Joseph Harcourt Tombs


Joseph Harcourt Tombs VC, born Frederick Griffith Tombs, who under the name Joseph Tombs, was an English recipient of the Victoria Cross, the highest award of the British honours system. The VC is awarded for ‘most conspicuous bravery … in the presence of the enemy’.

VC action

Tombs was born in Birmingham and was a 28-year-old Lance-Corporal in the 1st Battalion, The King's, British Army during the First World War when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the VC.
On 16 May 1915 near Rue du Bois, France, Lance-Corporal Tombs, on his own initiative, crawled out repeatedly under very heavy shell and machine-gun fire to bring in wounded men who were lying about 100 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.

Later life

He was promoted Corporal in the field. During World War II Tombs enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force and served at the Flying School in Trenton, Ontario, Canada. A 1952 operation to remove some of the shrapnel still embedded in his stomach was not completely successful, and in 1964 he suffered a stroke.
His Victoria Cross is held by the Royal Regiment of Canada Foundation, Toronto, Ontario, Canada.