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Auction: 19001 - Orders, Decorations and Medals
Lot: 574

The unique King David Hotel Bomb George Medal group of four awarded to Sergeant E. A. 'Ted' Smith, Palestine Police, it was he who rushed to the scene of the attack immediately after the bomb exploded, rescuing 3 trapped soldiers after 6 hours of relentless, dangerous tunelling work - his rescues ammounted to half of those who were saved in the aftermath

George Medal, G.VI.R. (Sgt. Edward S. [sic] Smith, Palestine Police); General Service 1918-62, G.VI.R., 2 clasps, Palestine, Palestine 1945-48 (1316 Const. E. A. Smith. Pal. Police); Defence and War Medals 1939-45, mounted as originally worn, generally very fine (4)

G.M. London Gazette 21 Janaury 1947:

'On July 22nd, 1946, Jewish terrorists attacked the Secretariat and Force Headquarters situated at the King David Hotel, Jerusalem and by means of high explosives completely destroyed part of the building.

At the time of the explosion Sergeant Smith was off duty but he immediately turned out all the available personnel and at once initiated rescue work. With assistance he made a hole in the debris large enough to insert himself in a prone position and in this manner tunnelled his way into the wreckage until he reached three soldiers who were seriously injured.

Smith spent 6 hours under the debris in an atmosphere choked with dust and explosive fumes before he succeeded in extricating the three men. There was a real and constant danger of further explosions, of fire and of the collapse of the tunnel. Throughout his ordeal Smith displayed courage of the highest order with complete disregard of his own safety.'

Edward Alfred 'Ted' Smith was born in Ballymena, County Antrim and was a Regular Soldier for 12 years, serving with the British Army on the Rhine, meeting his Dutch wife in the process. In 1937 Smith left the army and went into coal mining, but prospects were poor, so he applied to join the Palestine Police. Initially rejected on account of being 'too short [and] chest not big enough', he was not to be deterred, and appealed via Sir Charles Augustus Tegart, Adviser to the Palestine Government, who by chance his wife was housekeeper. 'I promise to do well, Sir, if I am accepted' was his plea and they were answered, for he was accepted to the force in 1938. Assigned as British Police Constable No.1316, he saw service during the latter stages of the Arab Rebellion (Medal & clasp) and remained on service with the police in Palestine throughout the Second World War, being promoted Sergeant in 1945. Of this promotion he wrote to his wife:

'Tell Sir Charles I was promoted Sergeant today…still trying.'

Before the Second World War they had lived in Gertrude Street, World's End, Chelsea, but their home had been bombed during the Blitz.

King David Hotel Bombing - G.M.

The infamous bombing of the King David's Hotel in Jerusalem took place on 22 July 1946 and cost the lives of 91 people, with a further 46 being injured. The bombing was a terrorist attack by the militant Zionist underground organization Irgun on the British administrative headquarters for Palestine, which was housed in the southern wing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. The hotel was the site of the central offices of the British Mandatory authorities of Palestine, principally the Secretariat of the Government of Palestine and the Headquarters of the British Armed Forces in Palestine and Transjordan. The attack initially had the approval of the Haganah (the principal Jewish paramilitary group in Palestine). It was conceived as a response to Operation Agatha - a series of widespread raids, including one on the Jewish Agency, conducted by the British authorities and was the deadliest directed at the British during the Mandate era of 1920-1948. Disguised as Arabs, the Irgun planted a bomb in the basement of the main building of the hotel, whose southern wing housed the Mandate Secretariat and a few offices of the British military headquarters. Such was the force of the explosion that the western half of the southern wing of the hotel simply collapsed.

Following a number of calls, considered hoaxes, a concerned Palestine Postman called the police who informed the Hotel Manager was notified. In the closing minutes before the explosion, he called an unknown British officer, but no evacuation was ordered. Controversy has since arisen over the timing and adequacy of the warnings and the reasons why the hotel was not evacuated.

