, MILTON F. GREGG WILLIAM MJSTCALFE DAVID V. CURRIE THOMAS DINESEN COVETED DECORATION — This is the Victoria Cross, instituted by Queen Victoria to honor outstanding acts of bravery. The first awards were made in 1865 by the Queen to 62 men for brave deeds Ml the Crimean War. The cross, awarded to 102 Canadians, is cast in bronze from Russian guns captured at the Battle of Sebastopol. A rampant lion and the words For Valour are on the front with the name of the winner and the date of his award on the back. It GEORGE PEARKES is suspended from a brass bar and maroon ribbon. (CP Photo). FREDERICK HARVEY Victoria Cross Holders Regard Award as Battlefield Accident (By the Canadian Press) know there was sudi a cross nered New Brunswicker, also holding off his company in niey tend to regard their as the Victoria Cross when won a Miiitary Cross with bar woods nearby. Victoria Crdss asa bafticfrdtt' tbm told me I'd won it. I in the First World War. In an He tiok 35 pisoners with- thought the DCM was the attack at' "CX'trrbT a 1. -tbarfr our a snotr- • accident, something like get• highest award. cleared out Germans holding "I'm pretty fairly happy," ting hit by a stray biilet. up the Allied advance, his ci- "I was in hospital at Nor• he says of his post-war life. "You don't win these t a t i 0 n says he personally thampton when Gen. Turner, killed or wounded 11 of the CUT OUT GRENADES things, they give them to who was in charge of Cana• enemy and took 25 prisoners. you," says Ray Zengel, 72, dian troops in England, called Coulson Mitchell, 77, Mont• He became sergeant-at- real, was a captain with the now a retu-ed farmer at for me to see him. So I went and saw him in his office, arms in the House of Com• 4th Battalion, Canadian Engi• Eocky Mountain House, Alta. mons in 1934 but left the post neers, when sent out near '"Dhat must be, because "I was in hospital blues at to go overseas again in the Cambrai to prevent German there were an awful lot of tihe time and had no ribbon or Second World War and re• demolition of a bridge. people who did a lot more anything. I never even had an turned to build a successful than me to deserve it." political career. With a sergeant and a sap• investitut-e. Well, he cut off per, he cut the circtdts link• He is among the 13 men his own ribbon and put it on Herman James Good, 78, a ing a chain of German gre• still living who won the Victo• me." retired farmer and woodsman nades along the bridge. ria Cross while in Canadian IN CAVALRY CHARGE in New Brunswick, recalls When Germans attacked, uniform during the First most vividly "the sight of World War. Some were inter• Retired Brigadier Freder• he and the sergeant, who won ick Harvey, 79, raises and your pals giving their lives a DCM, dashed up on the viewed as part of a Cross- before your very eyes." Canada Survey by The Cana• trains horses south of Calgary river bank and began shout• dian Press. now and is a prominent Al- He was with the Quebec ing and shooting "to sound Like Zengel, they are as un• bertan. Regiment a corporal, when like a battalion." They killed ei^^t attackers derstated as the medal itself. He earned his VC March 27, he single-handedly stooned It is cast from the bronze of German positions Aug. 8, and also took prisoner 12 Ger-, 1917, in one of the last great mans under the bridge, Russian cannons captured cavafry charges, at Ferrone. 1918, after learning his broth• at Sebastopol in the Crimean er had been killed: at Amiens. "whom we hadn't noticed at War of the 1850s. Brig. Harvey was a lieuten• first." ant with the Lord Strathco- FOUGHT TANKS For more than a century, it Mitchell questions his VC na's Horse at the time. He His memories are of gore because, as he says, it wasn't has been Britain's highest rose to command of the decoration. Among the 65 Ca• and loss rather than ^ory the result of "instantaneous Strathconas in 1939. During and gam. He doesn't talk action." nadians to win it during he ttie Second World War, when 1914-18 war, 26 were killed in much about the war- "As an engineer, it took a his only son Dennis was killed lot of time. Seemed like a action. in action in Europe, he com• "Nobody is interested in VC winners any more," said Har- long time, really." REFUSE