The Jack Webb Collection of Medals and Militaria

Five: Sergeant E. E. Austen, 20th Middlesex (Artists) Rifle Volunteers and City of London Imperial Volunteers, later Major, 28th (County of London) Battalion (Artists Rifles), London Regiment, attached Royal Army Medical Corps, an authority on insect-borne tropical diseases who was twice Mentioned in Despatches and awarded the D.S.O. for his services in the Egyptian theatre during the Great War

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 4 clasps, Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Johannesburg, Diamond Hill (9 Sgt. E. E. Austen, C.I.V.); 1914 Star, with clasp (Capt: E. E. Austen. 28/Lond: R.); British War and Victory Medals, with M.I.D. oak leaves (Major E. E. Austen.); Volunteer Force Long Service Medal, E.VII.R. (Lieut. E. E. Austen. 20/ Middx V.R.C.); together with associated miniature awards including a D.S.O., very fine (5) £500-£700

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Jack Webb Collection of Medals and Militaria.

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D.S.O. London Gazette 1 January 1919:
‘For distinguished service in connection with Military Operations in Egypt’

Ernest Edward Austen was born in Dalston, Middlesex on 19 October 1867, and was educated at Rugby School and the University of Heidelberg. He entered the service of the British Museum in 1889, becoming a zoologist in the Department of Entomology and a few years later was in the Amazon region acting as naturalist for many months in the cable ship Faraday. In 1899 he was a member of the first expedition to West Africa by the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, and would go on to become an authority on the tetse fly and tropical ailments originating from insect-borne diseases.

Meanwhile, having earlier joined the Artists Rifles on 10 January 1890, Austen served with their City Imperial Volunteers detachment in South Africa as a Lance Sergeant in “F” Company of the Infantry Battalion. The 1891 census records him to be a resident of Willesden thus confirming beyond doubt that he is the same man as the E. E. Austin [sic] on the list of recipients of the Willesden Boer War Tribute Medal.

During the Great War Austen commanded a Company of the Artists Rifles on the Western Front from 29 October 1914, before being attached to the Royal Army Medical Corps, with whom he was Mentioned in Despatches (London Gazette 1 January 1916). Transferring to the Near East to fight the medical campaign against the malaria-bearing mosquito with the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, he was advanced Major, was once more Mentioned in Despatches ‘for services during the period from 16 March 1918 to 18 September 1918’ (London Gazette 22 January 1919), and was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.

In later life Major Austin continued to work at the British Museum in the Natural History Department of Entomology, in charge of the collection of diptera. He died in North London in 1938.

Sold with a telegram instructing the recipient to attend a D.S.O. investiture at Buckingham Palace, 28 June 1919, and an admittance card for the investiture.