Tommy Brown

Thomas William Brown GM ( 1926 – 13 February 1945) was an English recipient of the George Medal, one of the youngest persons to have ever received that award. In October 1942, as a NAAFI canteen assistant, he was involved in the action between Petard and , being one of three men to board the sinking submarine in an effort to retrieve vital documents, and was the only one of the three to survive. These documents greatly assisted Bletchley Park codebreakers in cracking the German Enigma code. After this heroic deed, it was revealed that he was underage to be at sea. He returned home to North Shields. In 1945 he died from injuries sustained while rescuing his sister Maureen from a house fire in North Shields Ridges Estate whilst on leave from HMS Belfast. His family were presented with his medal by King George VI in 1945, and later presented it to the NAAFI in 1985.

NAAFI career At the age of 15, Brown joined the NAAFI and was assigned as a Canteen Assistant onboard , a P class destroyer, for service during World War II. Unlike other services, the NAAFI only accepted men from the age of 17 onwards, so Brown had to lie about his age to join.

On 30 October 1942, Petard was in the waters off the coast of Port Said, Egypt. Petard then launched a boarding party in a seaboat. The German crew had opened the boat's seacocks, and water was pouring into the vessel.

Legacy For their actions, Fasson and Grazier were posthumously awarded the George Cross. Brown was awarded the George Medal. His mother Margaret and brother Stanley travelled to London to receive his medal on his behalf after Brown's death in 1945. Prior to being told about the presentation ceremony, his mother hadn't been told that Brown had received a medal for his actions. Brown never knew the contents of those documents; information relating to Enigma was not released till decades after his death. The museum has since closed, and Brown's medals are now on display at the NAAFI headquarters in Darlington. They were brought there to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the NAAFI in April 2010,