CONTENTS
| PAGE | |
| Introduction | [9] |
| The Victoria Cross | [12] |
| Captain Grenfell and the Charge of the Lancers | [16] |
| British Sailors who knew how to Die | [19] |
| Some of the First V.C.’s | [21] |
| The Spirit of Sir Philip Sidney | [28] |
| The Messengers | [30] |
| The Story of Corporal Holmes | [33] |
| The Men of the First Line | [36] |
| Lieutenant Leach and Sergeant Hogan | [42] |
| Wilson, O’Leary, and Martin-Leake | [45] |
| The Canadian Scottish | [48] |
| The Canadian Spirit | [52] |
| The Adventures of the “Kent” | [57] |
| The Lancashire Landing | [62] |
| Commander Unwin and the Two Midshipmen | [67] |
| Anzac | [73] |
| Submarines in the Dardanelles | [78] |
| Warneford and the Zeppelin | [83] |
| Smith and Forshaw: Two Heroes of Gallipoli | [87] |
| The Story of Edith Cavell | [90] |
| Jack Cornwell, the Boy who “Carried On” | [97] |
| Heroes of Loos | [100] |
| How Moorhouse brought in His Report | [104] |
| Loraine’s Fight in the Air | [105] |
| “A Glorious Band” | [108] |
| The Work of the Mine-Sweepers | [115] |
| “The Padre” | [121] |
| Lieutenant Robinson and the Zeppelin | [124] |
| The Canadians at Vimy Ridge | [129] |
| Heroes of a Hospital Ship | [133] |
| Along the “V.C. Walk” | [137] |
| Midshipman Gyles and the German Boarders | [146] |
| How Man made an Earthquake | [149] |
| “When can their Glory Fade?” | [155] |
| “The Heart of a Lion” | [157] |
AUTHOR’S NOTE
The author has used a large number of sources—newspapers, official reports, private letters and diaries, as well as books—in gathering the facts for these simple stories. Acknowledgments have been made wherever it was possible to trace the source, and indulgence is asked if through inadvertence or inability to find the original report any requisite acknowledgment has been omitted. Very meagre particulars of most of these brave deeds are at present available, for the British V.C. does not talk of his exploits. But such facts as are actually known ought surely to be given the widest possible publicity, especially in the schools of the Empire.
“If I should die, think only this of me,
That there’s some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England.”
Rupert Brooke.
“Will you at least try, if I am killed, not to let the things I have loved cause you pain, but rather to get increased enjoyment from the Sussex Downs, or from Janie singing folk-songs, because I have found such joy in them, and in that way the joy I have found can continue to live.”