Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Pair: Lieutenant P. N. Garnett, Royal Berkshire Regiment, who died of wounds in Nyasaland, 11 September 1914

1914-15 Star (Lieut., R. Berks. R.); Victory Medal 1914-19 (Lieut.) nearly extremely fine (2) £100-140

Philip Nigel Garnett was born in King’s Lynn on 4 November 1886, the son of Herbert Garnett Esq., of Bournemouth. He was educated at Stubbington, Cheltenham College and the R.M.C. Sandhurst. Commissioned into the Royal Berkshire Regiment on 4 May 1907 and promoted to Lieutenant in September 1911, he was seconded to the King’s African Rifles in October 1913. Serving in Nyasaland, he died of wounds on 11 September 1914 and was buried in Karonga No. 2 Cemetery, Malawi.

An account of the action which led to his death is recorded in A Place in the Sun, ‘A German column had marched on Karonga, a small British township at the northern end of Lake Nyasa. The compound, about 100 yards square, was protected by a five-foot, loopholed wall. The town was successfully defended for three hours by only one officer, seventy African troops and police and eight civilians. A relief column arrived just in time, and after repeated bayonet charges the Germans retreated towards the border. The British force, said the Governor of Nyasaland, “was too exhausted to pursue”’.

With copied service papers, m.i.c. and other research.