Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Four: Paymaster Captain W. H. Eves, Royal Navy, one of only 21 members of the Senior Service to be awarded the Union of South Africa Medal

1914-15 Star (Ft. Payr. W. H. Eves, R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (Payr. Commr. W. H. Eves, R.N.); Union of South Africa Medal 1910, unnamed as issued, mounted court-style as worn, good very fine and rare (4) £400-500

William Heath Eves was born in March 1877 and entered the Royal Navy as an Assistant Clerk in January 1895. Advanced to Paymaster in May 1906 and to Staff Paymaster in May 1910, he served as an Interpreter (in French) aboard the Balmoral Castle during her royal visit to South Africa in the latter year, thereby qualifying for his rare Union of South Africa Medal.

A Fleet Paymaster in the cruiser H.M.S. Birmingham by the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, Eves was subsequently present in the actions at Heligoland Bight and Dogger Bank prior to removing, in February 1916, to the battleship Royal Oak, in which ship he was appointed an Interpreter in French & German in May 1916, when he was also present at Jutland. His final wartime appointment was in the Naval Intelligence Department from September 1917.

Eves appears to have been placed on the Retired List as a Paymaster Captain in May 1927.