Norfolk's First World War Victoria Cross recipients

During the First World War, the Victoria Cross was awarded to 627 recipients, of whom I can trace just six from Norfolk. If any reader is aware of others, I should be glad to hear about them and research their stories. I have already written about the extraordinary life of Harry Daniels in a previous article. But November, with its remembrance connotations, seems an appropriate month in which to write about three more, each of whom showed great bravery, survived the war, and has an interesting back story. The two remaining, Lieutenant Gordon Flowerdew and Lance-Corporal Ernest Seaman both died in the actions which resulted in their awards and their amazing actions will be the subject of a later article.

Harry Cator of Drayton, who received the Victoria Cross. Photo: Newsquest library The first, Harry Cator, not only won the VC but also the Military Medal, the other ranks equivalent of the Military Cross. Drayton-born Cator was the son of a railwayman and a domestic servant. In September 1914 he married his cousin, Rose. The very next day he enlisted - legend has it that he promised his bride he would try to be awarded the Victoria Cross!

After training he was sent to France – he must have cut an impressive figure as he was promoted to sergeant just a few weeks after he arrived. His Military Medal recognised his bravery in rescuing 36 wounded men from the German lines and was followed in 1917 by the award of the VC.

Harry’s platoon had suffered substantial casualties from a well-sited German machine gun, when he, with one other volunteer, advanced across open ground to try to neutralise the weapon. His colleague was killed shortly after they started advancing, but Harry, picking up a Lewis gun and ammunition on his way made it to the enemy trench where he killed the entire crew, and their officer. He then held the trench position single-handedly, while a bombing squad (a unit within the platoon which usually included two specially trained bomb throwers to attack enemy trenches) attacked the far end of the trench covered by his protective fire and succeeded in capturing five machine guns and more than 100 prisoners. The citation referred to his ‘conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty’.

Harry Cator commemoration. Photo: Simon Finlay. Three days later Harry was badly wounded, his jaw broken by shell fragments, some others remained embedded in his shoulders. For treatment and surgery he was evacuated to the Beaufort Military Hospital in Bristol. It was while he was a patient there that he received the Victoria Cross from the King at Buckingham Palace. On arriving back at Bristol on the train he found a joyous group of fellow patients waiting to greet him. They carried him shoulder-high to waiting transport and on arrival at the hospital a regimental band played See the Conquering Hero Comes.

Harry Cator declined the offer of a commission but was certainly an inspirational character. It seems fitting that he should have been selected as a member of the Guard at the interment of the Unknown Warrior at Westminster Abbey in 1920.

Captain Harry Cator's grave at the cemetery next to St Margaret's Church, Sprowston. Photo: Denise Bradley After the war he followed several occupations, as a shoe repairer, a post office official and as a civil servant. When war returned, he was initially commissioned as quartermaster of a Transit Camp before being appointed as commandant of a POW camp. He continued in the service until 1951. It’s rather touching to read that such a military hero treated the former enemies entrusted to his charge so fairly that after the war some of them invited him to visit them in Germany for his holidays.

As with so many of the heroes I’ve researched, I find it sad that the families were not able to retain the medals they had won. In this case his medals, VC, MM and the Croix de Guerre, were sold for just £10,500 in 1985. Sold again, for £28,500, to Michael Ashcroft they are now on display in the Ashcroft Gallery at the Imperial War Museum.

VC recipient Sidney Day. Photo: Newsquest library Sidney James Day was a Norwich boy, educated at Lakenham who, on leaving school was apprenticed to a butcher. He enlisted just a month after the declaration of war and was sent to France a year later. He quickly showed his mettle, carrying a wounded officer in his arms back towards the British lines. Sadly, the officer was shot again as Sidney carried him, and died before reaching safety.

Sidney was promoted to lance corporal, but during the Battle of the Somme he suffered four wounds and was evacuated home. It was six months before he was deemed fit to return to the front, where he was, in August 1917, promoted to corporal. Put in charge of a bombing squad (often a group of eight soldiers – two trained to throw the bombs, two more to carry their stock of bombs, the others providing covering fire) he was, that same month, detailed to lead his squad in an attempt to clear forward trenches still held by the Germans. He did so successfully, taking four prisoners in the process.

