The Olympic doctor who wouldn’t leave his wounded: Noel Chavasse, the only man awarded two Victoria Crosses for the Great War

Remembrance | By Matt, Editor

He was a doctor, not a fighting soldier. Yet Captain Noel Chavasse is the only man awarded two Victoria Crosses for the First World War, and the second was given after his own wounds had killed him. On Remembrance Sunday, his story is worth telling in full.

An Olympian and a surgeon

Noel Godfrey Chavasse was born in Oxford on 9 November 1884, one of identical twins. His father later became Bishop of Liverpool. At Oxford University he was a gifted athlete, and in 1908 he and his twin brother Christopher both ran in the 400 metres for Great Britain at the London Olympic Games, according to the Olympedia record.

He qualified as a doctor and joined the Royal Army Medical Corps, serving as medical officer to the 1/10th (Scottish) Battalion of the King’s (Liverpool) Regiment, the Liverpool Scottish. He had already won the Military Cross before the actions that made his name.

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Guillemont, August 1916

His first Victoria Cross was for Guillemont, on the Somme, in August 1916. The London Gazette citation records that “during an attack he tended the wounded in the open all day, under heavy fire, frequently in view of the enemy”. That night he searched for wounded men in front of the enemy lines for four hours.

The next day he took one stretcher-bearer to the advanced trenches and carried an urgent case 500 yards to safety under heavy shellfire, and was wounded in the side by a shell splinter on the way. That same night he led a party of twenty volunteers, rescued three wounded men from a shell hole twenty-five yards from the enemy trench, buried the bodies of two officers and collected many identity discs, while under fire from bombs and machine guns.

The citation says that altogether he saved the lives of some twenty badly wounded men, besides the ordinary cases that passed through his hands. “His courage and self-sacrifice were beyond praise.”

Wieltje, 1917

A year later the battalion was at Wieltje, near Ypres, at the opening of the Third Battle of Ypres. The Gazette citation for the Bar to his Victoria Cross describes what followed.

He was severely wounded early in the action while carrying a wounded soldier to the dressing station. He refused to leave his post. For two days he not only carried on with his duties but “went out repeatedly under heavy fire to search for and attend to the wounded who were lying out”. He was practically without food, worn with fatigue and faint with his wound, yet he helped carry badly wounded men over heavy and difficult ground.

The citation says he was instrumental in rescuing many wounded men “who would have otherwise undoubtedly succumbed under the bad weather conditions”. It ends simply: “This devoted and gallant officer subsequently died of his wounds.”

Where he lies

Noel Chavasse died on 4 August 1917, aged 32. He is buried at Brandhoek New Military Cemetery in Belgium. The Commonwealth War Graves Commission notes that his headstone carries two Victoria Crosses and the words chosen by his father: “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

Only three men have ever been awarded the Victoria Cross twice. Chavasse is the only one whose two awards were both for the Great War. He is also commemorated on more memorials than any other British individual killed in that war.

He was a man who could have stayed behind the lines and been forgiven for it. He went out instead, again and again, for men who could not help themselves. We will remember them.

Sources

• London Gazette 29802, p10394 (VC citation)
• London Gazette 30284, p9531 (Bar to the VC)
• CWGC: Captain Noel Godfrey Chavasse VC and Bar MC; CWGC: Brandhoek New Military Cemetery
• Olympedia: Noel Chavasse

Images: portrait of Captain Chavasse, unknown author, public domain (Wikimedia Commons); Brandhoek New Military Cemetery, Wernervc, CC BY-SA 3.0.