Orders, Decorations and Medals

A Queen’s Commendation for Brave Conduct group of five awarded to John Henry Barnes, Littlehampton Urban District Council, late Aircraftsman 1st Class, Royal Air Force and a prisoner-of-war of the Japanese

1939-45 Star; Pacific Star; Defence and War Medals; Queen’s Commendation for Brave Conduct, two silver laurel leaf sprays with pin fitting, the pair in Central Chancery, St. James’s Palace case of issue, all unnamed as issued, nearly extremely fine (6) £120-160

Queen’s Commendation London Gazette 18 July 1967. ‘Electrician, Littlehampton Urban District Council’.

John Henry Barnes was born on 7 August 1920. A Butcher by occupation and living at 26 Grove Crescent, Littlehampton, Sussex, he joined the Royal Air Force and became an Aircraftsman 1st Class. Serving in the Far East he was captured by the Japanese and made a prisoner-of-war. Postwar he was employed as an Electrician with the Littlehampton Urban District Council. In 1967 he was awarded the Queen’s Commendation for Brave Conduct for his part in the attempted rescue of a man who drowned in the sea at Eastbourne.

Sold with copied Japanese P.O.W. record; original Buckingham Palace letter to returning P.O.W’s. of the Japanese dated September 1945; Queen’s Commendation forwarding slip and Queen’s Commendation award certificate named to ‘John Henry Barnes, Electrician, Littlehampton Urban District Council’. Also with copied gazette extract giving details of the rescue attempt for which Constable William Thomas Day, Eastbourne Police, received the B.E.M., and several other, including Barnes, received the Queen’s Commendation.