Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A fine Blitz 1940 bomb disposal operations G.C. awarded to Mr. R. T. Harris, a Staff and Liaison Officer for the Croydon A.R.P. Engineer’s Service: on joining the Royal Engineers in 1942, he was ordered to remove the G.C. riband from his uniform by a senior officer - “We don’t allow civil decorations to be worn in the Army”

George Cross (Roy Thomas Harris, A.R.P. Croydon, 17th December 1940), in its Royal Mint case of issue, extremely fine and rare £10000-12000

After arranging for the supply of tackle which the R.E. parties have asked for in order to dig out and extricate bombs, Mr. Harris has on a large number of occasions personally assisted in this operation. He was one of the volunteers when the Naval Officer, Sub. Lieutenant Spiers, R.N., asked for assistance to deal with an unexploded parachute land mine at Mead Way on 20 September, and this incident is confirmed by the Borough Engineer. Mr. Harris’ mechanical experience was also of the greatest assistance to an R.E. party who had difficulty in removing the fuse from a 500 kg. bomb at Duppas Hill a few weeks ago.

By volunteering for this work and by his complete disregard for personal danger, this officer has assisted very materially in reducing the hardship that would otherwise have been caused to large numbers of people who had to leave their homes. His investigations have enabled them to return much earlier than would otherwise have been possible, especially during the time the services of the R.E. parties were not available.’

Roy Thomas Harris, who was born in August 1902, was employed as Chief Combustion Officer to Croydon Corporation on the outbreak of hostilities, which post led to his subsequent attachment to the Croydon A.R.P. Engineer’s Service as a Staff and Liaison Officer, and his winning of the G.C. for bomb disposal work at Langdale Road, Thornton Heath, Surrey on 18 September 1940, and Mead Way in co-operation with a Naval bomb disposal expert, two nights later - among other locations:

‘One other civilian was decorated with the George Cross for bomb disposal work in 1940. That was Mr. Roy Thomas Harris, Staff Officer of the Croydon A.R.P. Engineer Service and a member of the Borough’s Engineer’s Department. In 1940, Croydon received its fair share of bombs and the normal proportion of them failed to explode on impact. The nearest Bomb Disposal unit was at Kingston and Mr. Harris was nominated to act as Liaison Officer between the local A.R.P. Service and the Sappers at Kingston.



To begin with, he did little more than locate and pin-point the bombs and then lead the Sappers to them. But, as the Bomb Disposal unit became more heavily engaged, it was often necessary for them to send small parties of junior ranks to deal with incidents at Croydon and Mr. Harris would often assume unofficial charge of the operations. More than once he disarmed highly sensitive bombs himself.

Having taken on the role of Bomb Disposal officer it was hardly surprising that, some time later, Mr. Harris joined the Army and was commissioned into the Royal Engineers, eventually reaching the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel’ (Bisset’s The George Cross refers).

Harris, just the eighth recipient of a George Cross, died at Wolverhampton, Staffordshire on 18 August 1973.

Sold with original congratulatory letters from the Inspector-General, Air Raid Precautions, and the recipient’s M.P., both dated 18 December 1940, together with a related wartime newspaper cutting.