Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Four: Stoker 1st Class R. Hill, Royal Navy, who drowned on active service on 8 March 1915

Africa General Service 1902-56, 1 clasp, Somaliland 1902-04 (R. Hill. Sto H.M.S. Dryad) contemporary re-engraved naming; 1914-15 Star (295409, R. Hill, Sto. 1., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (259409 R. Hill. Sto. 1. R.N.) toned, nearly extremely fine (4) £120-£160

Robert Hill was born in Liverpool on 24 June 1876, and joined the Royal Navy as a Stoker 2nd Class on 30 May 1900. Promoted Stoker in H.M.S. Jupiter on 22 August 1901, he transferred to H.M.S. Dryad on 25 September 1903, too late to see service during operations on and off the coast of Somaliland (the qualifying period for H.M.S. Dryad for this clasp was 17 June to 11 September 1902). He was promoted Stoker 1st Class on 1 July 1906, and was shore demobilised on 31 May 1912. He joined the Royal Fleet Reserve on 1 June 1912, and served during the Great War in the destroyer H.M.S. Coquette from 9 August 1914. He died on 8 March 1915 when he accidentally drowned owing to his falling overboard from the Steam Launch 89 in Stangate Creek, on the River Medway, and is buried under a C.W.G.C. headstone in Gillingham (Woodlands) Cemetery, Kent.

Sold with copied record of service.