Lot 827

Description

Royal Humane Society of Australasia, award medal in bronze (30mm), inscribed on reverse 'Albert / Richards / 7.7.32'. Extremely fine.

Albert Richards, North Fitzroy (Vic), tramway conductor, aged 27 years, who stopped a bolting horse in Collins Street on July 7, 1932. Richards was waiting for his tram, and was standing on the footpath, near the intersection of Market Street, when he saw a horse, attached to a lorry, bolting in an easterly direction along Collins Street. Richards ran onto the roadway and swung himself onto the lorry. He leaned over the front of the lorry and had to reach down three times before he grasped the reins and managed to pull the horse up about half way between Queen and Elizabeth Streets. The traffic was very heavy, and several collisions were narrowly averted.