Star of Courage

• Awarded on: April 21, 1987
• Invested on: June 26, 1987

Near dusk on June 26, 1986, Andrew Spence, a 16-year-old boy of the Lax Kw'alaam tribe, lost his life in an attempt to save a 7-year-old boy. The child had been riding his bike on the wooden deck of a government wharf in the native reserve community of Port Simpson, British Columbia, when he lost control and plunged, with his bike, into the cold salt water of the bay. While others stood by, Andrew voluntarily dove off the wharf to try and save him. He went below the surface looking for the child, surfaced once, possibly with the boy, then disappeared again. It was more than an hour later that a diver recovered the bodies of the two youths. Attempts were made to resuscitate them, but they were pronounced dead upon arrival at the Prince Rupert Hospital.