Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Three: Sergeant G. W. Gatesman, 1st Battalion, Dorsetshire Regiment, late Royal Army Medical Corps, a Boer War veteran who was wounded on the Western Front in September 1914

1914 Star (8023 Sjt. G. W. Gatesman. Dorset. R.); British War and Victory Medals (8023 Sjt. G. W. Gatesman. Dorset. R.) nearly very fine (3) £100-£140

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Medals to Recipients of the 1914 Star.

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George William Gatesman was born at Netley, Hampshire in 1878 and joined the Medical Staff Corps as a boy on 7 March 1893, transferring to the ranks on 7 May 1896 having reached the age of 18. He served with the newly formed Royal Army Medical Corps in South Africa from May 1898. During the Boer War he was hospitalised with enteric fever in March 1900 and was sent back to England in January 1901 but he returned to South Africa in July 1901 and remained there until February 1906. For his services during the Boer War he received the Queen’s South Africa Medal with Cape Colony clasp and the King’s South Africa Medal with both date clasps.

Having been discharged from the R.A.M.C. at the termination of his period of engagement on 12 February 1906, Gatesman attested for the Dorsetshire Regiment on 21 August 1906 and served with the 1st Battalion during the Great War on the Western Front from 16 August 1914. He suffered a gun-shot wound to his right shoulder on 10 September 1914, on which date his battalion was engaged in the Battle of the Marne, and was repatriated to England. Upon recuperation he returned to the 1st Battalion in France on 28 April 1915, remaining there until October 1920, when, having been advanced Acting Company Sergeant Major, he was discharged to pension after more than 21 years’ service.