"For most conspicuous gallantry near Rue du Bois on June 16th, 1915. On his own initiative he crawled out repeatedly under a very heavy shell and machine gun fire to bring in wounded men who were lying about one hundred yards in front of our trenches. He rescued four men, one of whom he dragged back by means of a rifle sling placed round his own neck and the man's body. This man was so severely wounded that unless he had been immediately attended to he must have died."
Morrow got the V.C. "for most conspicuous bravery near Messines, on April 12th, 1915, when he rescued and carried successfully to places of comparative safety several men who had been buried under the debris of trenches wrecked by shell fire. Private Morrow carried out this gallant work on his own initiative and under very heavy fire from the enemy." I am able to supplement this official record by a statement made by one of the men who was saved by Morrow: "The enemy opened fire unexpectedly. A shell fell in the trench, burying over a dozen men, of whom I was one, in the wreckage. Those who were able ran to shelter, for that shell was followed by many more; and the trench having been laid bare, the enemy opened a hot rifle and machine-gun fire upon it. At the same time the enemy was making an attack in force. Accordingly it was a risky thing to be there. Morrow didn't mind. He came up to where we were pinned under the remains of the parapet and a dug-out. He dragged me out and carried me on his back to a place of safety. Then he went back to look for others. He made the journey six times, bringing all the men that were alive. It was slow, laborious work, and all the time Morrow was under heavy fire from the Germans."
On the same day that the notice of Private Morrow's distinction was published, his death was announced in the list of casualties. He was killed on April 25th, 1915, at St. Julien, while in the act of again succouring the wounded. His widowed mother, at Newmills, Dungannon, received the Victoria Cross that was awarded to her gallant boy with an autograph letter of sympathy from the King.
Private John Caffrey got the Victoria Cross for a gallant display of bravery and humanity near La Brique on November 16th, 1915. A man of the West Yorkshire Regiment had been badly wounded, and was lying in the open, unable to move, in full view of, and about 300 to 400 yards from, the enemy's trenches. Corporal Stirk, Royal Army Medical Corps, and Caffrey at once started out to rescue him, but at the first attempt they were driven back by shrapnel fire. Soon afterwards they started again, under close sniping and machine-gun fire, and succeeded in reaching and bandaging the wounded man, but, just as Corporal Stirk had lifted him on Private Caffrey's back, he himself was shot in the head. Caffrey put down the wounded man, bandaged Corporal Stirk, and helped him back into safety. He then returned and brought in the man of the West Yorkshire Regiment. "He had made three journeys across the open, under close and accurate fire," says the official record, "and had risked his own life to save others with the utmost coolness and bravery."
No more moving story of the devotion of a private to an officer, to whom he was regimentally attached, is to be found than that enshrined in the record of the deed for which the Victoria Cross was given to Private Thomas Kenny, 13th (Service) Battalion Durham Light Infantry, part of "Kitchener's Army." Kenny, aged thirty-three, was living with his wife and seven children, and following the occupation of a quarry-man, at Hart Bushes, a hamlet two miles outside Wingate, County Durham, when on the outbreak of war he joined the Army. His battalion was sent to the front on August 25th, 1915. On the night of November 4th, 1915, Kenny won the Victoria Cross near La Houssoie, for conspicuous bravery and devotion to Lieutenant Brown of his battalion. The deed is finely described in a letter written by Major C.E. Walker, of the 13th Durham Light Infantry:—
"I just want to write to you to tell you how proud we all are of your husband, Pte. T. Kenny, for the magnificent pluck and endurance he showed under very heavy fire when Lieut. P.A. Brown was wounded. Your husband was what we call 'observer' to Lieut. Brown—that is to say, he acted as a sort of shadow to his officer, who never moved anywhere without him. The Lieutenant went out in front of our trenches in a thick fog to superintend a party of our men mending our barbed wire, Kenny, as usual, accompanying him. They over-ran our wire and lost their bearings in the fog. Finding that they were on unfamiliar ground they sat down to listen for sounds to guide them. After a while they decided to go back. As soon as they rose a rifle was fired from a listening post about 15 yards away. (They were only about 30 yards from the enemy trenches, and a listening post runs out from their front line.) Lieut. Brown fell, shot through both thighs. Kenny at once went to his assistance, and although Lieut. Brown was a good-sized man, got him slung on to his back and started off with him.
