Rip, A WW2 S&R Dog, Was Awarded The Dickin Medal For Bravery For Saving More Than 100 People

"Rip wore his Medal on his collar until the day he died in 1946."

Damjan

• Published in Animal Stories
• November 6, 2022

War brings out the best and worst in humanity. Sadly, we humans are not very nice in general, so the bad out shadows the good.

However, war creates heroes, and some of them are unexpected. We are not talking about humans, but animals.

And dogs are the first in line. They are incapable of doing anything evil, so they are the heroes with the purest of hearts.

One Redditor stumbled upon an interesting story about Rip, a WW2 search & rescue dog, who saved the lives of more than 100 people during the German bombing of London.

“Such was his skill that Rip became the ARP Service's first official search and rescue dog. In 12 months during 1940-41, it is reckoned that he rescued over 100 Blitz victims in London.

His success was partially responsible for prompting the training of many more search and rescue dogs by the end of the war. Rip was awarded the PDSA Dickin medal in July 1945, which is the animal equivalent of the Victoria Cross.

His citation read: "For locating many air-raid victims during the Blitz of 1940."

Rip’s story is very interesting. He had no training – finding and helping people came naturally to him. Read his interesting story below:

This is Rip, a WW2 search & rescue dog that saved lives of more than 100 people during German bombing campaign

“A stray mixed-breed terrier, Rip was found wandering about after a bombing raid in Poplar, London, England, United Kingdom by an air raid warden named Mr. E. King. King soon adopted the dog and he became the mascot of the Southill Street Air Raid Patrol.

Despite having no training, Rip had a talent for locating people trapped in bomb-damaged buildings. He would sniff and scratch for signs of life before barking to attract attention.”

He had no official training - his ability to find and help people was natural

“Rip wore his Medal on his collar until the day he died in 1946. He is buried at PDSA's Animal Cemetery in Ilford, Essex, England. Rip's headstone reads: "We also serve - for the dog whose body lies here played his part in the Battle of Britain". His medal was sold at auction in London on 23 April 2009 fetching a record price for a Dickin Medal of £24,250.”

"Rip was awarded the PDSA Dickin medal in July 1945, which is the animal equivalent of the Victoria Cross"

Rip did much more than saved lives directly. This success inspired the idea of training more dogs. This led to even more lives being saved.

By the conclusion of the war, many additional search and rescue dogs had been trained in part due to his success. We can say that Rip inspired change and led to modern-day search and rescue dog services.

And that makes him a hero and a pioneer. He confirmed once more what we've been saying the whole time - dogs are God's gift to humans.

What would we do without them?

Damjan