Judy was still young when World War II broke out. When she went onboard, she became the only female among about 50 males on the Royal Navy’s insect-class ship HMS Gnat. She could not speak English, but she understood a few words after a while. The Gnat’s designation as an insect-class ship was misleading because the Gnat was a well-armed gunboat that the Germans wanted to eliminate.
On October 21, 1941, German submarine U-79 located the Gnat and fired a torpedo. The torpedo struck its mark and did enough damage to the ship to put it out of service, but not to sink it. The survivors, including Judy, were transferred to the dragonfly-class river gunboat, HMS Grasshopper. Four months later, on February 14, 1942, Japanese dive bombers attacked the Grasshopper, and it slowly sank. The survivors made their way to land and began their daring trek to safety in enemy territory.
On land, the men searched but were unable to find a source for drinkable water. Once Judy learned what they were looking for, she joined the search. It was she who found fresh water. For that, the men began referring to her as their “guardian angel.”
The survivors were eventually captured by Japanese soldiers and taken to a prison camp. The men became official prisoners of war under the Geneva Convention, but the Japanese guards refused to register Judy as an official P.O.W. The guards were unsure what to do with Judy, but they refused to provide food, water, or shelter for her.
The men shared their meager rations of putrid water and maggot-infested rice with Judy. When the guards were abusing the men, Judy intervened. It usually ended the beatings, but the guards often trained their hostilities onto her instead. Somehow, one of the prisoners convinced the camp commandant to register Judy as an official prisoner of war. This meant that they had to provide food, water, and shelter for Judy.
Judy was unbreakable. Her determination to survive brought hope to the other prisoners. Then, after being in the camp for more than two years, a Japanese captain arrived and ordered the men to move to a ship that would take them to another camp. Judy, he ordered, would be left behind to fend for herself.
The prisoners knew better than to try to convince the captain to bring Judy, but they were not going to leave her behind to die alone. They quickly came up with a plan in which they could communicate by using hand signals and low whistles. The men rehearsed loading Judy in and out of rice sacks and taught her the different whistle signals; the most important one was the signal for her to be still and quiet.
On June 25, 1944, the prisoners loaded the sacks of rice from their former prison onto a ship that was to take them to their new prison camp. Judy was hiding in one of those sacks and made it safely aboard. Just one day into the trip, their ship was sunk by a torpedo. Judy not only survived, but she also pulled survivors from the water. Finally, after the Victory over Japan on August 15, 1945, and after three years of captivity, the prisoners, including Judy, were rescued.
Many English soldiers owe their lives to Judy, their guardian angel. In May 1946, Judy was awarded the PDSA Dickin Medal for bravery, which is commonly referred to as the Victoria Cross for animals. Judy, a pure-bred English Pointer and mascot for the Royal Navy, was the only dog in history to be officially registered as a prisoner of war.