Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The mounted group of four miniature dress medals attributed to Major B. L. Fletcher, Scots Guards, attached Hawke Battalion, Royal Naval Division, who was Second in Command of the latter in September 1914, and was interned in Holland for the duration of the war after the fall of Antwerp, October 1914

1914 Star, with clasp; British War and Victory Medals; Special Constabulary Long Service Medal, G.V.R., 2nd issue, mounted for wear, nearly extremely fine (4) £60-£80

Bolton Littledale Fletcher was born at Allerton Manor, Allerton, Liverpool in October 1886, the son of Alfred Fletcher, a Cotton Merchant, and was educated at Eton. He was commissioned Second Lieutenant in the Scots Guards in February 1906 and was appointed as Aide de Camp to Admiral Sir D. H. Bosanquet, G.C.V.O, K.C.B., Governor of South Australia in December 1910.

Fletcher was attached as Temporary Major to the Royal Marines, 30 September 1914, and appointed as Adjutant and Second in Command of the Hawke Battalion, Royal Naval Division. He embarked with the Battalion to defend Antwerp where, in early October, having belatedly received the order to withdraw, he was one of approximately 1,600 men of the Benbow, Collingwood and Hawke Battalions of the 1st Brigade who were forced to take refuge in neutral Holland in order to prevent unnecessary casualties or capture by the enemy.

Fletcher was interned under International Law on 9 October 1914 and housed in barracks in Groningen where, other than periods of leave from Holland, he was so detained for the duration of the war (he was in fact on one of these periods of leave in England when the Armistice was signed).

Fletcher returned to the Scots Guards, 30 November 1918, and died in Hoylake, Wirral in November 1943.

Note: The recipient’s full-sized medals were sold in these rooms in December 2022.