b. 03/06/1882 ? d. 04/1951 Eton, Buckinghamshire.
DATE OF AM ACTION: 28/12/1911 Slough, Berkshire.
George E Bennett AM
George was awarded the Albert Medal by King George V at Buckingham Palace on 12th August 1913. He was also awarded the Silver Medal of the Society for the Protection of Life from Fire. The boy who he saved, Gerald Whitaker, had dropped a cigarette. Bennett was also a member of the Windsor Volunteer Fire Brigade. After the incident he spent three weeks in hospital with severe burns to his face and ears. Following his recovery, George became a pub landlord, firstly at The Globe in Windsor, then just prior to the Second World War, he was the proprietor of the Dolphin Hotel in Slough.
AM CITATION:
On the 28th December last while an exhibition was being given at the Empire Cinema Palace, Slough, some cinematograph films, which a boy, aged 13 years, was rewinding, caught fire. In response to the boy’s shouts an operator from the adjoining operating chamber tried to put out the fire with a wet blanket, but the flames were too fierce for his efforts to prove successful. Mr. Bennett, the proprietor, was in the hall, and on learning that the boy was in the rewinding room, he at once climbed the vertical iron ladder leading to the trap-door of the room, from which volumes of flame and smoke were issuing. On entering the room he found the boy lying on the floor, and succeeded in dragging him to the trap-door and down the ladder into the hall, and thus saved the boy’s life. Some 5000 feet of film were destroyed. Mr. Bennett was badly burned, and ran very serious risk to his own life.
BURIAL LOCATION: UNKNOWN.
LOCATION OF MEDAL: UNKNOWN.
Acknowledgement:
Allan Stanistreet – Image of George Bennett AM.