John Gerard Heath Lander

Who was John Gerard Heath Lander?

John Gerard Heath Lander was a British rower who competed at the 1928 Summer Olympics. He was killed in action during the Second World War.

Lander was born in Liverpool. He attended Shrewsbury School and was in the Shrewsbury crew that won the Ladies' Challenge Plate at Henley Royal Regatta in 1924. He then went to Trinity College, Cambridge, where he rowed for the First Trinity Boat Club. With Edward Vaughan Bevan, Richard Beesly and Michael Warriner, he won an Olympic gold medal in the coxless fours event rowing at the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam. They recorded a time of 6:36.0 in the final to beat the U.S. crew by 1 second. In 1929 Lander was expected to be included in the Cambridge crew in the Boat Race, but Richard Beesly, fellow gold medalist and the Cambridge President, called on Tom Brocklebank as stroke instead.

Upon leaving Cambridge, Lander took up a business appointment in Hong Kong. He was killed in the Battle of Hong Kong on Christmas Day 1941, the only British Olympic gold medallist to have been killed during World War II.