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Gordon Highlanders Trio - India 1895, QSA, KSA 10 years 1 month ago #18900

  • Frank Kelley
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Hello Greg,
Reading your post again, I see that whilst you are happy with the medals to Clunes, you feel it is "too bad" that he was not further entitled, let me persuade you against such folly.
Clunes had very considerable service and would have certainly seen a bit of gunpowder on more that one occasion too.
Life in Victorian Scotland was often far from easy and life in the highland regiments would be much harder still.
Clunes has a three clasp India medal which was earned the hard way, you should bare in mind the Tirah clasp next time you look at that particular medal, his regiment was part of the Tirah Field Force during the Pathan Revolt in 1897-98.
They were engaged in the desperate fight at the Dargai Heights for example, the depiction here, gives some idea of how things were, a point to note, is the gentleman playing the pipes, lower middle.
This particular gentleman continued to play, although badly wounded, he was awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions that day.
I rather think your Mr Clunes had already done the measure and perhaps far more that the measure to be futher entitled.
Kind regards Frank Kelley

GregN wrote: Thanks David Frank and Brett, I'm very happy that all the bars are good, too bad about other possible entitlements. The medals came in a Tupper Ware container with an early Army LSGC medal to the 92nd Foot which, I just discovered is also a Gordon Highlander.

The LSGC is named: CORPL ROBT IMLACH 92nd FOOT and I think was issued much earlier than Pte. Clune's group. I've asked for more info on the BMF as I'm not familiar with early British medals, most of my collecting being WW1 or later.

Regards,

Greg


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Gordon Highlanders Trio - India 1895, QSA, KSA 10 years 1 month ago #19149

  • GregN
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Thank you Frank for chastising me (in a good way), and encouraging me to look closer at the man and his service and in doing so, bringing him back to life.

Regards,

Greg

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Gordon Highlanders Trio - India 1895, QSA, KSA 10 years 1 month ago #19155

  • Frank Kelley
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Hello Greg,
Well, I think with campaign medals that is what you should be doing, I have to say though, that I actually much prefer the other medal you mentioned.
Imlach's medal is not only very nice indeed, but, rather scarcer too, a very interesting period in the empires history and one that I have certainly always liked, men like him really did put the "great" into this country.

I'm a product of the 1970's but even so, it did not stop me from being an "interested party" as a boy.
For me it started with Thomas Hughs and his "Tom Brown's School Days" then I discovered Cecil Scott Forester's books and began to think about the empire and in particular medals.
George Fraser had revived the "Harry Flashman" character from Hughs original Victorian classic and after that Bernard Cornwell wrote his now famous books and by that point I was well and truely hooked.

There is an interesting post script too, years later I began to think about Thomas Hughs book again, after I bought a South Africa medal to the Adjutant of the 2nd Regiment, after a short time at the then public record office, I found a letter written by this gentleman's father to Lord Somerset at Horse Guards, with a reference to his sons own school days at Rugby and a direct reference to the famous Doctor Arnold who was the headmaster at the particular time frame Hughs book was set in.
At that point the Victorian classic ceased to be a mere novel and I felt as though I really was touching history!
The book had been adapted for TV a few years ago and Stephen Fry took on the roll of Thomas Arnold, it was on here over the Christmas period and whilst I enjoyed watching it, I was disapointed that nobody played the part of the gentleman who had been recipient of my medal! :(

So in short, always take a hard look at the recipient of each medal that have, you will often end up being surprised!
Kind regards Frank

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