DETAILS manded Military District 13 He organized a cmpany of based at Calgary. cus Strachan, about 80, of Most of tho se who survive Vancouver. e n g i n e e r s for the Second refused to "glorify" them• -Other prominent VCs from World War, served in Eng• selves by talking about their the First World War include "I dont blame them one land and became a lieuten• exploits Lieutenant-Governor George bit.". ant-colonel. Between wars he Zengel was a 23-y6ar-old Pearkes of British Columbia, Veteran of both world wars, worked as a construction sergeant with the 2nd Bri• commander of the 1st Cana• he was a lieutenant with the manager for a major firm. dian Division in the 1939-45 Fort Garry Horse of Winni• gade, 5th Canadian Infantry TOOK OVER ATTACK Battalion, Regina, on winning war and later defence minis• peg when the Germans his in 1918. He says he was ter in the Diefenbaker admin- massed 400 tanks against Al• Robert Hanna, now 79, lives "blown up" on the Somme i s t r a t i 0 n, and Milton F. lied lines in France in Sep• in Mount Lehman, B.C. He but not injured in the engage• Gregg, 75, now high commis• tember, 1917. resumed faiming and logging, ment that brought him the sioner in Guyana and labor The battle began in the aft• after the war and is still ac• VC. He won't go into details. mrinister ir. the St. Laurent ernoon and when it ended at tive. "I was playing a little bit of administration. 4 a.m. the next day, only 43 of He is taciturn about the his 150 men—some on horse• 1917 action at Lens, France, poker in the dugout when a HIT IN ATTACK runner came in and said I back—were alive. Strachan is that won him the VC. But his was wanted at headquarters. Maj.-Gen. Pearkes, 79, was on a disabled veteran's pen• citation notes that after his I didn't want to go because I wounded five times in the sion. officers were kiled, Sgt.-Maj., was winning a little bit of 1914-18 war. Among his recol• Also a Military Cross win• Hanna rallied an attack and money. But I went and they lections of the VC action at ner, he says tlie VC didn't personally put an enemy nest told me J had won the VC. Passchendaele are the "ap• help him "one iota" in a out of action. Was I surprised!" palling casualties." post-war career in which he He was with the 29th Cana• The major problem about A company commander rose to become a successful dian Infantry. winning the VC, said Zengel, with the 51h Canadian Mount• banking executive. Robert Shankland, now ail• "is the people who are al• ed Rifles, he was hit in the "You can't eat VCs," he ing in a Vancouver hospital, ways trying to do things for thigh as his men went over said. "You can walk around was among the nine Cana• you, buy you drinks and so the trenches into heavy with a VC on your shirt but it dians to win a VC in fierce artillery and machine-gun won't help you set a job." action at Passchendaele in fire in a dawn attack. 1917. He was a lieutenant "You just take it out of the HOODWINKED ENEMY citation," ordered Alex Brere- "I had approximately 25 with the Canadian Infantry ton, 74, of Elnora, Alta., when men out of about 600 who had Charles Smith Rutherford, Battalion. asked how he won his VC at started," he recaDs. They 75, Keswick, Ont., a retired The wurds For Valour are Amiens in 1918. managed to hold a farm, dairy farmer, grocer and i n s c r i b e d on the Victoria though isolated,, until relieved postman, takes a humorous Cross. T!i3refore it was fitting WON'T TELL after dark the next evening. approach in talking about his that Pine Street, in a quiet "I've never told anyone yet Battle wounds left him par• VC. residential area of Winnipeg, and I don't intend to start tially disabled but he is in A lieutenant with the 5th was renamed Valour Road in now," said Brereton, a re• good health and has no com• Canadian Mounted Rifles, he 1925. A single short block tired fM-mer. "I always say it plaints. became separated from his along this street produced was for drinking rum." He says the VC may have company and accidentally three VC winners in the 1914- He was an acting corporal helped his political career. walked into a crowd of Ger- 18 war. with the Little Black Devils, "When I was first elected it m a n s in Monchy-le-Preux, Two of them—Sgt.