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Auction: 19002 - Orders, Decorations and Medals
Lot: 732

(x) Natal Volunteer Ambulance Corps

Queen's South Africa 1899-1902, 2 clasps, Tugela Heights, Relief of Ladysmith (Br: A. Downie. Natal Vol: Amb: C.), nearly extremely fine

Alex Downie attested for the Natal Volunteer Ambulance Corps at Durban on 9 December 1899, his papers noting, 'webbed fingers both hands'.

According to With the Flag to Pretoria by H. W. Wilson:

'On the 6th (January 1900) the base hospitals at Pietermaritzburg had been cleared of the wounded; on the 8th the Frere hospitals were likewise emptied, and that evening 700 civilian stretcher bearers or "body-snatchers" as they were called by the troops, arrived at the front. They were a nondescript lot of men, ill-clad, poorly shod, but, as their deeds upon the battlefield showed time and time again, surpassingly brave. For them there were no laurels, no honours, no mentions in despatches, not even the gaudium certaminis which so often paralyses the sense of fear. Yet they did their duty and something more; with placid devotion they followed the fighting line, and many of them laid down their lives in noble efforts to succour the wounded and dying. All honour, then, to this ragged corps!'

Sold with copied roll entry.


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Sold for
£95