Private Samuel Harvey V.C.
Born 17 September, 1891, Basford, Nottingham.
Served in the 1st Battalion
York and Lancaster Regiment.
Victoria Cross citation
Printed in the London Gazette in November 1915
“On the 29th September, 1915, in the ‘Big Willie’ trench near the Hohenzollern Redoubt, France, during a heavy bombing attack, more bombs were urgently needed. Private Harvey
volunteered to run across open ground under intense fire backwards and forwards, and succeeded in bringing up 30 boxes of bombs over a 13 hour period before he fell with a head wound. It was largely due to his cool bravery in supplying the bombs that the enemy was eventually driven back.”
Private Harvey was invested with his Victoria Cross by King George V at Buckingham Palace, on the 24 January, 1917. An appeal was made for information on the whereabouts of Harvey’s V.C. which was lost by him some time later.
Private Harvey died on 23 September 1960. He had fallen on hard times and, when he died, was buried in an unmarked pauper’s grave in Ipswich Old Cemetery.
