Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Pair: Lieutenant-General G. S. Thwaites, 48th Foot, who was wounded at Salamanca and severely wounded in the Pyrenees; he had earlier served in Egypt as a Lieutenant in the 10th Foot

Military General Service 1793-1814, 5 clasps, Egypt, Badajoz, Salamanca, Vittoria, Pyrenees (G. S. Thwaites, Capt. 48th Foot); Sultan’s Medal for Egypt 1801, 4th Class, gold, 36mm., complete with original hook and chain suspension, very fine (2) £4,000-£5,000

Provenance: Seaby, December 1949; Elson Collection, Glendining’s, September 1963.

George Saunders Thwaites was born in 1778 and entered the British Army as an Ensign in the 10th Foot on 12 September 1795; Lieutenant, 23 December 1795; Captain, 2 July 1803; Captain 48th Foot, 2 March 1805; Major 48th Foot, 4 June 1814; Major 57th Foot, half-pay, 6 February 1817; Lieutenant-Colonel, 22 July 1830; Colonel, 9 November 1846; Major-General 1854; Lieutenant-General, 13 February 1861.

He served in the expedition to the coast of Holland in 1796; in the East Indies in 1799; then was on marine duty on board H.M.S. La Forte till wrecked in the Red Sea. He was in the campaign of 1801 in Egypt, having volunteered, crossing the Desert of Suez with Colonel Lloyd’s detachment, with which he joined the Grand Vizier’s army on the advance to and surrender of Cairo. He was with the 48th regiment from 1811 to 1813, as Captain of Light Infantry, in the Peninsula; and shared the glories of the siege and storming of Badajoz in 1812, of the battle of Salamanca (where he was wounded), of the advance to and occupation of Madrid, of the battles of Vittoria and the Pyrenees (where he was wounded [26 July 1813] commanding the brigade’s light companies), and of numerous minor engagements. He received the Sultan’s gold medal of the Order of the Crescent and the silver war medal with five clasps, for Egypt, Badajoz, Salamanca, Vittoria, and the Pyrenees. He was for many years Assistant Keeper and Secretary of the National Gallery of Pictures, Trafalgar Square, and died at his house at 48 Sydney Street, in London on 30 December 1866, aged 88.