The British War Medal awarded to Private S. E. Pilbrow, Middlesex Regiment and Manchester Regiment, attached 20 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps, who was awarded the Military Medal for shooting down four enemy aircraft - three in one day - and was killed in aerial combat by the German Ace Werner Voss on 15 August 1917

British War Medal 1914-20 (2381 Pte. S. E. Pilbrow. Midd’x R.) nearly extremely fine £300-£400

M.M. London Gazette 28 September 1917.

Stanley Edward Pilbrow was born in Battersea, London, and attested for the Middlesex Regiment. Transferring to the Manchester Regiment, he served with the 22nd Battalion during the Great War, before being attached to 20 Squadron, Royal Flying Corps. He was killed in action in aerial combat on 15 August 1917- ‘September Evening: The Life and Final Combat of the German World War One Ace Werner Voss’ takes up the story:
‘On the afternoon of 15 August a patrol of FE2bs from 20 Squadon was circling over Ypres when they ran into elements of Jasta 10. In the dogfight that followed Voss latched onto the FE of Second Lieutenant Charles Cameron, a 21-year-old Canadian volunteer from Ottawa. He first disabled the engine with a telling burst of fire from his twin Spandau machine guns, and on his second pass killed Private Stanley Pilbrow, Cameron’s observer/gunner. Pilbrow had been in the R.F.C. for less than a month but was already credited with shooting down four enemy machines- three of these in one day. For this action he had been awarded the Military Medal, but after encountering Voss he never lived to receive it.’

Pilbrow is buried in The Huts Cemetery, Ypres, Belgium.

Sold with a copy of the book ‘Winged Sabres’, by R. A. Sellwood, which mentions the recipient; and copied research.