Orders, Decorations and Medals

Four: Captain E. W. Daniel, Essex Regiment, late Royal Fusiliers, who was severely wounded in August 1918

1914-15 Star (6069 Pte., R. Fus.); British War and Victory Medals (Lieut.); Coronation 1937, privately engraved, ‘Capt. E. W. Daniel’, mounted as worn, generally very fine (4) £180-220

Edward Welley Daniel, who was born in West Ham, London in April 1895 and educated at St. Paul’s College, Cheltenham, enlisted in the Royal Fusiliers in December 1914. Posted to the 19th Battalion, he served out in France, onetime being attached as a “batman” to 2nd Lieutenant de la Rue, 98 Light Trench Mortar Battery (his service record refers), but in late 1916 he was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in the 3rd Battalion, Essex Regiment. Sometime thereafter joining the 10th Battalion out in France, he was severely wounded at Morlaucourt on 8 August 1918, when shot in the face, the bullet entering his lower left jaw at an angle and exiting at the outer side of his nose (Medical Board report refers). He was duly evacuated from Le Havre, saw no further active service and was demobbed in March 1920.

Daniel was awarded his Coronation 1937 Medal while employed as the Assistant Director of Education in Trinidad - the official roll refers - so his privately engraved rank of Captain might well suggest additional service in the Local Defence Force.