============= VICTORIA CROSS, New Zealand Troops who have won the =========
RESOURCE: ©1994 The Electric Book Company Ltd.
VICTORIA CROSS
Victoria Cross is the highest British decoration awarded to members of the
NZ armed forces for valour while on active service. The medal has been won
by British servicemen in NZ during the New Zealand Wars, and by New
Zealanders serving in the South African War, and World Wars One and Two.
The total of NZ Victoria Cross winners is 21, with Captain Upham being the
only combatant ever to receive a bar.
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Listed below are Victoria Cross winners who hail from New Zealand, or
served with New Zealand regiments, with an explanation of their deeds on
the following pages.
R.C. Travis was also known as Dickson Cornelius Savage but he enlisted and
served under the pseudonym - R.C. Travis.
* Posthumous award
- Killed in action
/ later taken Prisoner of War
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Last name, First name Year of birth/death Actions Performed At War
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McKENNA, Colour-Sergeant Alexandra Redoubt (Tuakau), 1863 NZ
HEAPHY, CHARLES (1820-81) b.London Paterangi Pa - Feb. 1864 NZ
HARDHAM, William James (1876-1928) b.Wgtn Naauwpoort - Jan. 1901 Sth African
BASSETT, Cyril Royston Guyton(1892-1983), b.Auck Chunuk Bair Ridge, Gallipoli-7 Aug.1915 WWI
SHOUT, Alfred John (1882-1915) b. NZ Lone Pine WWI*
RHODES-MOORHOUSE, William Barnard (1887-1915) b. London France - Apr. 1915 WWI*
COOKE, Thomas (1881-1916) b. Kaikoura Pozières, Somme - 24 Jul.1916 WWI*
BROWN, Donald Forrester (1890-1916), b.Dunedin. Somme - 15 Sept.1916 WWI-
FREYBERG, Bernard Cyril (1889-1963) b. London Somme - Nov. 1916 WWI
FRICKLETON, Samuel (1891-1971) b. Scotland Messines, Belgium - Jul.1917 WWI
ANDREW, Brigadier Leslie Wilton (1897-1969) b. Manawatu La Basseville, France in 1917 WWI
NICHOLAS, Henry James (1891-1918) b. Lincoln Polderhoek, Western Front - Dec.1917 WWI-
SANDERS, William Edward (1883-1917) b. Auckland Cmdr of HMS Prize - 1917 WWI-
STORKEY, Percy Valentine (1891-1969) b. Napier France - April 1918 WWI
+TRAVIS, Richard Charles (1884-1918) b.Opotiki Rossignol Wood - Jul. 1918 WWI-
JUDSON, Reginald Stanley (1881-1972) b. Auckland France - 24 August 1918 WWI
GRANT, John Gilroy (1889-1970) b. Hawera Bancourt - Sept.1918 WWI
WEATHERS, Lawrence Carthage (1890-1918) b. Te Kopuru Peronne, Western Front - Sept.1918 WWI*
LAURENT, Henry John (1895-1987) b. Hawera Western Front - Sept.1918 WWI
FORSYTH, Samuel (1891-1918) b. Wellington Bapaume - 1918 WWI*
CRICHTON, James (1879-1961) b.Ireland Crevecoeur, France - 1918 WWI
HINTON, John Daniel (1908-97) b.Riverton Kalamata, Greece - Apr.1941 WWII/
HULME, Alfred Clive (1911-82) b.Dunedin Crete - May. 1941 WWII
UPHAM, Charles Hazlitt (1908- ), b Christchurch Crete - May 1941, Egypt - July 1942 WWII
WARD, James Allen (Sgt.-Pilot)(1919-41) b. Wanganui July 1941 WWII-
ELLIOTT, Keith (1916- ) b.Apiti, Manawatu Ruweisat Ridge, Wtrn Desert-15 Jul.1942 WWII
TRIGG, Lloyd Allan (1914-1943) b.Houhora Morocco - Aug. 1942 WWII-
NGARIMU, Moananui-a-Kiwi (1918-43) b. Ruatoria Tebaga Gap, Tunis - Mar. 1943 WWII*
TRENT, Leonard Henry (1915-86) b.Nelson Holland - May 1943 WWII/
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ANDREW, Brigadier Leslie Wilton (1897-1969) b. Manawatu.
Won the Victoria Cross at La Basseville, France in 1917. In World War Two
he commanded the 22nd Battalion of the Second NZEF, and led the victory
contingent in London in 1946.
BASSETT, Cyril Royston Guyton (1892-1983), b.Auckland
Bassett was the first New Zealander to win the Victoria Cross in World War
One. Bassett was a corporal in the New Zealand Divisional Signals Company,
and was one of the signallers in support of the attack by NZ, Gurkha and
British soldiers on Chunuk Bair Ridge, Gallipoli. The New Zealanders
achieved the ridge despite horrendous losses and after trying to hold it
were dislodged. The VC was awarded on 7 August 1915, when he kept lines of
communication open to the men beleaguered by intense enemy fire on the ridge
of Chunuk Bair.
BROWN, Donald Forrester (1890-1916), b.Dunedin.
A sergeant in the 2nd Otago Battalion of the New Zealand Division, won the
Victoria Cross during the Somme Battle in World War One, on 15 September
1916, and died in action a fortnight later. He was a farmer before he
went to the war.
COOKE, Thomas (1881-1916) b. Kaikoura.
Was a private in the 8th Infantry Battalion of the Australian Army in World
War One. He was awarded the Victoria Cross posthumously for extreme valour
under fire as a machine-gunner at Pozières, in the Battle of the Somme, on
24 July 1916.
CRICHTON, James (1879-1961) b.Ireland.
Served in the South African War with the Cameron Highland Regiment. In
World War One, Crichton relinquished his rank of Warrant Officer to join a
frontline regiment as private, and at the age of 39 was posted to the
Auckland Regiment. He was awarded the Victoria Cross four weeks from the
end of World War One, at Crevecoeur, France. He swam a river several times
and ran through enemy fire to communicate between company headquarters and
a group of isolated comrades, and then under fire dismantled German
explosive charges from a bridge to enable reinforcements to move forward.
ELLIOTT, Keith (1916- ) b.Apiti, Manawatu.
Won the Victoria Cross at the Battle of Ruweisat Ridge in the Western Desert
on 15 July 1942. Sergeant Elliott withdrew his platoon from a situation in
which a substantial number of NZ troops had been taken prisoner by a group
of retreating German tanks. In escaping past enemy positions, Elliott and
his small band of men captured over 140 prisoners, killed or wounded more
than 30 Germans and Italians and destroyed eight machine-gun posts. Elliott
was badly wounded in four places. In 1947, after going back to farming for
a period, he became a clergyman and was for several years City Missioner in
Wellington.
FORSYTH, Samuel (1891-1918) b. Wellington
Served in France during World War One with the Second Auckland Battalion,
and won the Victoria Cross posthumously. Sergeant Forsyth was shot by a
German sniper after directing an operation against machine-guns that
enabled the NZ attack to continue during the battle for Bapaume.
FREYBERG, Bernard Cyril (1889-1963) b.London. First Baron of Wellington,
New Zealand, and Munstead, Surrey. At the start of the 1914-18 war Freyberg
went to England, joined the 7th (Hood) Battalion of the Royal Naval Brigade
and went to the Belgian front. One night in April 1915 he swam ashore in
the Gulf of Saros to divert the Turks' attention from the main landing at
Gallipoli and escaped unharmed despite heavy fire. This earned him a
Distinguished Service Order medal.
Freyberg served in France and won his Victoria Cross for action on the
Somme in November 1916. The citation said, 'This single officer enabled the
lodgement (in the battle for Beaumont Village) of the corps to be
permanently held, and on this point the line was eventually formed' for
later attacks. He was carried away..on a stretcher after being wounded four
times.
