Amazing bravery o VC hero behind the brand so loved by FULL ME
Model David Gandy and TV chefs Tom Kerridge and Jamie
Oliver are also big fans.
Jack, born Jacob Weiss in Leeds, was among the first wave of young men to sign up for active service when he joined the King’s Own Royal Regiment (Lancaster) at 18.
He was originally posted to Gallipoli, Turkey, before being sent to Kut in Iraq in an attempt to win back the former British Army base which had been overrun by Ottoman forces.
It was here in 1917 that the signaller’s heroics earned him the VC.
Jack and his unit were trying to cross the Diyala River on a pontoon carrying weapons and ammo. They were ambushed by Turks who opened fire from the riverbank, showering the Brits with bullets.
Jack’s citation for his actions on March 7 and 8 read: “For most conspicuous bravery and resource. This signaller during an attempt to cross a river saw the two pontoons ahead of him come under heavy machine-gun fire, with disastrous results.
“When his own pontoon had reached midstream, with every man except himself either dead or wounded, finding that he was unable to control the pontoon,
Pte White promptly tied a telephone wire to the pontoon, jumped overboard and towed it to the shore, thereby saving an officer’s life and bringing to land the rifles and equipment of the other men in the boat, who were either dead or dying.” After the war, Jack returned home to a hero’s welcome and was presented with his VC by King George V at Buckingham Palace on April 3 1919.
Back home, he embarked on his career in textiles in Manchester, first as a trainee pattern cutter. He would become general manager and then the owner of the red-brick factory on the River Irwell.
The firm, which later launched Private White V.C. still calls the factory home. In 1916 it supplied the Allies with cotton gabardine trench coats. In the 40s it was commissioned by the war ministry to supply the RAF with waterproof parkas.
Jack, who was born into a Jewish family, was pictured laying a wreath at the Cenotaph in 1935 after the Jewish ex-servicemen’s national remembra fellow VC hero Leo
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