Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Five: Leading Seaman K. B. Jones, Royal Navy, killed in H.M.S. Vernon during an air raid on Portsmouth, 11 March 1941

Naval General Service 1915-62, 1 clasp, Palestine 1936-1939 (JX.139082 K. B. Jones. O. Smn. R.N.), with named Admiralty letter, in envelope of issue, addressed to ‘Mrs. K. Jones, 19 Mill Road, Twickenham, Middlesex’; 1939-45 Star; Africa Star; Defence and War Medals 1939-45, with named Admiralty enclosure, in card box of issue, addressed to ‘Mrs. K. Jones, 19 Mill Road, Twickenham, Middx.’; together with a Royal Navy and Royal Marines Swimming Medal, bronze, the reverse engraved ‘Standard 220 yds. Ord. Sea. K. B. Jones 2M. 53 2/5Secs.’, in case of issue; H.M.S. Ganges Swimming Medal, bronze, unnamed, in case of issue; and a Swimming Trophy 1932 Medal, bronze, the reverse engraved ‘K. B. Jones’, extremely fine (8) £180-220

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Medals to Second World War Casualties.

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Kenneth Bernard Jones served during the Second World War in the shore establishment H.M.S. Vernon, in Portsmouth, which became responsible for mine disposal and mine countermeasures. One of their earliest successes of the establishment was the rendering safe and the recovery of the first German magnetic mine at Shoeburyness on 23 November 1939. For this deed, various Officers and ratings were decorated with gallantry awards by H.M. King George VI at a ceremony on H.M.S. Vernon’s parade ground on 19 December 1939- the first Royal Naval decorations of the Second World War.
Jones was killed during an air raid on Portsmouth on the night of 11 March 1941, aged 23, when a bomb demolished Dido Building in H.M.S Vernon and killed 100 people. He is buried in Haslar Royal Naval Cemetery, Hampshire.