In plan form, the six-story hotel, which was opened in 1932 as the first, modern, luxury hotel in Jerusalem, had an I-shape, with a long central axis connecting wings to the north and south. Julian's Way, a main road, ran parallel and close to the west side of the hotel. An unsurfaced lane, where the French Consulate was situated and from where access to the service entrance of the hotel was gained, ran from there past the north end of the hotel. Gardens and an olive grove, which had been designated as a park, surrounded the other sides. In 1946, the Secretariat occupied most of the southern wing of the hotel, with the military headquarters occupying the top floor of the south wing and the top, second and third floors of the middle of the hotel. The military telephone exchange was situated in the basement. An annexe housed the military police and a branch of the Criminal Investigation Department of the Palestine Police.

Rooms had first been requisitioned in the hotel in late 1938, on what was supposed to be a temporary basis. Plans had already been made to erect a permanent building for the Secretariat and Army GHQ, but these were cancelled after the Second World War broke out, at which point more than two-thirds of the hotel's rooms were being used for government and army purposes.

By March 1946, British Labour Party MP Richard Crossman gave an insight to the ongoing activities at the hotel:

'Private detectives, Zionist agents, Arab sheiks, special correspondents, and the rest, all sitting around about discreetly overhearing each other.'

Aminchai Paglin, Chief of Operations of the Irgun, developed a remote-controlled mortar with a range of four miles, which was nicknamed the V3 by British military engineers. In 1945, after attacks using the mortar on several police stations, six V3s were buried in the olive grove park south of the King David Hotel. Three were aimed at the government printing press and three at the hotel itself. The intention was to fire them on the King's birthday, but the Haganah learned about the plan and warned the British through Teddy Kollek of the Jewish Agency. Sappers then dug them up. On another occasion, members of an unknown group threw grenades at the hotel, which thanfully missed.

The leaders of Haganah opposed the idea of a large-scale bombing initially. On 1 July 1946, Moshe Sneh, Chief of the Haganah General Headquarters, sent a letter to the then leader of the Irgun, Menachem Begin, which instructed him to carry out the operation at the 'chick', code for the King David Hotel. Despite this approval for the project, repeated delays in executing the operation were requested by the Haganah, in response to changes unfolding in the political situation. The plan was finalized between Amichai Paglin (Irgun alias 'Gidi'), Chief of Operations of the Irgun, and Itzhad Sadeh, Commander of the Palmach.
In the plan, Irgun men, disguised as Arabs, except for Gideon, the leader, who would be dressed as the hotel's distinctive Sudanese waiters, would enter the building through a basement service entrance carrying the explosives concealed in milk cans. The cans were to be placed by the main columns supporting the wing where the majority of the offices used by the British authorities were located. The columns were in a basement nightclub known as the Régence. In the final review of the plan, it was decided that the attack would take place on 22 July at 11.00am, a time when there would be no people in the coffee shop in the basement in the area where the bomb was to be planted. It would be possible to enter the hotel more easily at that time as well.

It would have been impossible to have planted the bomb in the Régence any later than 2.00pm because it was always full of customers after that time. The timing was also determined by the original intention that the attack should coincide with another, carried out by the Lehi, on government offices at the David Brothers Building. However, that attack, codenamed Operation 'Your Slave and Redeemer', was cancelled at the last moment. The Irgun said details of the plan were aimed at minimizing civilian casualties. Irgun reports allegedly included explicit precautions so that the whole area would be evacuated. This led to recriminations between the Haganah and Irgun later. The Haganah said that they had specified that the attack should take place later in the day, when the offices would have been emptier of people.

