Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A Great War M.M., Russian St. George’s Medal for Bravery group of five awarded to Private T. Ditchburn, King’s Own Scottish Borderers

Military Medal, G.V.R. (16716 Pte. T. Ditchburn, 1/K.O. Sco. Bord.); 1914-15 Star (16716 Pte., K.O. Sco. Bord.); British War and Victory Medals (16716 Pte., K.O.S.B.); Russian St. George’s Medal for Bravery, 4th Class, the reverse officially numbered ‘1273220’, mounted as worn and contained in an old ‘British Legion 1914-18’ leather carrying wallet, contact marks and polished, otherwise generally good fine (5) £800-1000

M.M. London Gazette 6 August 1918.

Thomas Ditchburn first entered the French theatre of war in February 1915, when he joined the 2nd Battalion, K.O.S.B., as a result of which he was almost certainly involved in that unit’s gallant part in an attack on “Hill 60” that April, in which it sustained 200 casualties. So, too, in the assault on Gravenstafel Ridge, a few days later, when the Battalion sustained a further 250 casualties. According to his MIC entry, Ditchburn was onetime attached to Royal Fusiliers, but he was undoubtedly serving in the 1st Battalion, K.O.S.B. when he won his M.M. in 1918, quite possibly for work in the German “Spring Offensive”, when the unit was based on the River Lys sector, or even for the unit’s offensive operations in the period May-June; Russian award unconfirmed but the group absolutely mounted as worn.