Thomas Raymond Kelly, GC (19 March 1928 – 18 March 1947) was a Northern Irish sailor in the British Merchant Navy who was posthumously awarded the George Cross for the courage he displayed in the Bay of Biscay, when he lost his own life saving people from drowning during a storm.
During the Second World War, Kelly left school at age 14, and in May 1942 he joined the SS Rowan.
As the men of Empire Plover lowered ropes and two crew members climbed down the scrambling nets to assist, Kelly swam with a line to the people struggling in the turbulent water and rescued a badly injured officer.
He returned again to drag another man to safety but on his third foray he and the woman he was rescuing were swamped by a wave and disappeared.
Each time he left the Empire Plover he risked his life To leave his ship on the third occasion, with the full knowledge which his first two rescues must have given him of the risk and difficulty of his undertaking and in the face of the bodily fatigue which those rescues must have entailed, was an act of supreme gallantry.This Northern Ireland biographical article is a stub.