Orders, Decorations and Medals

A good Great War minelaying operations D.S.M. group of seven awarded to Chief Yeoman of the Signals W. C. Chapman, Royal Navy - ‘on one occasion he went aloft to strike the top-mast, quite regardless of the fact that shells were passing between the mast and the funnel’

Distinguished Service Medal, G.V.R (213631 W. Chapman, Yeo. Sigs., H.M.S. Princess Margaret, 1915-16); 1914-15 Star (213631 Y.S., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (213631 Y.S., R.N.); Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., 1st issue (213631 Yeo. Sigs., H.M.S. Amphitrite); French Croix de Guerre 1914-1918, with palm; Danish Slesvig Medal 1920, contact marks and somewhat polished, thus generally good fine or better (7) £800-1000

D.S.M. London Gazette 25 October 1916. The original recommendation states:

‘He has displayed great coolness whilst under fire. On one occasion he went aloft to strike the top-mast, quite regardless of the fact shells were passing between the mast and the funnel.’

French Croix de Guerre London Gazette 17 May 1918. The following citation was taken from the Ordre de L’Armee dated 20 December 1917:

‘For 20 dangerous minelaying operations in enemy waters in the period July 1915 to December 1917.’

Wilfred Cubitt Chapman was born at Hickling, Norfolk in November 1885 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class in February 1901. Gaining advancement to Leading Signalman in August 1908, he was serving in the same rate in Attentive II on the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914 but was appointed Yeoman of the Signals in March 1915, shortly before joining the ship’s company of the minelayer H.M.S. Princess Margaret. Subsequently awarded the D.S.M and a “mention” (A.W.O. 2843 of 3 August 1917 refers), he served in the same capacity until coming ashore in January 1918, a period that witnessed the Princess Margaret coming under enemy fire on at least two occasions - namely a run-in with an enemy destroyer flotilla in the Heligoland Bight on the night of 17-18 August 1915 and an incident of a similar nature in April 1916.

Chapman next went to sea with an appointment in the cruiser Amphitrite, in which ship he served until April 1919, and was awarded his L.S. & G.C. Medal in November 1918. Then in June 1919, he joined the cruiser Carysfort, an appointment that lasted until January 1921, and one which encompassed his ship’s service as a component of the 5th Light Cruiser Squadron in the Baltic at the time of British and French support for the Slesvig plebiscite. Having then been advanced to Chief Yeoman of the Signals, he was finally pensioned ashore in November 1924.

Sold with the recipient’s original Croix de Guerre bestowal document.