A rare Great War M.M. group of twelve awarded to Sergeant A. Belsan, a Czech Legionnaire who served in the elite 1st Independent Striking Battalion, and was again decorated in the 1939-45 War for his gallant deeds in the Prague Uprising in the final days of the conflict

Czechoslovakia, Bravery Medal 1939; War Cross 1918; Revolutionary Medal 1918; Victory Medal 1918, official type 2; F.I.D.A.C. Medal for Veterans of the Great War; Zborov Commemorative Medal 1917-47; Brachmac Commemorative Medal 1918-48; 4th Regiment Commemorative Medal 1918-48; Medal for Fidelity 1918-38, bronze emblem on riband; Brno Volunteers Medal 1918-19; Great Britain, Military Medal, G.V.R., unnamed as issued; Russia, St. George Medal for Bravery, Nicholas II, 4th Class, the reverse numbered ‘No. 22868’, together with a small 20th anniversary commemorative badge for the Battle Of Zborov 1917-37, the last heavily polished and with replacement ring suspension, fine, the remainder generally very fine or better (13) £800-1000

Abbot and Tamplin estimate some 320 M.Ms were bestowed on Czech Legionnaires.

Augustin Belsan was born in Hresihlavy in the district of Rokycany, south-west of Prague in August 1888, and was employed as head of a workshop in a locomotive factory in Kladno prior to the outbreak of hostilities.

Recruited into the Austro-Hungarian Army in October 1914, he attended an N.C.O’s course and was posted in the rank of Corporal
to the famous 28th “Prague’s Children” Regiment, going into action on the Eastern Front in March 1915, where he was wounded in the following month and taken prisoner by the Russians at a Field Hospital near Regetow. Forced labour followed but with news of the formation of the Czech Legion in July 1916, he was appointed a Sergeant in the 1st Regiment of “Mistr Jan Hus” and participated in the Battle of Zborov, winning his Russian decoration on the same occasion.

In January 1918, Belsan was transferred to the elite 1st Independent Striking Battalion and fought against the Germans at Bachmac that March, in addition to numerous clashes with the Bolsheviks, including the actions at Kljukvenaja, Krasnojarsk, Niznyj Udinsk, Beli, Kultuk, Irkutsk, near Bajkal Lake, and on the Uralsk and Samara fronts, but most probably won his British M.M. for the critical defence of the Trans-Siberian railway, in which he was twice wounded. Indeed his elite unit, which numbered around 800 men of whom 120 were killed in action, was regularly ordered to where the fighting was heaviest, finally covering the retreat of the Czech forces to Vladivostok, where Belsan and his comrades arrived in April 1920.

He remained in the Army for another two years, latterly as part of the 6th Border Battalion (a.k.a. the “Siberian Strikers”) in Domazlice, from which he took his discharge to take up employment as an Inspector of Price Control at the Land Government Office in Dejvice, Prague. And it was here, in the final days of the last War, that he won his prestigious Czech Bravery Medal for gallantly manning the barricades in the uprising of May 1945.

Sold with two of the recipient’s original Czech Legion identity cards (”Clenska Legitimace”), one with a portrait photograph and assorted stamps, and the other with front cover number ‘No. 7529’; and around a dozen Great War period photographs, including a fine portrait in uniform wearing some of his Honours & Awards, this with his handwritten dedication to a niece or nephew on the occasion of his 50th birthday.