By the end of the war Freyberg was a Temporary Brigadier with two bars to
his DSO, the Croix Militaire de Guerre (CMG) and had been six times
mentioned in despatches. He was wounded nine times. Troops who served with
him in World War Two say there was hardly a part of his body unmarked by
scars.
He was recalled in 1939 and was invited by the NZ government to command the
New Zealand Division in the Middle East in November. Briefly in 1941 he was
Allied Commander-in-Chief in Crete, controlling the evacuation, and he led
the New Zealanders until the end of the war, for which he gained a third
bar to his DSO.
FRICKLETON, Samuel (1891-1971) b. Scotland
A coal miner from Blackball, in Westland, who won the Victoria Cross when
he captured two German machine-gun nests single-handed and killed all the
occupants in July 1917 at Messines, Belgium. Frickleton, a lance-corporal
in the Third Battalion, New Zealand Rifle Brigade, was severely wounded in
the battle.
GRANT, John Gilroy (1889-1970) b. Hawera
Sergeant with the First Battalion, Wellington Regiment, in World War One.
He won the Victoria Cross for attacking and capturing a group of German
machine-gun nests near Bancourt in September 1918. He later settled in
Auckland.
HARDHAM, William James (1876-1928) b.Wellington.
The only New Zealander to win the Victoria Cross during the South African
War and the first to win it overseas. He won the VC near Naauwpoort in
January 1901 when he rode to the rescue of a colleague whose horse had been
shot from under him, and who had been injured as he fell to the ground. With
a group of Boer marksmen trying to cut him down, Hardham lifted him into his
saddle and ran to safety behind a rock outcrop pulling the horse behind him.
HEAPHY, CHARLES (1820-81) b.London
The first British colonial soldier to win the Victoria Cross. Heaphy was
awarded the VC for his 'total disregard for his own safety' during a
surprise attack by Maori near Paterangi Pa, not far from Te Awamutu, in
February 1864. Seven bullets hit him or went through his clothing from point
-blank range but he continued to go forwward to help two fellow soldiers.
When he was finally forced back, he stayed in a commanding position to
direct fire against the Maori, and prevent them from moving in to kill the
soldiers and take their equipment.
HINTON, John (Jack) Daniel (1908-97) b.Riverton.
A sergeant of the 20th Battalion in World War Two, he won the Victoria
Cross at Kalamata, in Greece, in April 1941. For hand-to-hand fighting
against the Germans in the last days of the Greek campaign, before he was
wounded and captured by the Germans. His award was announced to him by the
commandant of the camp in which he was held prisoner in Germany. Hinton
settled in Auckland after the war and died in 1997.
HULME, Alfred Clive (1911-82) b.Dunedin
Joined the 23rd Battalion as a sergeant and won the Victoria Cross for
eight days of sustained fighting on Crete during May 1941. He stalked and
killed 33 German snipers and once disguised himself as a German paratrooper
and killed a number of the enemy on the outskirts of Galatos. After the
war he settled in the Bay of Plenty.
JUDSON, Reginald Stanley (1881-1972) b. Auckland.
Won the three highest awards for gallantry open to a non-commissioned
officer, within one six-week period during July and August 1918. This time
is still a record. He went overseas as a sergeant in the First Battalion,
Auckland Regiment, in 1915. Serving in France, he won the Distinguished
Conduct Medal on 24-25 July, the Military Medal on 16 August and the
Victoria Cross on 24 August, when he single-handedly captured a machine-gun
nest, 'a prompt and gallant action [which] not only saved lives but also
enabled the advance to continue unopposed', according to the citation. He
rose to the rank of lieutenant. Judson settled in Auckland, served on the
city council for ten years and on other local bodies, and farmed in
Mangonui for some years before returning to Auckland where he died aged 91.
LAURENT, Henry John (1895-1987) b. Hawera.
Served in World War One with the Second Battalion of the New Zealand Rifle
Brigade on the Western Front, and won the Victoria Cross in September 1918
after Sergeant Laurent's section killed 30 of the enemy and captured 112,
for the loss of one man. Laurent settled in Hastings after the war.