The city of Norwich citation of VC recipient Sidney Day. Photo: Newsquest library Returning to his own section he was immediately under attack himself. In a trench with five other men including a badly wounded officer, he performed the sort of feat that used to appear in the ‘war hero stories’ of 1950’s comics. No sooner had he reached the trench than a German squad lobbed a bomb into it. Quick as a flash he picked up the bomb and tossed it out of the trench just as it exploded, thus saving the lives of all in the trench. Extraordinary speed of reaction, amazing speed of thought. The citation referred to his ‘conspicuous bravery’ and went on to report how, after ejecting the bomb he completed his task of clearing the neighbouring trenches and then remaining in position for 66 hours under heavy shell and mortar fire. The citation concludes ‘Throughout the whole operation his conduct was an inspiration to all’.

Subsequently returned home both for treatment of his wounds and for his investiture at Buckingham Palace, he enjoyed a civic reception in Norwich. After receiving the medal he was admitted to hospital for further treatment, but three months later returned to France, was again wounded, and then taken prisoner. On his discharge he was awarded a 30% disability pension. He returned briefly to butchery, but then decided to move south to Portsmouth, where he acquired a restaurant, which he re-named the ‘Sidney Day VC Tearoom’ above which he made his home, marrying in 1939.

A little ironically, given his exploits, the tearoom was destroyed by enemy bombing in 1941. He stayed in Portsmouth in rented accommodation and worked as a dockyard messenger. Like Harry Cator, he was a member of the VC guard at the internment of the unknown warrior. Like Harry he should be remembered as the extraordinary hero he was, and like Harry his VC, purchased in 2018 by Lord Ashcroft for £160,000, can be seen in the Imperial War Museum.

The order of service at a ceremony to commemorate the bravery of VC recipient Arthur Cross. Photo: Newsquest library. The one remaining holder of the VC whose story is still to be told is Arthur Henry Cross. Like Harry Cator he won the Military Medal as well as the Victoria Cross. Like the others he survived the ‘war to end all wars’, but his post war history is rather sadder than that of his fellow heroes. Born in Shipdham, he moved to Camberwell as a teenager, working on the railways, enlisting in 1916. He later transferred to the Machine Gun Corps. In March 1918 he volunteered to make a reconnaissance of the position from which the Germans were using machine guns which they had captured when the British had pulled back. Armed only with a revolver he crept back to the trench which his own section had been occupying when the retreat came. Astonished at his sudden appearance all seven German soldiers in the trench promptly surrendered. He escorted them back to the British lines, carrying the machine guns and the ammunition, which were soon in use, helping to fight off another German attack.

After receiving his VC from the King at Buckingham Palace in early September 1918, he was feted in his home village, and presented with an inscribed gold watch on behalf of the villagers of Shipdham. Unfortunately, he had overstayed his leave and was posted AWOL, though he maintained that he had been granted additional leave to visit his family. When arrested he didn’t take it lying down and there was a good deal of sympathetic press comment at his protestations.

The Lord Lieutenant of Norfolk Sir Richard Jewson addressing a ceremony commemorating the bravery of VC recipient Arthur Cross. Photo: Newsquest library Discharged from the army the following year, he found life difficult, and by the early 1920s, his army gratuity spent, he was unemployed and not in good health. Settling for a lowly paid role as a council scavenger, he was soon in trouble again, charged first with acting as a bookie’s runner and later with theft.

He suffered a tragedy during the Second World War when his wife and two of their children were killed during an air raid in 1941, when the shelter in which they had sought safety took a direct hit. Harry escaped as he had decided not to go into the shelter, but to remain in their flat which survived intact. After the war he worked as a messenger in the city.

A plaque commemorating the bravery of VC recipient Arthur Cross. Photo: Newsquest library In the early 1950s he enjoyed a brief burst of publicity when David Niven, who was to star in the film Carrington VC and wanted to wear an original VC, borrowed Harry’s medal, which he had managed, despite his financial difficulties, to hold on to. The medals were still in his possession when he died in 1965 and remained with his family until 2012 when they were sold for £185,000.

Harry Cross had, at times, a difficult life after his wartime heroics, but I am indebted to Steve Snelling’s research about him for an article in the Eastern Daily Press in 2018 for another side to his character in which Steve quoted family sources as saying that Harry lived his life to the full, and that ’wine ,women and song were his favourites in life’. He’d certainly earned the right to some relaxation!

Norfolk can be truly proud of its heroes.