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Auction: 15002 - Orders, Decorations, Campaign Medals and Militaria
Lot: 105

Five: Lieutenant D.M. Rowland, Hertfordshire Home Guard, Late Royal Engineers and London Regiment
1914 Star, with Bar (1023 Pte. D.M. Rowland. 1/28 Lond: R.); British War and Victory Medals (Lieut. D.M. Rowland); Defence Medal; Service Medal of the Order of St. John (Pte. D.M. Rowland. London. S.J.A.B. 1952.), very fine, with the recipient's Second War Intelligence Section hand-written Diary and Notes; hand-written summary of his career; various Home Guard letters; seven postcards; and group photograph (5)

Lieutenant Douglas Mayhew Rowland, born Bletchley, Buckinghamshire, April 1890, the son of Alderman W.R. Rowland, J.P.; educated at Bedford School and University College, London; on the outbreak of the Great War enlisted in the 28th (Artist's Rifles) Battalion, London Regiment, 4.8.1914; served during the Great War on the Western Front from 26.10.1914 'at Ypres, Hill 60, St. Eloi Craters, Messines, Vimy Ridge, La Bassee, Neuve Chappell, and lost my horse from shell fire at Vimy Ridge' (recipient's hand-written account refers); Commissioned Second Lieutenant, Royal Engineers, 9.1.1916; promoted Lieutenant, 9.7.1917, 'after about 8 months in the Somme areas and actions, was ordered up to the Passchendaele Front, a very much shelled area, and was here wounded twice in the arm and suffered from effects of gas poisoning, and eventually sent to hospital (ibid); relinquished his Commission, 3.4.1919; in civilian life Rowland moved to Watford, and embarked upon a successful engineering career, ultimately being appointed Surveyor to the Senior Architect of the Ministry of Works; joined the Watford St. John Ambulance Brigade, 1936; served during the Second War with the 9th (Bricket Wood) Battalion, Hertfordshire Home Guard, as Intelligence and Security Officer at the Battalion Headquarters; injured in the Harrow railway crash, 8.10.1952, Britain's worst peacetime rail disaster in which 112 people were killed, but despite his injuries helped give first aid to the wounded; awarded the Service Medal of the Order of St. John, 1952; retired, 1953.

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