Leonard Keysor

He hurled live enemy grenades back from the captured trench.

Leonard Maurice Keysor was born in Paddington, London, on 3 November 1885 into the Kyezor family. He spent about ten years in Canada before arriving in Australia shortly before the First World War. Working as a clerk in Sydney, he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force in August 1914 and sailed to Egypt with the 1st Battalion.

He landed at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915. During the fighting at Lone Pine on 7–8 August, Turkish troops repeatedly threw grenades into the captured trenches. Keysor moved along the position, picking up unexploded grenades and throwing them back. When he could not return one safely, he used sandbags or discarded clothing to smother it and protect the men around him.

Although wounded and ordered to obtain treatment, he continued working with the bomb throwers, including those of another company. His repeated actions over nearly fifty hours helped the Australians hold the exposed position against successive attacks. The Victoria Cross recognized that sustained defence rather than one isolated throw.

Keysor later served on the Western Front, transferred to the 42nd Battalion and received a commission in January 1917. Further wounds and gas injury interrupted his service. He returned to Australia in 1918 for recruiting work and was medically discharged that December as a lieutenant.

In 1920 he returned to London and joined the family clock-importing business. He married Gladys Benjamin in 1921. A later attempt to re-enact his grenade work for a film left him with burns when a flash-powder charge exploded. He volunteered for military service again in 1939 but was rejected on medical grounds. Keysor died in London on 12 October 1951 and was cremated after a service at the Liberal Jewish Synagogue. His Victoria Cross and surviving service medals were later acquired for the Australian War Memorial.

Official Victoria Cross citation

On 7th August, 1915, he was in a trench which was being heavily bombed by the enemy. He picked up two live bombs and threw them back at the enemy at great risk to his own life, and continued throwing bombs, although himself wounded, thereby saving a portion of the trench which it was most important to hold. On August 8th at the same place, Private Keysor successfully bombed the enemy out of a position, from which a temporary mastery over his own trench had been obtained, and was again wounded. Although marked for hospital he declined to leave, and volunteered to throw bombs for another company which had lost its bomb throwers. He continued to bomb the enemy till the situation was relieved.

The London Gazette of 15 October 1915, Numb. 29328, p. 10154