"The Germans in the listening post—there are generally four to six there—opened rapid fire at him. He therefore dropped to his hands and knees and began crawling, with the officer still on his back. Lieut. Brown was hit about 9.45. Kenny carried him in this manner, under heavy fire from the enemy every time they heard him, for over an hour in spite of the wet, clinging nature of the ground. At last he came to a ditch he recognised, and being utterly exhausted, he made the Lieutenant as comfortable as he could and then started off for our lines for help. He found an officer and a few men of his battalion at a listening post, and having guided them back to where he had left his officer, Lieutenant Brown was brought in still living, but died at the dressing station. His last words were, 'Kenny—you're a hero!' The General is delighted with the pluck, endurance, and devotion shown by your husband, and has recommended him for the Victoria Cross. Kenny is a splendid fellow, and you may well be proud of him."
Lieutenant Brown's mother wrote from Beckenham, Kent, to Kenny, expressing her deep gratitude for his services to her son: "I am thankful to feel that he died among friends and that he was able to thank you," she says. "I know you will value his last words. He had often mentioned you to me in his letters home, and talked of 'my observer Kenny, a very nice Irishman from Co. Durham, who goes with me everywhere.' His life had been a very different one before this dreadful war, but he gave up everything for pure patriotism."
These are rare, fine, and noble actions. They are not necessarily actions which only a true soldier could accomplish. They are the outcome of fortitude, that spirit which supports a man to go through with a tremendous task, involving pain of body and trouble of mind, but a task from which his sense of duty will not permit him to turn aside; and fortitude is a quality found not uncommonly in the ordinary daily round of civil life as well as on the battlefield. The other awards of the Victoria Cross to Irishmen were made for deeds of quite a different character; real soldierly deeds, bold, dashing, and intrepid; deeds, if not of reckless bravery, certainly of bravery reckless of life for the attainment of the purpose in view. In a word, they are deeds more representative of the traditional fiery fearlessness of Celtic valour.
There is the case of Private Edward Dwyer, of the East Surrey Regiment, who was born at Fulham, London, of Irish parents, his father being a Galway man and his mother a native of Omeath. I saw him one sunny day in July, 1915, coming down the Strand at the head of a recruiting procession, and his appearance gave me at first a shock of surprise. I do not know why it should be so, but it is the fact that we usually associate intrepidity and resolution with men of powerful physique and demeanour that suggests fearlessness. Perhaps the illusion has taken its rise from misty recollections of the heroes of the fiction-reading of our youth. That illusion has been dispelled, for me, at least, by those V.C.-men of the war whom I have seen, and I have seen several of them. In all of them, without exception, I should say it was the mind that told and not so much the body. Dwyer looked quite a boy, and one of small stature, too, as he walked that day between two burly sergeants, to whose shoulders his head just about reached. But I could see the Victoria Cross of dark bronze and its red ribbon on the left breast of his khaki tunic. His hearty laughter and smiles told of his pride and joy in the demonstration, of which he was the central figure—silk-hatted men baring their heads to him; women, young and old, pressing forward to kiss him; and the air filled with shoutings and the blare of brass instruments. Then, from the plinth of the Nelson Monument in Trafalgar Square, standing between two of Landseer's great lions, he made a sprightly recruiting speech. "I promise you this," said he, "a drink and a cigar for the first ten recruits to come up here. Age is nothing. I was only sixteen when I joined. I think the recruiting-sergeant must have been a little short-sighted on purpose, because he enlisted me without any trouble. Out at the Front there are men who are grey-headed. Doesn't it shame you?" he cried, turning sharply to the young men in the crowd.