Orders, Decorations and Medals

A good Great War M.M. group of six awarded to Private W. Casey, Gloucestershire Regiment, late Coldstream Guards: wounded in the head in May 1915, and recommended for the D.C.M. for his gallantry at the battle of Loos, his M.M. was probably an early award for the battle of the Somme

Military Medal, G.V.R. (2753 Pte. W. Casey, 1/Glouc. R.); Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 6 clasps, Belmont, Modder River, Driefontein, Johannesburg, Diamond Hill, Belfast (8100 Pte. W. Casey, Cldstm. Gds.); King’s South Africa 1901-02, 2 clasps, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (8100 Pte. W. Casey, Coldstream Guards); 1914-15 Star (2753 Pte. W. Casey, Glouc. R.); British War and Victory Medals, M.I.D. oak leaf (2753 Pte. W. Casey, Glouc. R.), the Boer War pair with contact marks and occasional edge bruise, otherwise generally very fine or better (6) £600-800

M.M. London Gazette 14 September 1916.

William Casey was born in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, and enlisted in the Coldstream Guards in June 1890, aged 18 years. Having then been discharged to the Army Reserve in May 1897, he was recalled on the outbreak of the Boer War and saw action with the 2nd Battalion (Queen’s Medal & 6 clasps; King’s Medal & 2 clasps). He was discharged on his return to the U.K. in the summer of 1902.

Rejoining the Colours after the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, Reynolds was wounded in the head at Barleux in May 1915 while serving in the 1st Battalion, Gloucestershire Regiment - ‘the wounded man, Private Casey, had been a guardsman years earlier. Now he must have been nearly fifty years old, yet he was full of life and dash’ (Regimental records, refer).

Back in action with the Battalion at the Battle of Loos, he was recommended for the D.C.M. for his gallantry on 26 September 1915, when he ‘volunteered to go out with Lieutenant Hewitt and Corporal Holder to look for Major Stevenson’ after a gas attack (Regimental records, refer): in the event an unsuccessful recommendation.

However, he was mentioned in despatches in the following year (London Gazette 15 June 1916, refers), and was awarded the M.M., the latter distinction possibly in respect of the Battalion’s attack at Contalmaison on the Somme on 16 July 1916; sold with copied research, including attestation papers and portrait photograph taken from the Cheltenham Chronicle and Gloucestershire Graphic, 1 May 1915.