Henry Hook (VC)

He held off the attackers as patients escaped through walls.

Alfred Henry Hook was born in Gloucestershire on 6 August 1850. He worked as a labourer and served in the Royal Monmouth Militia before enlisting in the 24th Regiment at Monmouth in March 1877. Sent to South Africa in 1878, he served in the Cape frontier fighting before the regiment entered the Zulu War.

In January 1879 his company was left to guard the mission station at Rorke's Drift. A hospital occupied part of the post. On 22 January, after the destruction of the British force at Isandhlwana, a large Zulu force attacked the small garrison. Hook was among the men defending the hospital's rooms and caring for the sick who could not simply run to safety.

As ammunition diminished and attackers entered the building, Hook and John Williams helped the patients escape. The hospital's internal arrangement made ordinary withdrawal impossible. Williams opened passages through partition walls while Hook fought to keep the attackers back, and the men alternated between holding the rooms and moving wounded soldiers through the openings. They brought patients out of the burning building into the remaining defences. Hook suffered a scalp wound.

He received the Victoria Cross from Sir Garnet Wolseley at Rorke's Drift on 3 August 1879. Returning to Britain, he purchased his discharge in 1880. His first marriage did not survive the separation, and he later established a new home and married again in 1897.

Hook worked at the British Museum in London, including duties as a cloakroom attendant. He also returned to part-time soldiering in London volunteer units and became a sergeant instructor of musketry with the Royal Fusiliers. Ill health eventually ended both forms of employment. He retired at the end of 1904 and returned to Gloucestershire.

He died on 12 March 1905 and was buried at Churcham. His medal pair survives in the regimental collection at Brecon, recording both his South African campaigning and the hospital defence.