Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Five: Lieutenant-Colonel C. H. Townsend, East Surrey Regiment, and Pasha, Egyptian Army - Governor of Berber Province and then Kassala Province

British War Medal 1914-20 (Major C. H. Townsend.); Ottoman Empire, Order of Osmanieh, Fourth Class breast badge, silver-gilt and enamel; Order of the Medjidieh, Fourth Class breast badge, silver-gilt and enamel; Khedive’s Sudan 1896-1908, 1 clasp, Sudan 1899, unnamed as issued; Egypt, Kingdom, Order of the Nile, 3rd Class neck badge, silver, silver-gilt and enamels, the first four mounted court-style as worn, together with similarly mounted set of five miniature dress medal and tunic riband bar, all contained in a specially fitted double-fronted glazed leather display case by Spink, Piccadilly, nearly extremely fine (5) £1,200-£1,600

This lot is to be sold as part of a special collection, Medals from an Africa Collection.

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Order of Medijieh London Gazette 23 September 1902.

Order of Osmanieh London Gazette 22 March 1912.

Order of the Nile London Gazette 20 June 1916.

Cuthbert Hanson Townsend was born on 5 April 1872, at Rushbrook, near Queenstown, son of Admiral S. P. Townsend, R.N. He was educated at United Service College, Westward Ho!, North Devon, and R.M.C. Sandhurst 1891. Noted to be acquainted with French and German, following training at the Royal Military College he was commissioned 2nd Lieutenant on 18 June 1892, into the East Surrey Regiment. Promoted Lieutenant on 29 May 1894, he was appointed Adjutant in November 1896. Seconded to Egyptian Army on 9 March 1899, he was Assistant Adjutant General Egyptian Army 1905-07. He retired from the British Army in 1910 but continued to serve in Egypt. He was Governor of Berber Province for three years, then Governor and Commandant of Troops, Kassala Province for four years. He retired from the Egyptian Army and Sudan Government Service in 1917, and was employed at the War Office 1917-18 (single B.W.M. for services in Sudan confirmed; and M.I.D. 1916 ‘For administrative work connected with the situation in the Sudan created by the War’).

The following appeared in Near East 1917, Volume 13:

‘The Sirdar and Governor General of the Sudan has issued a special army order on the occasion of the retirement of Lewa [equivalent to Major General] C. H. Townsend, Pasha, Governor of Kassala on pension. In which the eminent services which this officer has rendered during the 18 years spent in the Egyptian Army and Sudan Government as O.C. 2nd Battalion, Assistant Adjutant General and Governor of Halfa, Berber and Kassala have been placed on record.’
Correspondence between Townsend and General Sir Reginald Wingate, covering 1915-16, is held in the Durham Archive. Towsend was afterwards Regional Director of Pensions for the N.W. Region, 1919-25.

Townsend’s first wife, Letitia (the youngest daughter of the 18th Baron Trimlestown), died on 2 May 1938, and he remarried on 2 April 1946 to Muriel Amy Denton. He died on 27 January 1956, while living at Godrevy, Park Hill Road, Ewell, Surrey.

Sold with original Commission Certificate dated 18 June 1892, and copied research saved to CD.