Gazetted: 19 November 1914.
Investiture: 13 January 1915 at Buckingham Palace by King George V.
Other Decorations: Military Cross.
Other Medals: 1914/15 Star, BWM, VM.
Location of Medals: VC and MC - RGJ Museum.

Personal: Son of Mr John Dimmer, late Royal Navy. He was educated at Merton School, Surrey and Rutish Science School, Merton, Surrey. He enlisted in 1902 and the following year was promoted Corporal for reconnaissance work in the Orange River Colony. He was made Lance-Sergeant in 1905 for scouting and signalling in the Mounted Infantry and in 1906 he was sent to study the military systems of Belgium and Germany. In November 1907, he visited a foreign country on behalf of the Intelligence Department and for his work, received a special letter of thanks from the Army Council. In January 1908, Lord Methuen recommended him for a commission as Second Lieutenant and from then until the outbreak of the present war, he was doing special work in West Africa. On the outbreak of the European War he went with the first Expeditionary Force to France. He rejoined the 2nd Battn King's Royal Rifle Corps, and was thus in the First Division. He was present in the action at Klein Zillebeke on 12 November 1914, and for his services was awarded the Victoria Cross and promoted Captain. In his own account of the affair he tells how the Prussian Guards suddenly attacked them and besides shelling them, sent a hail of bullets at a range of about 100 yards. After smashing up one of Dimmer's guns almost at once, the Germans concentrated their attention on the gun Dimmer himself was with. He says "My face is spattered with pieces of my gun and pieces of shell, and I have a bullet in my face and four small holes in my right shoulder. It made rather a mess of me at first, but now that I am washed and my wounds dressed, I look quite alright." He was awarded the Victoria Cross. John Henry Stephen Dimmer, Lieut., 2nd Battn King's Royal Rifle Corps. Date of Act of Bravery: 12 November 1914. This officer served his machine-gun during the attack, on the 12th November at Klein Zillebeke, until he had been shot five times - three times by shrapnel and twice by bullets - and continued at his post until his gun was destroyed." "Deeds that thrill the Empire (Vol 1 page 270) says: "On the morning of 10 November 1914, the King's Royal Rifles, who had been attached to the sorely shattered 4th (Guards) Brigade, relieved the London Scottish in the sections of the trenches at Klein Zillebeke which the Territorials had held so gallantly in the face of heavy and persistant shelling. The machine-gun section which was in the charge of Lieut Dimmer, took over from the Scots about noon and that officer lost no time in placing his two Vickers machine-guns in position. The German trenches opposite to ours had been dug behind a bank on the edge of a wood known to our men as the Brown Road Wood, and the trees of which, though it was already the second week in November, were still covered with leaves. A great number of the trees had, however, been broken down by the fire of our artillery; indeed, as viewed from the British trenches, the wood appeared almost impassable. The No Man's Land between the hostile lines presented a curious and gruesome spectacle, being covered with shell-holes and littered with the unburied bodies of fallen Germans - in heaps and singly - many of which had probably lain there since the desparate and sanguinary fighting of the last days of October.