Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Six: Lieutenant-Colonel L. Moss, Royal Army Service Corps, late Royal Flying Corps: as a pilot in No. 10 Squadron, he survived a forced-landing in his anti-aircraft-fire-damaged B.E. 2 in December 1915

1914-15 Star (2 Lieut., A.S.C.); British War and Victory Medals (2 Lieut.); Italy Star; Defence and War Medals, together with a set of related miniature dress medals and two original R.F.C. embroidered uniform “Wings”, both medal groups mounted as worn, very fine and better (14) £600-800

Lionel Moss, who was born in May 1890 and commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant, A.S.C. in April 1915, commenced his pilot training at Farnborough in the latter month. Subsequently transferred to the Central Flying School at Upavon, and thence to Gosport - with a brief visit to No. 6 Squadron at St. Omer in between - he commenced his first proper operational tour with No. 10 Squadron in France in November 1915, flying a patrol over the Bois de Biez on the 17th.

Similar Army-co-operation reconnaissances were flown for the remainder of the month, and into early December, but on the 8th, during a patrol over the Lille sector, Moss and his Observer, 2nd Lieutenant Henderson, were brought down by anti-aircraft fire, making a forced landing in their B.E. 2 at Nieppe on the Belgian frontier. As verified by his service record, Moss was wounded, and did not fly again until June 1916.

His known subsequent R.F.C. postings were to No. 57 Squadron at Headley Bar and Tadcaster, from June to August 1916, and to No. 54 Squadron at Castle Bromwich from August to September of the same year. It is clear, however, that Moss returned to regular duties with the Army shortly thereafter, and he ended the War as a Captain, A.S.C., attached to the Norfolks. Placed on the Reserve of Officers at the War’s end, he was recalled to the Royal Army Service Corps in the rank of Brevet Major in September 1939, and was advanced to Honorary Lieutenant-Colonel in October 1947. Moss died at Frinton-onSea in October 1980, aged 90 years.

Sold with the recipient’s original Flying Log Books (2), the first an early “white cover” edition with entries for the period May 1915 until being shot down on 8 December that year, and including pasted-in pilot group photograph, the outer cover with a handwritten list of his assorted postings, and the second, a card cover Army Book 136 edition, with entries for the period June to September 1916; together with his Federation Aeronautique Internationale (British Empire) Aviator’s Certificate, a duplicate issue dated 12 June 1915, with portrait photograph.