Three: Lieutenant J. J. Carney, Chinese Labour Corps, late Durham Light Infantry and Brabant’s Horse

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 4 clasps, Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal, South Africa 1901 (20587 Tpr: J. Carney. Brabant’s Horse.); British War and Victory Medals (Lieut. J. J. Carney.) good very fine and better (3) £140-£180

John Joseph Carney served during the Boer War as a Trooper with the 2nd Brabant’s Horse. He later served on the Western Front from September 1917, firstly as a Second Lieutenant in the Durham Light Infantry and later as a Lieutenant in the Chinese Labour Corps; initially detailed to free troops for front line duties, the Chinese labourers of 1918-20 were heavily engaged in the dangerous work of clearing the battlefields of ordnance and assisting with the rebuilding of communities in France and Belgium. Their work was hampered by a language barrier and outbreaks of disease, notably cholera at the worker’s camp of Noyelles-sur-Mer; the local cemetery contains the graves of 842 men of the C.L.C., each engraved with Chinese characters and guarded by two stone lions, gifts from China.