Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A fine Great War D.C.M. group of five awarded to Sergeant C. Graves, Royal Berkshire Regiment: although gazetted under a P.O.W. Army Order in 1920, regimental sources clearly state that his D.C.M. was for his bravery in action at Marriolles Bridge in late August 1914, when he was wounded in the shoulder and taken prisoner

Distinguished Conduct Medal, G.V.R. (5330 Sjt. C. Graves, 1/R. Berks. R.); 1914 Star, with clasp (5330 Sjt., 1/R. Berks. R.); British War and Victory Medals (5330 Sjt., R. Berks. R.), surname spelt ‘Greaves’; Army L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., 1st issue (5330 Sjt., R. Berks. R.), surname spelt ‘Greaves’, generally extremely fine (5) £2500-3000

D.C.M. London Gazette 30 January 1920: ‘In recognition of bravery in the Field, in accordance with the terms of Army Order 193 of 1919.’

The Royal Berkshire Regimental Journal, China Dragon, states:

He [Graves] joined the regiment on 9 April 1898 and served continually with the 1st Battalion until wounded and taken prisoner by the Germans on 25 August 1914.

After four years as a prisoner of war in Germany, he was repatriated to Holland and finally to England, and after a spell of hospital treatment was discharged on 21 August 1918 as unfit for further service.

For his conduct on 25 August 1914, he was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal.’

Graves, a native of Reigate, went to France as a Sergeant, No. 9 Platoon, ‘D’ Company, 1st Battalion, Royal Berkshire Regiment, on 13 August 1914. He is mentioned in the diary of a fellow battalion member, Corporal Tiestial, who describes how Graves’ platoon came under severe fire on moving up to new positions on 23-24 August - he also records that the honour of capturing the first German fell to one of Graves’ men, the enemy soldier being ‘a big fellow and wonderfully equipped ... we took his equipment and dressed his wound but I do not know what happened to him after we withdrew.’ Badly wounded, Graves himself became a P.O.W. on the following day, when in the care of a mobile field ambulance.

On his subsequent repatriation to England via Holland in August 1918, he gave an account of his time in captivity to a Berkshire newspaper, The Times (“Berkshire Sergeant’s Story - Ill-treated in Germany”):

‘I was wounded by a rifle bullet in the shoulder and was taken prisoner on the second day of the retreat. A whole batch of badly wounded prisoners, of whom I was one, was taken in Wagons to Landrecies. Many of us were in a semi-conscious condition. At Landrecies there was a temporary hospital, which had previously been prepared by the French Red Cross. There we found some of our own medical staff who attended us for about a fortnight. At the end of that time the doctors were taken away by the Germans and for the next eight weeks we saw no doctors at all, all the sick being attended by two R.A.M.C. orderlies. We were behind their lines and they had no fear that cot cases would disappear. The French women in Landrecies treated us splendidly, and I cannot find words strong enough to praise them. They gave us what food we had and all such comforts as they could. The Germans provided no food at all; in fact they rather took food away. In the last week of our stay there the Germans came back but beyond putting on double sentries they did not trouble themselves about us. Then one day we were taken to a railway station on stretchers and lay there eight hours waiting for a train. German soldiers on the lines of communications guarded us, but a German mob of soldiers jeered at us and threatened to strike us. A friend of mine who was wounded in the leg was kicked at for smiling. We were given no food all that day. At last a journey lasting two and a half days began. We were placed on the floor in ordinary carriages and received no attention whatsoever. All the food we got was a bit of bread and water. Many of us were in a high state of fever. At one railway station German women looked in through the windows and spat at us. Finally we arrived at Paderborn, Westphalia and were there taken to a nunnery, where we remained for about a month. There we were fairly well treated, but there was little comfort. Then we were taken to a Franciscan monastery in the same place, where we remained for seven months. The food was fairly good at first, but rapidly became bad. We had just enough to stave off hunger. The doctor was a cruel rough brute. He operated without chloroform, used rusty surgical instruments, which had not been sterilised, and always spoke in a sneering tone.

From August 1915 till the end of the year we were moved about from one place to another, and at the beginning of 1916 I was sent to a prison camp at Minden. It was shockingly overcrowded and was infested with vermin. We got clothes and food from England; the food the Germans gave us was not fit for pigs. My next camp was at Quedlinburg (Harz) where I remained until I went to Holland last February. Here they tried to make us work by chasing us out of the rooms with bayonets and dogs. The camp was divided into compounds. In one of these were the Russians who were literally starving. In the next compound the French prisoners had been given a tub of soup, which they refused to eat. They took it to the wires separating the two compounds, and the Russians crowded up to get some. Thereupon a German sentry fired killing two and wounding one. All discipline at this camp was discipline by the bayonet. The men were repeatedly struck. The warders were awful bullies and the doctor a brute.’

Graves, an excellent athlete who had won the Army 100 Yard Championship in 1907, was appointed a Civil Sergeant Mess Caterer at Reading Barracks after the War, thereby maintaining strong links with his old regiment for several more years. He died at the “Green Man”, Grazely Heath, near Basingstoke, Hampshire on 7 February 1952.