Special Collections

Sold on 17 September 2004

1 part

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Medals to Royal Naval Sick Berth Personnel from the collection of John Hailey

John Hailey

Lot

№ 575

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17 September 2004

Hammer Price:
£100

Africa General Service 1902-56, 1 clasp, Somaliland 1908-10 (350616 N. Woolfrey, 2nd S.B.S., H.M.S. Philomel) slight contact marks, about very fine £90-110

Robert Woolfrey was born in Wareham, Dorset on 31 October 1876. A Hat Presser by occupation, he enlisted into the Royal Navy as a Probationary Sick Berth Attendant on 29 August 1898. He became a 2nd Sick Berth Steward in 1903 and served aboard H.M.S. Philomel in that capacity in the operations on and off the coast of Somaliland during 1908-10. The outbreak of the Great War saw him aboard the pre-dreadnaught battleship H.M.S. Irresistible, and he remained with her until she was mined and sunk in the Dardanelles on 18 March 1915. He was discharged and pensioned in 1920 having achieved the rank of Sick Berth Chief Petty Officer.