George William Burdett Clare

He carried wounded men and alerted every post of poison gas.

George William Burdett Clare was born at St Ives, Huntingdonshire, on 18 May 1889. He grew up mainly in Chatteris with his grandparents and attended its Church School. Before becoming a regular soldier he worked with horses and served in the local Bedfordshire Yeomanry. At the outbreak of the First World War he first went to a remount depot and then joined the 5th Lancers.

Although a cavalryman, Clare was serving as a stretcher-bearer during the fighting around Bourlon Wood in November 1917. Under persistent bombardment he dressed casualties and helped them across open ground to a dressing station roughly five hundred yards away.

When every man at an isolated post became a casualty, Clare crossed the fire-swept ground to reach them. After treating the wounded, he held the post alone until relief arrived. He then brought another badly injured man into cover and eventually reached the dressing station with him.

Warned that gas shells were being used and that the wind was carrying gas towards the British positions, Clare went along the line to alert each company post. He continued despite shellfire and rifle fire. A shell subsequently killed him on 29 November 1917.

King George V presented his posthumous Victoria Cross to his parents in March 1918. He has no known grave and is commemorated on the Cambrai Memorial. His First World War campaign medals were later reunited with the VC and given to his regiment, preserving a complete group associated with his service in the Lancers.

Victoria Cross citation

For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty when, acting as stretcher-bearer during a most intense and continuous enemy bombardment, Pte. Clare dressed and conducted wounded over the open to the dressing-station about 500 yards away. At one period, when all the garrison of a detached post, which was lying out in the open about 150 yards to the left of the line occupied, had become casualties, he crossed the intervening space, which was continually swept by heavy rifle and machine-gun fire, and, having dressed all the cases, manned* the post single-handed till a relief could be sent. Pte. Clare then carried a seriously wounded man through intense fire to cover, and later succeeded in getting him to the dressing-station. At the dressing-station he wastold that the enemy was using gas shells to a large extent ' in the valley below, and as the wind was blowing the gas towards the line of trenches and shell-holes occupied, he started on the right of the line and personally warned every company post of the danger, the whole time under shell and rifle fire. This very gallant soldier was subsequently killed by a shell.