Orders, Decorations and Medals

The First Gulf War 1990-91 Medal awarded to Warrant Officer B. J. Wickett, Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, a member of the British Liaison Team in Kuwait, who was taken hostage following the invasion and accordingly the recipient of the ‘2 August 1990’ clasp: he was held in captivity at a hydro-electricity and irrigation complex as part of Saddam Hussein’s “human shield”

Gulf 1990-91, 1 clasp, 2 Aug 1990 (24170241 W.O. 1 B. J. Wickett, R.E.M.E.), in its card box of issue, extremely fine £2500-3000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Ron Penhall Collection.

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Barry John Wickett was born in April 1953 and enlisted in the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers at Surbiton in December 1969 - his certificate of service further reveals that he was awarded the General Service Medal for Northern Ireland, where he served from February to June 1977.

In November 1989, Wickett joined the British Liaison Team in Kuwait, and following the Iraqi invasion of 2 August 1990 he and his family went to ground. At the end of the same month, however, they were arrested - ‘they came to get us very quickly, surrounded the block and started to break the door in’. Separated from his wife and children at the beginning of September, when they were put on board a flight to England from Baghdad, he was taken to a hydro-electricity and irrigation complex, about 40 km. from the Iranian border, as part of Saddam Hussein’s “human shield”. There, with three other British hostages, he was moved around the site on three occasions, firstly to the neighbouring village, then to the power house and finally to a caravan near the top of the dam, this latter being only 25 metres from anti-aircraft guns. Worrying times, indeed, but come mid-December, thanks largely to the background diplomacy of Edward Heath, he was among those released and flown home - albeit suffering from viral hepatitis.

Wickett was discharged at Southampton in July 1993.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including a group photograph of members of the “British Liaison Team Kuwait”, taken on 6 February 1990, including the recipient; letters written by him to his family while held in captivity (3), dated 13 and 21 September, and 6 October 1990; a signed copy of his poem “Why Are We Here?”; Adjutant-General’s “retirement certificate” to ‘Warrant Officer 1 Barry John Wickett’; certificate of service, date stamped at Marchwood, Southampton in July 1993; several photocopied newspaper articles, and copy letters from the British Embassy in Baghdad (‘I am sorry I am unable to make contact with you direct, but I should like to assure you by this letter that the British Government are doing everything they can to make it possible for you and other British citizens to leave Iraq ... ’).