A SUPERB “TWO BROTHER OFFICERS” QSA, NATAL 1906 & WW1 ASSEMBLY. NATAL POLICE, 1st KINGS AFRICAN RIFLES: Lieut 1/7th & 1/8th MIDDLESEX Regt (Severely Wounded 1st Day of The Somme, 1st Jul 1916) Captain HEREFORD Regt. CBE (Civil) 1914-15 Trio, (Severely Wounded Dardanelles, P.O.W. Turkey)


[Brother One]
2602 TPr G.A. CHALLIS. NATAL POLICE,
1st KINGS AFRICAN RIFLES & 1/7th, 1/8th MIDDLESEX Regt.

Queens South Africa Medal,
2602 TPr G.A. CHALLIS. NATAL POLICE,
Transvaal, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902.

Natal Rebellion Medal (Clasp 1906)
TPR: G.A. CHALLIS, NATAL POLICE.

WW1 War Medal & Victory Pair: Pair Absent.

*The pair isn’t recorded on his M.I.C. and there are actually no issue references on the 1st K.A.R. roll (Zomba, of 3.12.1921) so it’s very likely that a pair were never issued...(A blank pair will be included).

[BIOGRAPHY] GEORGE ANDERSON CHALLIS.

George was the elder son of Mr G. Challis who was the chairman of the Brentford Board of Guardians. He served initially as a Trooper with the NATAL POLICE & 1st Kings African Rifles, during the Boer War & The Natal (ZULU) Rebellion. For this service he gained the Queen’s South Africa Medal & The Natal Rebellion Medal with 1906 Clasp. Prior to WW1 he had been a general merchant in Rhodesia.

[WOUNDED, 1st DAY of THE SOMME]. (1st July 1916) During the Great War George joined 1/7th Middlesex Regt and took part with 1/8th Middlesex Regt in the diversionary attack at Gommecourt, Somme, on 1st July 1916, where while attending to surrendering enemy soldiers he was seriously wounded in both legs and between the shoulders by a German explosive shell. He was very lucky to survive as the two men positioned each side of him were killed outright. He was evacuated to an officers’ hospital in London.

He also served at The Battle of Ginchy, The Battle of Flers-Courcelette, The Battle of Morval in which the Division captured Combles and The Battle of the Transloy Ridges. In 1917 they were in action during The German retreat to the Hindenburg Line and the Battles of Arras in April, then The Battle of Langemarck in August, then the Cambrai Operations in November. In 1918 They were in action on The Somme, in the Second Battles of Arras, the Battles of the Hindenburg Line and the Final Advance in Picardy. At the Armistice the infantry were in a rest period, whilst the artillery were in action. The Division received orders to join the British force to occupy the Rhine bridgeheads, but these orders were cancelled on the 21st of November, when they were in the area of Harveng undertaking road and railway repairs. Demobilisation was completed on the 18th of May 1919.

George died on 11th December 1956 in hospital at Virginia Water, Surrey.

[Brother Two]
LIEUT, CAPTAIN, F.G. CHALLIS. HEREFORD Regt.

[BIOGRAPHY]FRANK GORDON CHALLIS.
Born 23rd November 1887, Frank was educated at Rothschild’s School, Brentford and prior to WW1 he joined the service of a well known West London firm of surveyors and valuers and later became associated with the Land Valuation Department of the Finance Board. He was a resident in Ealing and Hanwell. He joined the Army at age 28 in August 1914 with a posting to the 1st Hereford Regt with which unit on 19th September 1913 he entered the Dardanelles (MIC, Theatre 3, Egypt 19th September 1915) He was seriously wounded in the Dardanelles campaign and spent 9 weeks in hospital in Malta.

Upon his recovery, he was transferred back to his unit in Egypt where he was appointed acting Adjutant. He was initially listed as wounded and missing after the Battle of Gaza and was eventually confirmed as being captured and made a Prisoner of War of the Turks.

After WW1 and being F.R.I.C.S. he returned to his vocation of Assistant Chief District Valuation Officer for which service he was awarded the CBE (Civil) on 1st January 1952.

[PRISONERS OF THE TURKS] The shocking & brutal treatment of our troops by the Turks is legendary in the annals of war. After capture, our men were forced marched across the desert without food and water and those who didn't die on the march were imprisoned in prison camps in subhuman conditions. Both officers & men who could work were forced to labour under atrocious circumstances, but prisoners who were not fit to work were not given food at all with the predicable outcome of death in a very short time.

Frank Challis was clearly a tough man as he both survived the desert marching and then a period of forced labour, probably on the Cilician Gates railway project.

The Turks sent sick British and Russian prisoners to a hospital in Bor for treatment and recovery. Bor was located in the Vilayet of Konia, near Nigdeh, twenty-five miles southeast of Akseral and sixty-one miles north of Adana, north of the Cilcilian Taurus Mountains. The hospital served prisoners assigned to the labor detachments working on the railway line through the Cilician Gates.

Out of a total of 2,962 British soldiers captured by the Turks at Gaza, 1,782 died as prisoners of war, mainly of starvation.

LEST WE FORGET THE TRUE COST OF OUR FREEDOM.

A RARE & UNUSUAL GROUP FIT FOR THE FINEST COLLECTION.

£1395 with part exchanges welcome.