Richard George Masters

He drove repeated trips amid fire to move wounded to safety.

Richard George Masters was born in Birkdale, Lancashire, on 23 March 1877. Educated locally, he worked as a chauffeur and married Alice Johnston in 1901. In 1914 he enlisted as an Army Service Corps driver and was attached to the 141st Field Ambulance. A series of ambulance journeys under fire on the Somme in 1917 brought him the French Croix de Guerre.

At Gorre, east of Béthune, on 9 April 1918, an enemy attack cut communications and left wounded men without evacuation. Masters volunteered to try a road considered impassable. Clearing debris, he made repeated journeys through shelling and machine-gun fire, also surviving an air attack. His ambulance evacuated most of the casualties moved that afternoon. He earned the Victoria Cross.

After demobilisation he resumed driving, eventually working for Southport Corporation’s gas department. He remained active in the Army Service Corps association. He died at Southport on 4 April 1963 and was buried at St Cuthbert’s.

Official Victoria Cross citation

For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty. Owing to an enemy attack, communications were cut off and wounded could not be evacuated. The road was reported impassable, but Pte. Masters volunteered to try to get through, and after the greatest difficulty succeeded, although he had to clear the road of all sorts of debris. He made journey after journey throughout the afternoon, over a road consistently shelled and swept by machine-gun fire, and was on one occasion bombed by an aeroplane. The greater part of the wounded cleared from this area were evacuated by Pte. Masters, as his was the only car that got through during this particular time.

Second Supplement to The London Gazette of 7 May 1918. 8 May 1918, Numb. 30675, p. 5556