Blair Mayne: Posthumous Victoria Cross

Al Pinkerton Excerpts

Tuesday 8th April 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Al Pinkerton (Surrey Heath) (LD)]

I begin by simply acknowledging the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) for tabling an early-day motion and securing today’s important debate. The hon. Gentleman has supported so many new starters in this House since we joined Parliament, so it is a pleasure to support him in his advocacy of this important cause today.

As we have heard from Members across the House, with his courage and bravery, Robert Blair “Paddy” Mayne stands alongside the greatest soldiers of our reckoning, past or present, and the heroism that he demonstrated during the second world war is rightly celebrated.

However, I want to take a moment to shine a light on a lesser-known but remarkable chapter of his life: the work he did with the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey. This chapter reflects his unwavering dedication to service and duty, but it also holds a special resonance for me personally. As a recovering academic with a strong interest in the UK’s overseas territories, an observer of the 2013 Falklands referendum, and a former Shackleton scholar, I have had the privilege of visiting the Falkland Islands on numerous occasions, most recently in 2023. During those visits, I have seen for myself the pristine wilderness and unparalleled beauty of the island’s wildlife, but above all the unwavering strength of the people who call the Falklands home.

In the aftermath of the second world war, one might have expected Robert Blair Mayne, having given so much in battles and skirmishes, to have sought the comfort of home, family and a well-earned rest, but that was not the direction he chose. Instead of stepping away from public service, he delayed his return to civilian life and joined the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey, a precursor to what is now the British Antarctic Survey. The organisation, which began life as a naval operation in 1943 under the codename Operation Tabarin, had an important strategic purpose. While its official mission had been to monitor enemy shipping, its true goal was to counter Argentine and Chilean territorial claims in the Antarctic and assert British sovereignty by establishing manned bases in the region. When the war ended, the operation transitioned into the Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey.

In late 1945, three former SAS members, including Lieutenant Colonel Blair Mayne, joined the expedition. Led by Naval Surgeon Commander Bingham, with Mayne appointed second in command, this was no ceremonial visit to the southern hemisphere. Blair Mayne fully embraced the challenges of the mission: he was active on board the ship, on the ground and on the ice, participating in the full scope of the expedition, leading dog teams, surveying wildlife and camping in some of the harshest, most isolated conditions imaginable. Mayne’s journals and photographs offer a rare glimpse into the lives and work of British explorers, surveyors and scientists in the southern hemisphere and Antarctica during the immediate post-war period, revealing not only the isolation of the vast icy landscapes, but the camaraderie he shared with his comrades—a recurrence of the same camaraderie he demonstrated during his active service in Europe and north Africa.

It was only a recurring back injury, one sustained during his wartime service, that forced Mayne’s early return to the Falklands for medical treatment. Nothing could be done to ease the condition or the pain from which he suffered. From Port Stanley, Mayne was transported back to England and thence to Northern Ireland in the spring of 1946. The injury that cut short his Antarctic service would trouble him for the rest of his life. Still in his 30s and resettled in Northern Ireland, Mayne, a former British and Irish Lion, was said to live with such profound and chronic pain that he was unable even to spectate rugby matches from the terraces at Ravenhill.

For 80 years, Mayne’s supporters have remained acutely aware of the injustice that denied the Victoria Cross to this extraordinary man and undisputed national hero. Blair Mayne’s legacy is not only of valour in battle, but of unparalleled leadership, courage and sacrifice under the severest of conditions. Colonel David Stirling, who himself knew something of courage and leadership, noted of Mayne that

“he had a marvellous battle nostril. He could really sense precisely what he had to do in a situation. It wasn’t sheer courage, it was sheer technique.”

Today’s debate is not about rewriting history; it concerns the righting of a historic wrong—one that was evident at the time of its making in 1945 and one that has become only clearer with the passage of time and the application of a clear-eyed historical lens. On the 80th anniversary of Mayne’s recommendation for the Victoria Cross and in the 70th anniversary year of Mayne’s untimely death in 1955, there could be no better or more appropriate moment for His Majesty’s Government to take up the cause and finally award Lieutenant Colonel Robert Blair Mayne the Victoria Cross—a recognition earned in 1945, which is now 80 years overdue, but we hope not for much longer.