Remembrance Day: Thirsk volunteer's tribute to officer Jessie North

As we mark Remembrance Day, a Thirsk Salvation Army volunteer has paid tribute to remarkable Salvation Army officer Jessie North, who was killed after an air raid in the Second World War. 

Kevin Earl, who volunteers at the Salvation Army charity shop where he researches items of particular interest, started to dig into Jessie North’s background after discovering she was the only woman named on the War Memorial in the town of Easingwold, North Yorkshire. 

Easingwold-born Jessie, who is also named on the memorial plaque erected inside the local church St. John the Baptist & All Saints, was a Salvation Army officer known as a ‘slum saviour’ for her work in the slums of London and Manchester. She died aged just 27 in 1941 during the London blitz. 

Kevin explained: “Jessie North was born in Easingwold on 9 July 1913, the daughter of Harry and Ellen Caroline. Her father made a living by catching rabbits. Jessie qualified as a first aider and then joined The Salvation Army, becoming an officer in 1932 and moving to London where she served as a slum officer at several places in the capital. She became adept at communicating with people who were deaf. 

“At the start of the London blitz, she had been working in the Kent hop fields but returned to the capital to help the civilian population, going from one shelter to the next offering assistance and encouragement and giving up her bed for a woman who had been bombed out of her own house. 

“When the city of Coventry suffered its own blitz in mid-November 1940, Jessie North volunteered to go there and spent several weeks in the midlands on relief work with the bombed-out population.” 

Returning to London, Jessie spent time in West Ham and then Southwark, where she was appointed to the Southwark Bridge Road Project, which supported people who were deaf. 

It was during one of the worst raids of the blitz on 29 December 1940 that the City of London and Southwark suffered badly with 100,000 bombs dropped. The public shelter in Keyworth Street took a direct hit from a high explosive bomb, killing thirteen civilians and injuring many others who were trapped by the debris and had to wait hours to be dug out by rescue crews whilst the raid continued overhead. Jessie North was badly injured and her fellow housemate and Salvation Officer Edith Stead was killed. 

Kevin continued: “A report in The War Cry describes how Jessie North was pinned down by rubble but was rescued by a serviceman, who was almost certainly army signalman Robert Tinto from Glasgow. He crawled through a tiny gap in the debris, clearing away rubble with his hands and found some survivors, remaining with them for four hours, giving them comfort and reassurance and administering morphine. For his bravery, Tinto was awarded the George Medal.

“Badly injured, Jessie North was taken out of the capital to Brookwood Hospital in Woking, Surrey, but despite efforts to save her, she died of her injuries on 6 January 1941. She was 27 years old.

“Jessie North was brought back to Easingwold and buried in the churchyard with the funeral service led by Brigadier Starbuck of The Salvation Army. Many people gathered to pay their respects as her coffin was borne through the streets and separate memorial services were held in both London and Coventry.” 

By the time of her death, Jessie was a Captain in the Salvation Army and her younger sister Ruby was then a Lieutenant, also working in London. Ruby survived the war.

This Remembrance Sunday The Salvation Army will join the nation in honouring all those who have died in conflict and reflecting on their great sacrifice, with members across the UK joining in local commemorations.

Find out more information about Thirsk Salvation Army, which operates as a fresh expression, out in the community rather than a traditional church building, here.