Animal 'Victoria Cross' medals of parachuting SAS dog fetch £140,000

Animal ‘Victoria Cross’ is awarded to heroic border collie retriever who made regular SAS parachute jumps behind enemy lines in Second World War sells for a record £140,000

• Rob the para-dog made 20 parachute jumps and served in daring SAS missions
• The courageous canine’s job was to alert men of danger by licking their faces 
• Awarded PDSA Dickin Medal for Gallantry and RSPCA Red Collar for Valour
• Medals, collar, portrait and photos fetched a staggering £140,000 at auction
• Previous record for a Dickin Medal was £22,000,  awarded to a homing pigeon 

The animal ‘Victoria Cross’ which was awarded to a heroic border collie retriever who made regular SAS parachute jumps behind enemy lines during the Second World War has sold for a record £140,000.

Rob the para-dog made 20 parachute jumps in daring SAS missions, including being dropped with the commandos in Nazi-occupied Italy to prepare the ground for the Allied invasion of Anzio in 1944.

The border collie retriever was strapped into a special harness and ‘eagerly’ followed his human comrades out of aircraft.

The courageous canine alerted the men of any danger by licking their faces and also carried important messages from one part of the front to the other.

Along with a lifetime supply of biscuits, Rob became the only dog ever to be awarded both the PDSA Dickin Medal for Gallantry and the RSPCA Red Collar for Valour.

And today, his owner’s son, Basil Bayne, who grew up with Rob near Tetchill, Shropshire, sold the heroic dog’s medals at auction alongside his collar, a portrait painting and several photographs.

The charming trove achieved a staggering hammer price of £140,000 at auctioneers Noonans of Mayfair, London.

Rob the para-dog (pictured being honoured) made 20 parachute jumps in daring SAS missions behind enemy lines during the Second World War

Rob became the only dog ever to be awarded both the PDSA Dickin Medal for Gallantry (pictured) and the RSPCA Red Collar for Valour. Today, they sold in a collection for £140,000

The PDSA Dickin Medal for Gallantry and the RSPCA Red Collar for Valour (pictured together)

The collection had previously been tipped to sell for more than £30,000 but achieved significantly more.

It also smashed the previous record for a Dickin Medal, which stood at £22,000 for one awarded to a homing pigeon called the Duke of Normandy which brought home the first news of the D-Day landings. That sold in April 2020.

After the war, Rob was returned to his owners and died in 1952 aged 12 – 69 in human years.

Books have been written about Rob’s wartime exploits and he even featured on the front cover of the Radio Times in 1989.

Mr Bayne, now of Antrim, Northern Ireland, will donate part of the proceeds of today’s sale to an animal charity which trains students in poultry husbandry.

Christopher Mellor-Hill, specialist at Noonans, said Rob’s medals were the ‘most important’ of their kind ever to come to auction. 

‘Rob the parachuting dog is the most famous of all the Dickin Medal recipients and we were delighted to be able to offer his medals on behalf of the family who owned him,’ he said.

‘Rob was the first war dog attached to the SAS to be awarded the ‘animal V.C.’ and was reportedly the only war dog to have been nominated for the Dickin Medal by the War Office.

‘Demobilised on November 27, 1945, Rob led the Wembley Parade of 32 war dogs on July 16, 1947. He was the star of the show as far as the 10,000 spectators were concerned, being the only dog present to hold both the Dickin Medal and the R.S.P.C.A. Red Collar and Medallion for Valour.

The courageous canine’s job was to be on guard and alert the men of any danger by licking their faces. He also carried important messages from one part of the front to the other

After the war Rob was returned to his owners and died in 1952 aged 12 – 69 in human years. His portrait was part of the collection which sold at auction today

His owner’s son, Basil Bayne, who grew up beside Rob near Tetchill, Shropshire, decided to sell the heroic dog’s medals alongside his collar, a portrait painting and several photographs

‘I believe this is the most important Dickin Medal to ever be sold at auction.’

The black and white dog was born in 1939 and he helped owner Edward Bayne on his Shropshire farm before the obedient animal was offered up for military service in 1942.

A letter included in the sale describes how Rob ‘eagerly followed’ his comrades out of the airplane on jumps.

The account tells of how his training began after soldiers in the 2nd SAS regiment in North Africa sneaked him into their airplane on jumps.

When heir commanding officer realised Rob had gone with them, he decided to send him to Italy.

The letter reads: ‘It was from there (North Africa) that the 2nd S.A.S. practised their parachute drops and one day the men smuggled Rob up in the plane for a ride.

‘It was all they could do to prevent him from jumping out after the men. So they borrowed a harness from a nearby American base who were trying to train dogs to jump and on the next jump again took Rob with them.

‘This time Rob jumped and on landing the men ran to him to release him from the parachute. He had made a perfect drop, falling silently without panic through the air.

‘It was only at this point that the commanding officer was informed of the fact that Rob had been airborne and from then on his training began in earnest.’

Jennifer Hodges, the daughter of Corporal Victor Redhead, Rob’s SAS handler, wrote in a letter that the canine would ‘eagerly parachute ahead’ of her father.

She said: ‘While the soldiers were sleeping Rob would patrol round them and lick their faces to bring them to instant wakefulness at the slightest sound.

The black and white dog was born in 1939 and he helped owner Edward Bayne on his Shropshire farm before the obedient animal was offered up for military service in 1942 

Books have been written about Rob’s wartime exploits and he even featured on the front cover of the Radio Times in 1989

The charming trove was tipped to sell for more than £30,000 at auctioneers Noonans of Mayfair, London next month but in fact sold for £140,000

‘On one mission, he went missing for five weeks but in that time rounded up all the widely scattered members of his 2nd SAS patrol and they returned home safely’.

After serving with infantry in North Africa, he became the first dog to serve with the SAS when he was dropped on sabotage missions with his own special parachute in Italy.

At the time of receiving the medals, Mr Bayne told how Rob cared for the other animals on the farm.

He said: ‘He used to help settle the chicks in their houses at night, picking them up in his mouth when they had strayed away – he had a wonderful mouth – and tucking them in under their mothers.’

When Rob was still a small puppy, he went on an exploration beyond the boundaries of Tetchill and was brought home by John Brunt, then a schoolboy at Ellesmere College. John became a frequent visitor and took Rob on walks.

After leaving college John joined the army and led a distinguished career until he was killed in action.

In a strange coincidence, on the day that Rob received the ‘animal VC’ it was announced that John had been posthumously awarded the VC.

The Dickin Medal has been awarded to 71 animals – 34 of them going to dogs, 32 to pigeons, four to horses and one to a cat.

The vast majority were granted for acts of bravery in the Second World War but several wards have been made to Arms and Explosives Search Dogs of the Royal Army Veterinary Corps for their gallantry in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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