Stanley Frederick Gibbs, GC (2 January 1909 – 3 March 1991) was an Australian shipping clerk and an exchange recipient of the George Cross, the highest civil decoration for heroism in the United Kingdom and formerly in the Commonwealth.

On 3 January 1927, the day after his eighteenth birthday, Gibbs went to the rescue of 15-year-old Mervyn Allum during a shark attack at Port Hacking, New South Wales.

Although Allum died from his injuries, Gibbs was publicly praised by the coroner and local community leaders for his actions, and was subsequently awarded the Albert Medal.

Born in Hunters Hill, Sydney, and educated locally, Gibbs was employed by the Australian Gas Light Company (AGL) as a shipping clerk for forty-five years.

During the Second World War, he enlisted as a private in the Second Australian Imperial Force in February 1942 and served with the 35th Battalion on home defence and patrolling duties in Sydney and Western Australia for two years.

On 21 October 1971, the British Prime Minister announced that the Albert Medal would be discontinued and living recipients would henceforth be regarded as holders of the George Cross.

[2] The specifics of Gibbs' education are unclear, but he left high school before achieving an Intermediate Certificate and at first worked as a shop assistant in a men's store.

[5][6] On 3 January 1927, following a venture out to Gunnamatta Bay,[7] Gibbs was piloting a launch back into the Grays Point area of Port Hacking when a scream rang out.

[5] The mayor, Milton Jarvie, described Gibbs' efforts as "one of the most specific acts of gallantry ever recorded" and drew comparisons to the battlefield heroism of the First World War.

[5] Recognition was swift in coming: Gibbs was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Shipwreck Relief and Humane Society of New South Wales (the state branch of the RHS) a week later,[13][Note 1] while the community fund raised over £400.

On the 3rd January, 1927, at Port Hacking near Sydney, New South Wales, a youth named Mervyn Allum was swimming a short distance from the shore when he was attacked by a large shark.

It was at first thought that he was drowning, and Stanley Gibbs, who was standing on the nose of a launch he was driving, ready to give assistance to Allum, observed that he was being attacked by the shark.

[4] On 9 February 1942, Gibbs, by now living in Ashbury with his wife and two children,[3] enlisted in the Second Australian Imperial Force (2nd AIF) at Paddington for service in the Second World War.

[22] The 35th, a Militia unit assigned to the 8th Brigade, was employed in the defence of Australia following Japan's entry into the war and was initially posted to the St Ives area of Sydney.

[22][23] The 35th Battalion spent the next two years engaged in training exercises and defensive patrols along the coast of Western Australia, spanning from Bunbury in the south to Geraldton in the Mid West.

[1][4] On 21 October 1971, the British Prime Minister Edward Heath in answer to a written question upon notice announced that the Albert medal would be abolished and living recipients would henceforth be regarded as holders of the George Cross.

[27] All six Australian Albert Medal recipients living at the time opted to accept the offer, Gibbs and four others travelling to London to receive their awards.

[Note 2] The five men, Jack Chalmers, Robert Kavanaugh, William McAloney, Dick Richards and Gibbs, were presented with their George Crosses by Queen Elizabeth II in an investiture ceremony at Buckingham Palace on 12 July 1972.

[1][4] Survived by his third wife, and by a daughter and son from an earlier marriage,[4] Gibbs' body was cremated and his ashes interred at the Eastern Suburbs Memorial Park in Matraville.