Bernard Warburton-Lee
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Photo submitted by Simon Manchee |
Bernard Armitage Warburton Warburton-Lee (
September 13,
1895 -
April 10,
1940) was a
Welsh recipient of the
Victoria Cross, the highest and most prestigious award for gallantry in the face of the enemy that can be awarded to
British and
Commonwealth forces.
He was 44 years old, and a
Captain in the
Royal Navy during the
Second World War when the following deed took place for which he was awarded the VC.
On
10 April 1940 in
Ofotfjord,
Narvik,
Norway, in the
First Battle of Narvik Captain Warburton-Lee of
HMS Hardy led a flotilla of five destroyers in a surprise attack on German destroyers and merchant ships in a blinding snowstorm. This was successful, and was almost immediately followed by an engagement with five more German destroyers, during which Captain Warburton-Lee was mortally wounded by a shell which hit
Hardy's bridge.
First VC to be gazetted in the Second World War.
* City and Naval Station of
El Ferrol in Northwestern
Spain 1936 [
1] -
In sight of the outbreak of a civil war, and because there was fear of social unrest in the naval station, the Foreign Office in London, organized a ship to repatriate all the remaining British citizens and on July 22, 1936. The HMS Witch (D89), captained by B.A. Warburton-Lee, departed from El Ferrol back to Britain. *
British VCs of World War 2 (John Laffin, 1997)
*
Monuments To Courage (David Harvey, 1999)
*
The Register of the Victoria Cross (This England, 1997)
This page has been
migrated from the
Victoria Cross Reference with permission.
