Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The unique campaign combination group of five awarded to Corporal C. Burch, Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, attached Telegraph Department, who later served as a Sergeant with the British Red Cross Society during the Balkan-Turkish War 1912-13

India General Service 1854-95, 1 clasp, Waziristan 1894-5 (3485 Pte. C. Burch. 2nd. Bn. Arg: & Suth’d Highrs.); India General Service 1895-1902, 2 clasps, Relief of Chitral 1895, Punjab Frontier 1897-98 (3485 Pte. C. Burch 2d. Argyll & Suther: High Tel: Dept.) second clasp neatly attached by means of two side plates, unit partially officially corrected; Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 4 clasps, Modder River, Paardeberg, Driefontein, Transvaal (3485 Pte. C. Burch, A. & S. Highrs:) initial officially corrected; King’s South Africa 1901-02, 2 clasps, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (3485 Corpl: C. Burch. A. & S. Highrs:); British Red Cross Society Medal for the Balkans War 1912-13, silver and enamel, hallmarks for Birmingham 1912, 1 clasp, Servia (Charles Burch.) with top riband bar, edge bruise to Q.S.A., light contact marks overall, therefore nearly very fine or better (5) £800-£1,200

Provenance: Taylor Collection, Christie’s, November 1990 and Mitchell Collection, Spink, November 2015.

Charles Burch was born in Reigate, Surrey, in 1870, and attested for the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. He served on attachment as a Military Signaller with the Telegraph Department during the operations in Waziristan 1894-95, and also during the Relief of Chitral in 1895 and operations on the Punjab Frontier.

Burch served with the 1st Battalion during the Second Boer War, and in a letter home from the front wrote about his experiences with the Highland Brigade:

‘Paardeberg Drift, 20 February 1900.

Last Sunday we met the enemy two miles from camp, and fought from daylight till pitch dark. The Highland Brigade was again in the thick of it, and suffered terribly. I escaped by a miracle. A bullet passed through the top of my helmet two inches above my scalp; another went through my ammunition pouch at my side, bending up six cartridges like cork screws and exploding one. The third and last one went through my khaki jacket on the left breast, and passed along to the right side between shirt and jacket and out through my right breast pocket. Everyone says I was the luckiest man in the field that day.

The way the Highlanders went into action under a galling fire and advanced as if on parade was superb, and a sight never to be forgotten. The enemy had us just in the same position as at Modder, they holding entrenched positions along the banks, and we right in the open veldt, and all day long under a burning sun. I am sorry to see my old regiment dwindling away, and the good men gradually getting fewer and fewer, but we must hope for the best. Lots of my old Indian chums are killed and wounded, and I shall miss their familiar faces and chaff knocking about the camp.’ (letter published in The Surrey Mirror, March 1900 refers)

Burch left the Army, and volunteered his services to the British Red Cross Society with the outbreak of the Balkan War 1912-13. He served as a Sergeant with No. 1 Red Cross Unit in Serbia, the unit had been raised in Wales and financed by the Welsh Red Cross Committee. Burch was 1 of 15 men under the command of Captain H. St. M. Carter, R.A.M.C. The unit left London, 12 November 1912, to set up a hospital in Uksub near Belgrade. Burch was in charge of the Orderlies, and the hospital was opened to care for 112 patients.

Sold with copied research, including a photographic image of the recipient as part of the No. 1 Red Cross Unit prior to leaving for Serbia.