Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Four: Captain H. J. Taylor, Gloucestershire Regiment

1914-15 Star (2 Lieut., Glouc. R.); British War and Victory Medals (Capt.); Defence, mounted as worn, good very fine (4) £90-110

Herbert James Taylor was born on 6.10.1887 at Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire. An electrical engineer by trade, he enlisted at Bristol on 16.9.1914 into the 12th (Bristol City) battalion Gloucestershire Regiment, having previously seen service with the Kent Cyclist’s Battalion. Taylor received his commission in the 12th battalion Gloucestershire Regiment on 13.8.1915 and was promoted Lieutenant and Adjutant on 15.4.1916 and Captain on 24.8.1917. With the battalion, he saw service in France / Flanders from November 1915 to November 1917 and in Italy from November 1917 to April 1918. On the night of 25.1.1917 Taylor was wounded in action when in command of a wiring party in ‘no-man’s land’. On returning to the British lines, he jumped into a trench and inadvertently transfixed his right forearm with a bayonet attached to a rifle that had been left resting against the parapet. A Court of Inquiry adjudged that no-one was to blame, though there was some debate as to whether it should be classed as ‘wounded accidentally’ or ‘wounded in action’. He was discharged in February 1919.

Sold with copied service papers including several concerning the ‘bayonet’ incident.