Lord Ashcroft KCMG PC has had his latest “hero of the month” article published in Britain at War, the country’s best-selling military history monthly magazine.
The July issue of the magazine has a two-page write-up on the life and bravery of Captain John Leslie Green, who was awarded the Victoria Cross (VC) for courage during the Great War.
Cambridge-educated Green, who was born in Buckden, Huntingdonshire (the village is now in Cambridgeshire) was commissioned into the Royal Army Medical Corps shortly after the outbreak of the Great War. At the time, he was 25 years old and the house surgeon at Huntingdon County Hospital.
On July 1 1916, the first day of the Battle of the Somme, Captain Green saw Captain Frank Robinson wounded and entangled in the German wire. Green, who was himself already wounded, went forward under a heavy fire to reach his injured comrade and then dragged him to safety. Just as they were about to reach safety, Green was shot again and fatally wounded, aged 27. Two days later, Robinson too died from his severe injuries.
Green’s VC was announced on August 5, 1916 and his gallantry medal was presented to his widow, Edith, also a doctor, by King George V in an investiture at Buckingham Palace two months later.
Lord Ashcroft’s articles for Britain at War over the past four years have been largely based on excerpts from four of his books on gallantry: Victoria Cross Heroes, Special Forces Heroes, George Cross Heroes and Heroes of the Skies. His fifth bravery book, Special Ops Heroes, was published in November 2014.
For the foreseeable future, Lord Ashcroft’s “hero of the month” articles will concentrate on men who were awarded the VC during the First World War. Lord Ashcroft is a military historian who has lectured extensively on courage and his various medal collections.
- Lord Ashcroft’s latest article appears in the July issue of Britain at War which is on sale now.