McKENNA, Colour-Sergeant
The Alexandra Redoubt (Tuakau) was attacked by the Ngati Maniapoto in 1863,
and defended by the 65th Regiment, a member of which, Colour-Sergeant
McKenna, earned the Victoria Cross for bravery during the battle. A monument
erected at Tuakau carries the names of the British troops who died in
action during the Land Wars in the Waikato.
NGARIMU, Moananui-a-Kiwi (1918-43) b.Kokai Pa, near Whareponga, Ruatoria.
The only full Maori to have won the Victoria Cross of the Maori Battalion
during World War Two. (Tebaga Gap in Tunis in March 1943) Over 24 hours,
Second Lieutenant Ngarimu and his platoon attacked and held a hill which
enabled the Germans to fire on other units of the New Zealand Division at
Tebaga Gap. Greatly outnumbered, he and the few members of his platoon
still able to fight, actually met a German attack by charging. He died
firing his sub-machine gun from the hip, 'defiantly facing the enemy',
said the citation, coming 'to rest almost on top of those of the enemy who
had fallen to his gun just before he fell to theirs'.
NICHOLAS, Henry James (1891-1918) b. Lincoln
A private in the First Battalion of the Canterbury Regiment during World
War One. He won the Victoria Cross near Polderhoek on the Western Front in
December 1917, by single-handedly capturing a German pillbox, killing 12 of
the 16 enemy and wounding the other four. He was killed in action a year
later, only 19 days before the armistice.
RHODES-MOORHOUSE, William Barnard (1887-1915) b. London, part-Maori
The first airman to win the Victoria Cross, he legally adopted the name
Rhodes-Moorhouse.
After requesting to fly on active duty, Rhodes-Moorhouse was posted to
France and in April 1915, in a B-E 26 biplane, attacked a key railway
junction at Courtrai. He scored a direct hit with a 100-lb bomb after
being hit in the stomach by a bullet during his approach, was hit again in
the leg and the hand as he checked the extent of the damage, and flew back
to his base through heavy ground fire aimed at his slow and low-flying
aircraft, determined not to land behind German lines. He was cheered by
Indian troops as he flew his battered biplane back behind the British front
line. He died of wounds the next day, and was awarded the VC posthumously
for what the British Commander, General Sir John French, then called 'the
most important bomb dropped in the war so far'. Rhodes-Moorhouse left an
infant son who died fighting in the Battle of Britain 23 years later. They
are buried side by side on a hill near the family home in Dorset.
SHOUT, Alfred John (1882-1915) b. NZ
Served with the New Zealand Army in South Africa, then settled in Sydney in
1905. He served as a captain in the first infantry battalion, Australian
Imperial Forces, in World War One. He won the Military Cross during the
Gallipoli landing, and became one of seven defenders of Lone Pine who were
awarded the Victoria Cross. Shout died of wounds aboard a hospital ship two
days after being withdrawn, and the VC award was posthumous.
SANDERS, William Edward (1883-1917) b. Auckland
A merchant seaman. Within one year, during World War One, he rose from
sub-lieutenant to lieutenant-commander and won both the DSO and Victoria
Cross. Sanders received his medals for skill and daring as commander of
HMS Prize, one of the Q-ships of World War One which acted as decoys to
trap and sink German submarines. He was killed when the Prize went down
with all hands, after being hit by a torpedo in August 1917.
STORKEY, Percy Valentine (1891-1969) b. Napier.
Served as a colour-sergeant with the Wellington Regiment while a law
student, before World War One. He was with the 19th Battalion of the
Australian Imperial Forces in France when he won the Victoria Cross in
April 1918. Lieutenant Storkey led ten men in an attack on German
machine-gun installations, killing or wounding about 30 and capturing 53.
TRAVIS, Richard Charles (1884-1918) b.Opotiki.
