Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Pair: Surgeon Lieutenant-Colonel J. A. Shaw, Army Medical Department

Egypt and Sudan 1882-89, dated reverse, 2 clasps, Tel-El-Kebir, Suakin 1885 (Surgn. Maj., A.M. Dept.); Khedive’s Star, 1882, unnamed; together with a mounted pair of miniature dress medals, minor contact marks, good very fine and better (4) £600-700

John Alexander Shaw was born on 2 March 1842. Gained the degree of M.D., Royal University of Ireland, 1863; appointed a F.R.C.S.I. in 1868. Entered the Army as Assistant Staff Surgeon on 30 September 1863; with the 4th Foot in October 1864 and with the Staff in June 1867. Surgeon with the Army Medical Department, September 1863; and Surgeon Major, April 1876. As such he served in the Egypt War 1882, being present at the battle of Tel-el-Kebir - his horse being wounded and a knife suspended round his neck being shot away. During the night march from Kassassin, Shaw was responsible for keeping a rather intoxicated soldier quiet, his noisy outbursts in danger of alerting the enemy. For this and his assiduous care of the sick and wounded of the 2nd H.L.I., he received a letter of commendation from the Commander-in-Chief, H.R.H. Field Marshal The Duke of Cambridge, 14 December 1882. Surgeon Major Shaw later served in the Suakin 1885 expedition and was placed in command of No. 1 Field Hospital. Placed on Retired Pay with the honorary rank of Brigadier Surgeon, August 1885. Designation of his substantive departmental rank altered to Surgeon Lieutenant-Colonel, September 1883 and to Lieutenant-Colonel. August 1898. Employed when on Retired List at Penally. He died at Bournemouth on 1 May 1914.

With an original hand-written War Office report on Surgeon Major Shaw in the Egypt Campaign 1882, written by the Officer Commanding the 2nd H.L.I. and his Adjutant:

‘I beg to enclose for the information of the Director General A.M.D. an extract relative to Surgeon Major J. A. Shaw from a report on the Battle of Tel-El-Kebir furnished by the Officer Commanding 2nd H.L.I. On that day Surgeon Major Shaw’s horse was wounded, & a knife suspended round his neck was shot away.’

‘During the night march from Kassassin a soldier of the Battalion under the influence of liquor commenced to talk & shout: Surgeon Major Shaw rode up & with much presence of mind he instantly administered a large dose of chloroform, thus silencing the man who was in imminent danger of being suffocated by his comrades.’

‘Whether or not it be owing to the care & to the sanitary suggestions of Surgeon Major Shaw, we are at present about the most healthy battalion in Egypt.’

‘His attention to the wounded under the hottest fire beyond all praise.’

With original newspaper cutting in which Mr Walter A. Lomer (Shaw’s father-in-law) refutes an earlier erroneous report that Surgeon Major Shaw had been killed at Kassassin. Another original cutting reported on Shaw’s appointment to command No. 1 Field Hospital in Suakin and the commendation he had received from the Commander-in-Chief - H.R.H. Field Marshal The Duke of Cambridge. With a quantity of copied research on the recipient and his family. Medals and miniatures contained in a fitted shield shaped glazed leather framed case (crack to glass).