Since the bombing, much controversy has ensued over the issues of when warnings were sent and how the British authorities responded. Irgun representatives have always stated that the warning was given well in advance of the explosion, so that adequate time was available to evacuate the hotel. Meantime Begin, for example, wrote that the telephone message was delivered 25-27 minutes before the explosion. It is often stated that the British authorities have always denied that a warning was sent. However, what the British Government said, five months after the bombing, once the subsequent inquest and all the inquiries had been completed, was not that no warning had been sent, but that no such warning had been received by anyone at the Secretariat in an official position with any power to take action. Author Thurston Clarke's analysis of the bombing gave timings for calls and for the explosion, which he said took place at 12.37pm. He states that as part of the Irgun plan, a sixteen-year-old recruit, Adina Hay (alias Tehia), was to make three warning calls before the attack. At 12.22pm the first call was made, in both Hebrew and English, to a telephone operator on the hotel's switchboard (the Secretariat and the military each had their own, separate, telephone exchanges). It was ignored. At 12.27pm, the second warning call was made to the French Consulate adjacent to the hotel to the north-east. This second call was taken seriously, and staff went through the building opening windows and closing curtains to lessen the impact of the blast. At 12.31pm a third and final warning call to the Palestine Post newspaper was made. The telephone operator called the Palestine Police CID to report the message. She then called the hotel switchboard. The hotel operator reported the threat to one of the hotel managers. This warning resulted in the discovery of the milk cans in the basement, but by then it was too late. Begin claimed in his memoirs that the British had deliberately not evacuated so that they could vilify the Jewish militant groups.

Shortly after noon Palestine time, the London UPI bureau received a short message stating:

'Jewish terrorists have just blown up the King David Hotel!'

The UPI stringer who had sent it, an Irgun member, had wanted to scoop his colleagues. Not knowing that the operation had been postponed by an hour, he sent the message before the operation had been completed. The bureau Chief decided against running the story until more details and further confirmation had been obtained.

There were other leaks. The perpetrators met at 7.00am at the Beit Aharon Talmud Torah. This was the first time they were informed of the target. The attack used approximately 350kg (770lb) of explosives spread over six charges. According to Begin, due to consultations about the cancellation of the attack on the David Brothers Building, the operation was delayed and started at about 12.00am, an hour later than planned.

After placing the bombs in the La Regence Cafe, the Irgun men quickly slipped out and detonated a small explosive in the street outside the hotel, reportedly to keep passers-by away from the area. The police report written in the aftermath of the bombing says that this explosion resulted in a higher death toll because it caused spectators from the hotel to gather in its south-west corner, directly over the bomb planted in its basement. The first explosion also caused the presence in the hotel of injured Arabs who were brought into the Secretariat after their bus, which had been passing, was rolled onto its side. The Arab workers in the kitchen fled after being told to do so.

During the attack, 2 Irgun casualties occurred, Avraham Abramovitz and Itzhak Tsadok. In an Irgun account of the bombing, by Katz, the two were shot during the initial approach on the hotel, when a minor gunfight ensued with two British soldiers who had become suspicious. The Irgun did not explain how the group would have been able to move 350kg of home-made explosives into the hotel with the guards already alerted. In Yehuda Lapidot's account, the men were shot as they were withdrawing after the attack. The latter agrees with the version of events presented by Bethell and Thurston Clarke and is more credible. According to Bethell, Abramovitz managed to get to the taxi getaway car along with six other men. Tsadok escaped with the other men on foot. Both were found by the police in the Jewish Old Quarter of Jerusalem the next day, with Abramovitz already dead from his wounds.

The explosion occurred at 12.37pm. It caused the collapse of the western half of the southern wing of the hotel. Of the casualties 21 were first-rank Government Officials, 49 were second-rank Clerks, Typists and Messengers, junior members of the Secretariat, employees of the hotel and canteen workers, 13 were soldiers, 3 policemen and 5 were members of the public.

Soon after the explosion, the rescue work began. Besides Smith, the Royal Engineers arrived with heavy lifting equipment. Later that night, the Sappers were formed into three groups, with each working an eight-hour shift. The rescue operation lasted for the next three days and 2,000 lorry loads of rubble were removed. From the wreckage and rubble the rescuers managed to extract six survivors. It was for his untiring work during the rescue efforts that Smith would be awarded the George Medal, the only such award for the bombing. His wife stated in the aftermath:

'I am so proud to know he has done well. He had kept the promise he made when he went out to Palestine.'



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