia). The attached account of his actions was written by James Price Lloyd of the Welsh Regiment, who served with Military Intelligence. After the war, the government to destroyed all the archives relating to this propaganda (section MI 7b (1)). They were regarded as being too sensitive to risk being made public. Remarkably these documents have survived in the personal records of Captain Lloyd. Many of these papers are officially stamped, and one can trace the development of many individual articles from the notes based on an idea, to the pencil draft which is then followed by the hand-written submission and the typescript. The archive Tales of the VC comprises 94 individual accounts of the heroism that earned the highest award for valour, the Victoria Cross. These are recounted deferentially and economically, yet they still manage to move the reader. Date stamp: 18 May 1918. || Article with annotations.

My grandfather, Albert Victor Kent, was a Fusilier in the WWI. He was wounded in Gallipoli and sent back to England to recover. When he recovered he was deployed in France for two years and he was injured several times and eventually captured. When he was in England he met and married an English lady and their first son was born 16 days before he was sent back to France. After being captured he was put in a prison camp in Poland, where he got TBC and died of it. He was decorated with the Military Cross for bravery. || records; hand written diary; copy of a telegram; photograph; chalkcarb