TOPIC:

Hi

This watch is on auction.




Regards
Adrian

I had the medal to this fellow - George Henry Phillips, Private, 80th Company, 21st battalion, Imperial Yeomanry

- Queens South Africa Medal with clasps Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal, South Africa 1901 & 1902.

I don't think he is the same fellow as the watch owner. My Phillips was born and bred in London and then moved to SA. I am not aware of any Welsh connection.

I also trawled through all the "G" Phillips. attestation papers and none of the seem to have hailed from Wales.

Rory

Adrian,

I am 99% certain this watch was presented to 28730 Trooper George Phillips of the 4th (Glamorganshire) Company, 1st Battalion Imperial Yeomanry.

How I came to this conclusion is a little convoluted.

I found this in the Western Mail of 4 September 1902:



Obviously our man and obviously second contingent IY. However I have a problem with this article as there is no Phillips listed on the medal roll for the second contingent of the 30th (Pembrokeshire) Company, 9th Battalion IY.

Interrogating Ancestry I came across this:



I have come across this sort of thing before and then been unable to find any attestation papers or service records - I presume because they were moved to another file and never returned. This proved to be the case once again. So I looked for 28730 G Phillips on medal rolls and found him on a medal roll for the 4th (Glamorganshire) Company, 1st Battalion IY. Now Pontardawe lies a few miles north of Swansea and is most definitely in Glamorganshire. So I went looking for a J Jones on the same medal roll and thankfully found only one - 28735 Trooper John Jones (my Uncle John was always called Jack). His paperwork is extant and shows he was born in Pontardawe and when he attested his father lived in Pontardawe. John (Jack) Jones SA service dates were 16/03/1901 to 28/08/1902 (including the voyage there and back) and he was discharged at Aldershot on 3 September 1902.

Both George & Jack received 5 clasps to their QSA medal - CC, OFS, Tr, SA1901 & SA1902.

Hope you manged to follow that!

Moral - always believe part of a newspaper article but never all of it, the problem being working out which part is true and which part is false!

Regards, David.