Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The Indian Mutiny Medal awarded to Sir Raymond West, K.C.I.E., the noted Indian civil servant, judge and jurist, who was later acquainted with Florence Nightingale and M. K. Ghandi

Indian Mutiny 1857-59, no clasp (Raymond West. C.S.) naming officially re-impressed in a slightly later style, toned, nearly extremely fine £300-£400

Medal authorised on 31 May 1872: ‘I am entitled to the Indian Mutiny medal as having served with Colonel McLean’s force in the Belgaum district, and on the Madras and Goanese frontiers in the year 1858.’ (L/MIL/5/93 Folio 43 refers)

Raymond West was born at Ballyloughrane, county Kerry, on 18 September 1832. He was educated at Queen’s College, Galway, and appointed to the Bombay Civil Service after the Open Competition of 1835, one of the second batch of so-called ‘competition-wallahs’. He arrived in India on 18 September 1856, and served in the Bombay Revenue and Judicial Departments as an Assistant Collector, Magistrate, Assistant Judge and Sessions Judge.

Officiating Under-Secretary to the Government in the Judicial and Political Departments and Acting Judge and Sessions Judge, Registrar of the High Court, Bombay, June 1863. Served on the Judicial Committee and Judge of the Sadar Court in Sind, June 1872. Judge of the High Court, Bombay, September 1873. On special duty as a member of the Law Committee, Calcutta, April to November 1879.

Vice Chancellor of the University of Bombay, 12 November 1887. K.C.I.E., June 1888. Retired April 1892. Sir Raymond West died on 8 November 1911.

Sold with research including copies of letters from Florence Nightingale to Sir Raymond in support of his work on the Bombay Village Sanitation Bill, taken from Florence Nightingale on Social Change in India, collected works published by Wilfred Laurier University Press. Of interest in particular is a letter she wrote in January 1892 which closes, ‘It seems late to wish you a happy & successful New Year and many of them; nevertheless I do with all my heart.’ So, too, details of correspondence with M. K. Ghandi, thanking Sir Raymond for his support for the efforts being made to improve the circumstances of Indians living in South Africa: ‘The thought that so many distinguished men and heart and soul with us buoys us up and enables us to hope for better things though the cloud seems to be blackest.’

Another officially impressed medal is known.