Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Three: Private W. Edwards, 1st Battalion, King’s Royal Rifle Corps, who served as a member of the original British Expeditionary Force, was wounded at the First Battle of Ypres, and was killed in action at Givenchy on 10 March 1915

1914 Star, with copy clasp (11009 Pte. W. Edwards. 1/K.R. Rif: C.); British War and Victory Medals (11009 Pte. W. Edwards. K.R. Rif. C.) extremely fine (3) £200-£240

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Barry Hobbs Collection of Great War Medals.

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William Edwards was born in 1894, the son of Alfred Edwards, a Liverpool-born Tinsmith Cannister Maker and his wife Margaret. Unlike his eleven London born British siblings, William was born in Montreal, Canada, and his nationality in the 1911 census is given as Canadian.

A resident of Whitechapel, London, he attested for the King’s Royal Rifle Corps in London in 1913 and served with the 1st Battalion during the Great War on the Western Front from 13 August 1914. As part of the 6th Brigade in the 2nd Division of the original British Expeditionary Force, his Battalion fought at the Battle of Mons, the subsequent retreat and the operations on the Marne, The Aisne and the First Battle of Ypres during which B, C and D Companies were surrounded and overwhelmed losing a total of 1027 men either killed, missing or wounded in just 6 weeks. In relation to this period of fighting, the casualty list of 26 November 1914 lists Edwards among those wounded.

Private Edwards was killed in action on 10 March 1915 during a failed assault by the 6th Brigade on the enemy’s trenches at The Bluff, near Givenchy-lès-la-Bassée. In regards to this attack, which cost the battalion a total of 256 men killed, wounded or missing, the battalion war diary states, ‘if gallantry and determination could have commanded success it would have been theirs..’ He has no known grave, and is commemorated on Le Touret Memorial, France.