Auction Catalogue

25 & 26 June 2008

Starting at 10:00 AM

.

Orders, Decorations and Medals

Washington Mayfair Hotel  London  W1J 5HE

Lot

№ 1200

.

26 June 2008

Hammer Price:
£1,200

A Great War M.C. group of nine awarded to Lieutenant-Colonel A. C. W. U. Stanley, Royal Tank Regiment, late Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers and Machine Gun Corps

Military Cross
, G.V.R., the reverse privately engraved, ‘Capt. A. C. W. U. Stanley, The Ry. Inniskilling Fus.’; 1914-15 Star (Lieut., M.G.C.); British War and Victory Medals (Capt.); 1939-45 Star; Africa Star; Defence and War Medals 1939-45; Coronation 1937, contact marks and a little polished, otherwise generally very fine (5) £700-900

M.C. London Gazette 3 June 1918.

Arland Christopher William Ussher Stanley was born in December 1892 and was educated at Cheltenham and Clifton Colleges. Commissioned in September 1914, he was appointed to the 18th (Service) Battalion, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, transferred to the 3rd (Reserve) Battlalion in February 1915 and joined the 2nd Battalion out in France at the end of the year. Shortly afterwards, however, in December 1915, he was seconded to the 15th Battalion, Machine Gun Corps, in which capacity he served until being advanced to Temporary Captain and appointed Adjutant of the 5th Battalion, M.G.C. in April 1918, of which latter unit he became Second-in-Command that October. He was awarded the M.C.

Returning to the U.K. in early 1919, Stanley was next embarked for India, where he served at the Machine Gun Training Centre at Mhow before returning to the strength of the 1st Battalion, Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in June 1921. Embarked with his Battalion for Iraq in early 1924, he transferred to the Royal Tank Corps on his arrival and was posted to the 10th Armoured Car Company - a short-lived posting for a few weeks later he returned to India. Next transferred to the Home Establishment, where he was posted to the 5th Battalion, Royal Tank Corps in April 1926, Stanley served in a similar capacity until being placed on the Retired List in June 1938 - other than a brief interlude back in India in August-November 1935.

Having then settled in Southern Rhodesia, he was recalled on the renewal of hostilities and attached to East Africa H.Q., onetime serving as Second-in-Command of the East African Armoured Car Regiment and as C.O. of a succession of Armoured Corps depots in the Middle East. Disembarked back in the U.K. in January 1945, he was granted the honorary rank of Lieutenant-Colonel (
London Gazette 30 November 1945 refers), and died in Southern Rhodesia in March 1974; sold with a file of related research, but verification is required for his Coronation 1937 Medal.