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Auction: 15003 - Orders, Decorations, Campaign Medals and Militaria
Lot: 4

A Great War 'Military' Division M.B.E. Group of Three to 'Zulu War Veteran' Major, Late Sergeant-Major, R.C. Williamson, Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders
a) The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, 1st type, Military Division, Member's (M.B.E.) breast Badge, silver (Hallmarks for London 1919)
b) South Africa 1877-79, one clasp, 1879 (1788 Lce. Sergt. R.C. Williamson. 91st Foot.), suspension slack
c) Queen's South Africa 1899-1902, five clasps, Modder River, Paardeberg, Driefontein, Transvaal, South Africa 1901 (Lt. & Qmr. R.C. Williamson. A & S. Highrs.), unofficial rivets between State and Date clasps, generally very fine, with photographic images of recipient (3)

M.B.E. London Gazette 15.4.1919 Williamson, Maj. Richard Charles, A. & S. Highrs. (Originally gazetted as a Civil Award, 7.1.1918, and changed to Military in the above gazette)

M.I.D. London Gazette 10.9.1901 Quartermaster and Honorary Lieutenant R.C. Williamson

Major Richard Charles Williamson, M.B.E. (1859-1927); enlisted 91st Highlanders in 1877, and served throughout the Zulu War of 1879; promoted to Sergeant Major of the 1st Battalion on 6.7.1887 and held this important position for the next ten years, serving under no fewer than four commanding officers; commissioned Lieutenant and Quartermaster, 1st Battalion Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, July 1897; and served as such in the Boer War until September 1900, when he became Quartermaster to the newly arrived 4th (Paisley) Militia Battalion; advanced Captain and Quartermaster, November 1900; retired in March 1908; for his services at home during the Great War he was awarded the M.B.E., 'Major R.C. Williamson, the "Chief" of the National Service Department at Stirling, attended an investiture at Buckingham Palace, London, last Wednesday to receive his M.B.E. insignia... at the hands of the King. There were between two and three hundred military and civilian recipients of the Order, but the Major was the only one in officer's uniform of a Highland regiment, and his stalwart figure in the kilt - which he knows how to swing properly - attracted much attention. Six times after leaving the Palace he was held up by press photographers anxious to get a snap shot of him, and judging by the illustrations in next day's papers, they did good work' (Stirling Observer, 6.4.1918, refers); he was appointed Superintendent of the Scottish Blinded Soldiers' and Sailors' Hostel, Newington House, Edinburgh, October 1918; he oversaw the Prince of Wales' visit in December 1924.

Provenance: Taylor Collection, Christie, November 1990

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Sold for
£1,800