Major John Bigelow Dodge DSO DSC MC (15 May 1894 – 2 November 1960) also known as "the Artful Dodger" was an American-born British Army officer who fought in both world wars and became a notable prisoner of war during the Second World War and survived The Great Escape.
Early life
Dodge's paternal great great grandfather was David Low Dodge, a pacifist and founder of the New York Peace Society. His great grandfather was William E. Dodge, co-founder of Phelps Dodge & Co. His grandfather was Brigadier-General Charles Cleveland Dodge, who fought in the American Civil War. His parents, Charles Stuart Dodge and Flora Bigelow (daughter of John Bigelow) divorced in 1902. Flora, who had custody of their two children, John and his sister Lucie, remarried to Lionel George William Guest, a cousin of Winston Churchill, and moved to live in Montreal, Canada. His education included Fay School and St. Mark's School, Southborough, Massachusetts and then McGill University in Canada.
First World War
It was through Churchill, who then was First Lord of the Admiralty, that Dodge became commissioned into the Royal Naval Division, arriving in England in August 1914. He became a naturalised British Citizen in 1915.
Dodge served in the 7th (Hood) Battalion of the Royal Naval Division first at Antwerp, then at Gallipoli. Together with Bernard Freyberg and two other officers, Dodge decided where Rupert Brooke was to be buried, and dug the grave on Skyros, immediately before the Gallipoli assault.
While serving as a lieutenant he was wounded at Gallipoli, and awarded the Distinguished Service Cross during this campaign. His award was published in the London Gazette on 8 November 1915.
He transferred to the British Army in April 1916 with the rank of captain, to the 10th Battalion Queen's Royal West Surrey Regiment (the recently raised 'Battersea Battalion), with whom he served on the Western Front, taking part in the Battle of Flers-Courcelette. He was promoted to major on 22 February 1918, was wounded on more than one occasion, and ended the war as an acting lieutenant-colonel commanding the 16th Battalion of the Royal Sussex Regiment fighting in France. He was further decorated with the Distinguished Service Order, this being gazetted on 3 June 1919.
He was demobilised on 18 December 1920, retaining the rank of major.
Dodge's American cousin, Braxton Bigelow, had also joined the British army to fight in the First World War. He was killed in Flanders in 1917.