Orders, Decorations and Medals

Pair: Private J. Featherstone, Royal Marines

Naval General Service 1793-1840, 1 clasp, Syria (John Featherstone); St. Jean d’Acre 1840, bronze, unnamed, pierced with ring suspension, edge bruising, contact marks, nearly very fine (2) £700-800

John Featherstone was born in Warsop, near Mansfield, Nottinghamshire. Employed in Husbandry, he enlisted into the Royal Marines on 17 April 1830, aged 18 years, 10 months for a bounty of £3. Promoted to Bombardier in October 1843; Corporal in January 1845 and Sergeant in November 1845 but reduced to Gunner in May 1846. Served aboard H.M.S. Pique in the operations on and off the coast of Syria 1840. His service papers state ‘Although the early part of this man’s conduct in the service was bad his subsequent years service has redeemed his character’. Elsewhere in his papers it provides details of his early years, with court martials, imprisonment, hard labour and floggings. John Featherstone was discharged at his own request having completed 21 years service, on 18 June 1851. With copied service papers and roll extracts. Only one man of this name in the published N.G.S. rolls.