Lionel Beaumaurice Clarke

Lionel Beaumaurice “Leo” Clarke VC was born on 1 December 1892 in Waterdown, Ontario. As a child he moved with his family to England before returning to Canada, where they settled in Winnipeg. Before the outbreak of the First World War he worked as a surveyor and resident engineer, and enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force in February 1915. After arriving in England with the 27th Battalion, he transferred to the 2nd Battalion (Eastern Ontario Regiment) so he could serve alongside his brother Charles.

On 9 September 1916, during the Battle of the Somme near Pozières, Acting Corporal Clarke led a bombing section assigned to clear a captured German trench while engineers established a defensive block. Most of his men were killed or wounded during fierce fighting. Alone and already suffering a bayonet wound, Clarke faced a German counterattack of approximately twenty soldiers led by two officers. Emptying his revolver into the attackers, he seized two enemy rifles and continued firing until one officer charged him with a bayonet. Clarke shot the officer dead, pursued the retreating Germans, killed several more and captured one prisoner, single-handedly securing the newly won Canadian position. His extraordinary courage earned him the Victoria Cross, the highest award for gallantry in the British Empire.

Only weeks later, on 11 October 1916, while helping secure Regina Trench under intense German artillery fire, an exploding shell collapsed the trench and buried Clarke beneath tons of earth. He was dug out by his brother Charles but had suffered devastating spinal injuries that left him paralyzed. Evacuated to No. 1 General Hospital at Étretat, France, he died of his wounds on 19 October 1916, aged just twenty-three.

His Victoria Cross was presented posthumously to his father by the Governor General before a crowd of approximately 30,000 people in Winnipeg. Clarke is forever remembered as one of the three Victoria Cross recipients who lived on the same Winnipeg street, renamed Valour Road in 1925 in honour of Clarke, Frederick William Hall, and Robert Shankland. Today, all three Victoria Crosses are displayed together at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa.