Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Three: Lieutenant D. R. Macdonald, Royal Navy, who was killed in action when H.M.S. Hawke was sunk by the German submarine U-9 in the North Sea off Aberdeen on 15 October 1914

1914-15 Star (Lieut. D. R. Macdonald, R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (Lieut. D. R. Macdonald. R.N.) light contact marks to BWM, good very fine (3) £280-£320

Donald Roy Macdonald was born in Oxford on 27 September 1888, the son of the Reverend James Middleton Macdonald, of Melbourne, Australia, and entered H.M.S. Britannia on 15 May 1903. He was commissioned Sub-Lieutenant on 30 November 1907, and was promoted Lieutenant on 31 December 1910, and served during the Great War in the cruiser H.M.S. Hawke from 7 August 1914. He was killed in action on 15 October 1914 when H.M.S. Hawke, on patrol off Aberdeen in the North Sea, was struck and sunk by a torpedo fired by the German submarine U-9. Whilst there were survivors, Macdonald was amongst 524 of the crew that lost their lives. He is commemorated on the Chatham Naval Memorial.

Macdonald’s sister, Enid, was drowned on passage to India when the mail steamer S.S. Persia was torpedoed and sunk on 30 December 1915. Both brother and sister therefore were killed by German submarines.

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