One of the most famous NZ soldiers of World War One, winning the Victoria
Cross, the Croix de Guerre (Belgian), the Distinguished Conduct Medal and
the Military Medal. He served with the Second Battalion, Otago Regiment,
on Gallipoli, and became famous for his forays into No-Man's-Land during two
years on the Western Front. He was described by one commentator as a
'dangerously patient', courageous and cunning scout, sniper and raider. He
prowled in No-Man's-Land during one period of 40 successive nights, seeking
out changes in enemy positions and taking a prisoner back for interrogation.
He won his major award in July 1918 for conspicuous gallantry over a period
of many hours during action against the Germans near Rossignol Wood.
Sergeant Travis was killed the following day and was buried with full
military honours at the front among his comrades, the battalion diary
recording that his death 'cast a gloom over the whole battalion.... never
missed an operation... went over the top 15 times.' His true name was
Dickson Cornelius Savage but he enlisted and served as R.C. Travis.
TRENT, Leonard Henry (1915-86) b.Nelson.
Joined the RAF in 1937 and was awarded the Victoria Cross for bravery and
dedication to duty during a bombing raid on a power-house in Holland in May
1943.
Squadron leader Trent was in one of ten Ventura bombers which set out on
the raid but, because of a series of problems and bad luck, they were left
virtually at the mercy of anti-aircraft fire and enemy fighters during the
whole of their route over enemy territory. Trent's was the only one of the
raiders to get to the target and, although his bombs overshot, blast damage
was done to the power-house. On the way back, his plane was shot down and
he spent the rest of the war in captivity.
He was one of the men who made a mass but unsuccessful breakout from Stalag
Luft III war prison in March 1944. This escape was the subject of Paul
Brickhill's book, "The Great Escape". Trent was in the RNZAF from 1944 to
1947, and then with the RAF until his retirement in 1965.
TRIGG, Lloyd Allan (1914-1943) b.Houhora, Northland.
The only British combatant in either of the World Wars to be awarded a
Victoria Cross on the basis of evidence given by the enemy he had engaged.
Trigg was commissioned a flying officer in 1942, after training in Canada.
In August that same year, while operating in Liberator bombers from Morocco
against German submarines, he went in for the kill against U-468. Although
the aircraft was hit early and was on fire from end to end, Trigg kept up
the attack and sank the submarine with depth charges, before the aircraft
finally crashed into the sea because Trigg, seriously wounded, could no
longer control it.
Some of the submarine crew escaped using a dinghy from the Liberator and,
when they were captured by the Royal Navy, told the story of Trigg's dogged
courage. He had completed 46 operational sorties by the time of his death.
UPHAM, Charles Hazlitt (1908- ), b Christchurch.
He is the only combat soldier ever to win the VC bar, although two medical
officers achieved the honour during World War One. Upham volunteered for
service at the outbreak of war and earned the Victoria Cross and Bar for
outstanding gallantry and leadership in Crete in May 1941, and at Ruweisat
Ridge, Egypt, in July 1942. After being severely wounded at Ruweisat Ridge,
Upham was captured by the Germans and recuperated in an Italian hospital.
He began a private war with his captors and ended the war in Colditz Castle
with other 'dangerous' allied prisoners.
WARD, James Allen (1919-41) b. Wanganui, a school-teacher before the war.
Won the Victoria Cross, in World War Two, in July 1941. He climbed out
along the wing of a Wellington bomber to push a canvas engine cover into a
hole near an engine, to block petrol from keeping a fire going, thereby
saving the crew from having to abandon the aircraft which was returning
from a bombing raid.
Sergeant-Pilot Ward was killed in action two months later, after he had
been given command of a 75 Squadron bomber. He was returning from a raid
on Hamburg when he was shot down by anti-aircraft fire, keeping the plane
aloft long enough for his crew to bail out but in the end crashing with it.
WEATHERS, Lawrence Carthage (1890-1918) b. Te Kopuru, near Dargaville.
He moved to South Australia before joining the 43rd Infantry Battalion of
the Australian Imperial Forces with whom he won the Victoria Cross
(posthumously) in September 1918 at Peronne on the Western Front.
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