Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A good Second World War North-West Europe operations M.C. group of five awarded to Captain J. Clark, Royal Army Medical Corps, attached The Inns of Court Regiment

Military Cross, G.VI.R. reverse officially dated ‘1945’; 1939-45 Star; France and Germany Star; Defence and War Medals, M.I.D. oakleaf, together with Kirkcaldy High School prize medal for mathematics, silver, the reverse inscribed, ‘John Clark, 1930’, extremely fine (6) £1600-1800

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Awards for the 1939-45 War.

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M.C. London Gazette 12 July 1945. The original recommendation for an immediate award states:

‘On 15 April 1945, at 1600 hours, Captain John Clark was ordered to go out and collect casualties that occurred to a troop of armoured cars south of Offen. One man had been killed and two seriously wounded and attention was immediately required. When 2000 yards short of his destination, Captain Clark was stopped by tanks and told that he could not reach the troop because of the enemy infantry in the wounds astride the road and because of an 88mm. firing from north to south down the road. Captain Clark continued and despite continuous rifle and anti-tank fire, reached the troop, attended to the casualties which by now also included four infantrymen, and evacuated all of them in safety. Captain Clark showed considerable coolness and outstanding courage and determination, and by his action saved the lives of badly wounded men.’

John Clark was educated at Kirkcaldy High School and Glasgow University, where he qualified in medicine, and was in practice in Cambridge before being commissioned in the Royal Army Medical Corps on the outbreak of hostilities. Subsequently attached to the Inns of Court Regiment, he landed in Normandy in 1944 and shared in the regiment’s honours up until V.E. Day in May 1945, winning a “mention” in addition to his M.C. (London Gazette 10 May 1945 refers). Clark died in Norfolk in November 1985.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including War Office and Buckingham Palace forwarding letters for the M.C., the latter in its original card box, and Army Council campaign medal forwarding slip; M.I.D. certificate, dated 10 May 1945; two or three wartime photographs, including one of the recipient receiving his M.C. riband from Montgomery, signed by the Field Marshal; Release Certificate, dated 1 May 1946, and War Officer appreciation of services letter, dated 1 May 1946; and a letter to the recipient from Lieutenant-Colonel J. C. A. D. Lawson, D.S.O., M.C., C.O. of the Inns of Court Regiment, in which he forwards him a pair of regimental gold cufflinks from all ranks in appreciation ‘for all your valiant and unselfish service’.