Charity Bick

Charity Anne Bick (19 December 1925 – 22 April 2002) was an English civilian dispatch rider during the Second World War, and the youngest ever recipient of the George Medal, the United Kingdom's second-highest award for civilian bravery. She later served in the Women's Royal Air Force.

Early life Charity Anne Bick was born on 19 December 1925 and educated at Lyng Primary School in Horton Street, Lyng, West Bromwich.

George Medal

At the age of 14, while living in Maud Road, West Bromwich in that town. She volunteered at the office of a brick works near her home, delivering messages between ARP depots, by bicycle. and her mother a Red Cross nurse.

During a air raid on West Bromwich, on 19 November 1940, she helped her father to put out an incendiary bomb that had lodged in the roof of a pawnbroker's shop.

Aged 15, she was the youngest person ever to receive the GM, and War Medal at the end of the war.

Later life

Bick was subsequently known as "Jimmie", from the honorific "GM". In the meantime, she had set up a home at Forres. She died there on 22 April 2002, age 76.

Legacy

Bick's portrait, in oil, by Alfred Reginald Thomson, RA, an official war artist, is in the Imperial War Museum, London, while her medals are on display at the Imperial War Museum North. A blue plaque commemorating Bick was erected at Lyng Primary School, by the Lyng History Group, on 21 February 2002. The school was presented with a replica set of her medals in March 2002. Charity Bick Way in West Bromwich is named in her honour.