A Great War M.M. awarded to Able Seaman P. Jackson, R.N.V.R., Drake Battalion, Royal Naval Division, later commissioned into the Machine Gun Corps

Military Medal, G.V.R. (L8-3278 A.S. P. Jackson, Drake Bn: R.N.V.R.) together with Drake Battalion pin badge, very fine £600-800

M.M. London Gazette 17 April 1917: ‘Able Seaman P. Jackson, R.N.V.R., attd. M.G. Coy.’

Paul Jackson was born on 23 July 1896. He volunteered to join the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve on 4 August 1914, and was enrolled in the London Division of the R.N.V.R., his enrollment papers intriguingly noting ‘bullet scar in left forearm’. Jackson joined the Drake Battalion R.N.D. and served ashore in Gallipoli, where he contracted dysentry in September 1915 and was sent to convalescent camp at Mudros before being invalided home to England in November 1915, aboard H.M.H.S. Mauretania.

In July 1916 Jackson proceeded to France, where he was posted to the 189th Brigade. He was again in hospital in August and it was not until October that he joined the 63rd (R.N.) Division at Etaples. He was soon afterwards posted to the Machine Gun Base Depot at Camiers, and in mid November was attached to the 189th Brigade Machine Gun Company. On 23 February 1917, he was severely wounded by shrapnel in the right arm and shoulder, and was in the 1st Field Ambulance when the award of the M.M. was announced in Divisional Orders on 11 March. This was probably awarded for his bravery at Beaucourt in the battle of Ancre, and in the attacks of the 3rd and 4th February on the Beaucourt Front. After six weeks in 12 General Hospital, Rouen, he returned to England in the Hospital Ship Grantully Castle. In November 1917 he was appointed as a cadet to the 11th Officer Cadet Battalion, and in April 1918 posted as Temporary 2nd Lieutenant to the Machine Gun Corps. Sold with full research.