Auction Catalogue

19 & 20 March 2008

Starting at 10:00 AM

.

Orders, Decorations and Medals

Washington Mayfair Hotel  London  W1J 5HE

Lot

№ 1078

.

20 March 2008

Hammer Price:
£460

Six: Warrant Officer Class 1 T. D. Dornan, Royal Army Service Corps

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902
, 5 clasps, Relief of Kimberley, Paardeberg, Driefontein, Diamond Hill, Belfast (6385 Sejt., A.S.C.); King’s South Africa 1901-02, 2 clasps, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (6385 C. Serjt.-Maj., A.S.C.); 1914-15 Star (T1SR-513 S.S. Mjr., A.S.C.); British War and Victory Medals (T1SR-513 W.O. Cl. 1, A.S.C.); Army Meritorious Service Medal, G.V.R., 1st issue (T1SR-513 S.S. Mjr., R.A.S.C.), surname officially corrected on the second, and number on the last, the earlier awards with contact marks but otherwise very fine and better (6) £300-350

Thomas David Dornan was born in Aldershot in December 1870 and enlisted in the Commissariat & Transport Corps as a boy recruit in September 1885, aged 14 years. Advanced to Lance-Corporal Bugler in April 1889, to Corporal in April 1893 and to Sergeant in December 1897, he served in South Africa from October 1899 to September 1902, and won entitlement to the above described Medals & clasps with 13 and 32 Companies, A.S.C. So, too, further promotion, to Company Sergeant-Major in May 1900, and a war gratuity in July 1902 (Army Order 134 of 1902 refers).

Having then been discharged in September 1906, Dornan rejoined the Colours as a C.S.M. in September 1914, was quickly advanced to Staff Sergeant-Major and first entered the French theatre of war in No. 2 Company, 19th Divisional Train, in July 1915. Having then transferred to 19th Division’s 59th Field Ambulance that December, he appears to have remained on active service until the end of the War, and was awarded his M.S.M. for ‘valuable services rendered with the Armies in France and Flanders’ (London Gazette 10 October 1919 refers). Demobilised in March 1919, Dornan died in February 1952.

Sold with an original portrait photograph, in uniform, as a young recruit, and an invitation to the Victoria Dances for 1903-04, in the name of Miss Dornan; also see Lot No. 1062 for his brother’s Honours & Awards.