Period:

Second World War (1939-1945)

Rank:

Corporal

Unit:

Signals Platoon, Headquarters Company, 1st Battalion, 1st Airlanding Brigade, 1st Airborne Division, British Army

Awarded for:

Operation Husky

Sicily 9/10 July 1943.
Corporal Waring is Battalion Signal Corporal. His glider crash landed on the beach during the night 9/10th July 1943. There was no medical orderly in the glider and Corporal Waring dealt with the injured. Whole moving to join his Battalion a second glider was found which had also crashed. This glider was under light automatic fire from an Italian post nearby. Both glider pilots were injured and unable to move. Corporal Waring approached the glider and managed to drag both glider pilots to a place of safety. He then dug a small slit trench for each of them with his entrenching tool. At this time grass and gorse caught fire close to the wounded pilots. Corporal Waring at once attacked the fire and prevented it reaching the wounded men. All this was done under fire from the Italian position about 100 yards away. Having made the injured pilots as comfortable as possible, Corporal Waring organised a small party of men and with one 2" Mortar which he had never fired before, assaulted and captured the Italian pill-box.
He then proceeded on his way and during the march to rejoin his Battalion encountered two more small Italian posts both of which he liquidated. On arrival at his Battalion HQ he continued to succour the wounded in the neighbourhood, and to search for others who had been reported to be lying by crashed gliders. He was working incessantly from the time of landing until mid-day July 10th when he was picked up in an exhausted condition. It was due to the self-sacrifice and devotion to duty of Corporal Waring that two glider pilots were brought to a position of safety and also to his powers of leadership and the initiative shown by him that three enemy posts were captured and the occupants killed.