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William Mosedale

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The buck stops here
Staff member
WILLIAM MOSEDALE.

March, 1941


An Auxiliary Fire Station was completely demolished by a high explosive bomb, trapping a number of firemen and also civilians from the adjoining house which had also been demolished. Station Officer, William Mosedale immediately began tunnelling and propping up operations. He fully realised that hundreds of tons of debris covered the site and at any moment he could be buried by a further collapse.
When the first tunnel was completed and the Control Room was reached, he found that he could not remove the men trapped there. He carried out another tunnelling operation from a different direction and again entered the Control Room. There were five men found, one dead and the others injured. The injured men were given oxygen and then taken out through the tunnel.
The entrance to the cellar of the private house was completely filled by fallen rubble so Mosedale organised the clearing of it. After some time he reached seven people who were trapped, three of whom had been killed instantly when the roof of the cellar had collapsed. He rescued the remaining four.
To reach yet more trapped victims, he again had to tunnel down into the Fire Station cellar and successfully removed another four men, the rescue operation took over twelve hours and the bombs were still falling throughout this time.
The King awarded William Mosedale the George Cross for Bravery and commitment to duty.
A VERY BRAVE MAN INDEED.
 
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Jim, Newspaper Pic of W Mosedale July 1941 total rescued was 12 people
 
William Mosedale's story has been told in full for the first time in Come if ye Dare, the story of the 11 Civil Defence George Cross receipients.

It is available direct from the author for £12.50. Please PM me with an email address and a flyer will folllow.

Terry
 
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