Orders, Decorations and Medals

Four: Serjeant G. Robins, Royal Field Artillery - with ‘Q’ Battery at Sannah’s Post

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 3 clasps, Relief of Kimberley, Paardeberg, Driefontein (31182 Gnr., Q. B. R.F.A.(sic)); 1914 Star (31182 Gnr., R.H.A.); British War and Victory Medals (31182 Sjt., R.A.) mounted court style for wear, good very fine and better (4) £500-600

Resulting from De Wet’s ambush of General Broadwood’s Brigade at Korn Spruit (Sannah’s Post), on 31 March 1900, “Q” Battery Royal Horse Artillery behaved with great gallantry and managed to save four of its guns from an apparently hopeless situation. The conduct of the battery was praised by Brigadier-General Broadwood in his report on the action. As a result of this report, Lord Roberts took the unusual step of ordering the battery to ballot for the Victoria Cross, to choose one officer, one non commissioned officer, one gunner and one driver to receive the coveted award, there being no other fair way to choose four from so many who performed so heroically on that day. As a result, Major Edmund John Phipps-Hornby, Sergeant Charles Edward Haydon Parker, Gunner Isaac Lodge, and Driver Horace Henry Glasock were each awarded the Victoria Cross. Gunner G. Robin’s name would have been in the ballot for the Victoria Cross to the ‘Gunner’. Robins was invalided in July 1900. With copied details of the action. Note: Robin’s Q.S.A. was incorrectly named to the ‘R.F.A.’ instead of the ‘R.H.A.’