Orders, Decorations and Medals

Four: Doctor George Mackay, M.D., Royal Navy, Inspector-General of Hospitals and Fleets and Honorary Surgeon to Queen Victoria

China 1842 (Asst. Surgeon, H.M.S. Samarang) fitted with contemporary swivel-bar suspension; Crimea 1854-55, 1 clasp, Sebastopol (Surgeon, H.M.S. Agamemnon) depot impressed naming; Order of the Medjidie, 5th class breast badge, silver, gold and enamel; Turkish Crimea 1855, Sardinian issue (Surgeon, H.M.S. Agamemnon) fitted with ring suspension, light contact marks, otherwise very fine and better (4) £450-550

George Mackay entered the service in October 1835, and served as Assistant Surgeon of the Samarang throughout the First China War, including the bombardment and capture of the forts of Bocca Tigris. He was strongly recommended by Captain Broughton and the Surgeon of the Samarang for the ability and perseverance he exhibited to the wounded Chinese in the action of the Bocca Tigris. As Surgeon of the Bellerophon he was present at the bombardment of Odessa and the landing of the troops at Varna. He transferred in August 1854 to Agamemnon, the flagship of Rear-Admiral Sir Edmund Lyons, G.C.B., and was the senior surgeon at the landing of the armies at Old Fort and the battle of the Alma. He was also employed as Inspector of Transports in the Crimean War, and was present at the bombardment of Sebastopol on 17 October 1854, the capture of Kertch and Yenikale, and the blockade and fall of Sebastopol. He was in charge of the hospital ship Melville at Hong Kong from 1860 to 1865, and was Deputy-Inspector at Haslar Hospital from 1865 to 1870, in which year he was appointed Honorary Surgeon to the Queen. He died at his home in Wellington, Somerset, from pneumonia on 26 April 1879. In addition to his medals for China and the Crimea, he was awarded Gilbert Blane’s Gold Medal when surgeon of Powerful in 1851.