A VERY UNUSUAL
"Battle of Bazentin Wood" 14th July 1916
(SOMME) MILITARY MEDAL & 1914-15 Trio.
To:
12104 Sgt W. SHEA. 6th Bn LEICESTER REGt.



Who at 56 was probably the oldest decorated soldier of The Great War.
(With two sets of attestation papers, 1879 & 1914 !!!! )

[BIOGRAPHY & FIRST ENLISTMENT in 1879...at age 18 ]
William Shea was born in February 1861 in St James' London. He had previously worked as a Printer, and his first set of Victorian attestation papers see him enlisting into the army ("General Service Infantry") on 19th April 1879 at age 18 years & 2 months, and he's seen serving with the 45th Foot,(Sherwood Foresters) 1/17th Foot, (Leicester's) 1st Leicester's, 2nd Leicester's until 22nd September 1885 when he's seen moving into the Section 'D' reserves. The dates 29th April 1891 to 28th April 1895 cover his time in the reserves.

[ THE GREAT WAR & HIS SECOND ENLISTMENT in 1914...at age 54 !!!! ]
William Shea is now seen re-enlisting on 28th August 1914 in London. This is where his story gets seriously interesting. He stated his age at the time of this second period of enlistment as being 44, which, was clearly a 'bare faced fib' as he was then almost 54. He did declare 'previous military service' but gave his previous unit as 17th Leicester's against which a statement of "Papers Lost" appears. The truth was that he had initially signed up in 1879 for the Sherwood Foresters (45th Foot) so there would not have been any locatable papers for him under the 1/17th !
A further tell tale feature of this subterfuge is that in 1879 his hair was described as 'brown' but in August 1914 it was described as "Black / Rather Grey" .....so clearly he was dying his hair !!

Clearly, by this rather 'over qualified' description, the army was perhaps only 'half fooled' by his age declaration, but as they were keen to enlist anyone who looked fit they turned a blind eye ! Basically, anyone very young, some only 15 or quite old like William Shea, and who looked fit to fight was being allowed into the army.

He & his unit entered France on 29th July 1915.




[THE WINNING OF THE MILITARY MEDAL. LG. 27th OCT 1916]
(The Battle of Bazentin Wood, Somme, 14th July 1916)

With the loss of all the Great War MM citations in the blitz fire of WW2 , it's sometimes not a simple matter to establish the exact date or action which led to the award of a particular Military Medal. However, in the current set of circumstances it can be 100% established that William Shea was decorated for bravery during the attack on Bazentin Wood. The 6th Bn Leicester's suffered over 500 casualties during this action on 14th July 1916.
Luckily, the meticulously written war diaries of the 6th Leicester's still survive and clearly detail the position on the ground. Having closely studied the details it's pretty clear that William Shea was awarded his MM for rushing one of two German machine gun posts which were producing infilading fire from the South East corner of Bazentin Wood.
The guns were silenced & the crews killed.

Further study of William's records also reveal that he was evacuated back to the UK the very next day, 15th July 1916 (while the battle was still going on) and as a Sergeant at the time the only reason for that immediate evacuation back to England would have been a badly disabling wound. Clearly, the wound wasn't permanently disabling as William didn't receive a silver war badge and remained on home service duties in the "Z" Reserve until 2nd February1919.

An excellent and compelling group to the much collected Leicester's. The medals are some of the best we've ever seen ....are totally unworn and grade as "Gem Mint State" with original ribbons.

FIT FOR THE FINEST COLLECTION.

SOLD

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