Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria, to include the Brian Ritchie Collection (Part I)

Afghanistan 1878-80, no clasp (Maj. C. W. Campbell, 1st Bl. Cavy.), together with related Eton College prize medal for rowing, in silver, the edge engraved ‘C. W. Campbell, Eton, 1858’, edge nicks, nearly extremely fine (2) £300-350

Charles Walter Campbell was baptised at Long Ditton, Surrey in August 1842, the son of James Campbell, ‘Gent, of Queen Anne Street, London’. Educated at Eton, where clearly he excelled himself on the river, young Charles was nominated for the East India Company’s Bengal Cavalry in 1859, and arrived in India at the end of the same year.

Appointed a Cornet on the Bengal General List (Cavalry), he was initially attached to the 7th Dragoon Guards and, soon after gaining advancement to Lieutenant in January 1861, was appointed an A.D.C. to Lieutenant-General Sir Hope Grant, the latter recently returned from his command in China. Then in April 1866, he became Adjutant of the Bodyguard to the Governor of Madras, in which capacity he served until 1877, when he was appointed Station Staff Officer at Saugor.

Campbell went on to witness active service in the Second Afghan War, when he served with the 1st Bengal Cavalry in the Kurram Valley 1879-80 and qualified for the Medal without a clasp. He retired as a Lieutenant-Colonel in January 1884 and died in August 1920.