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Auction: 21002 - Orders, Decorations and Medals
Lot: 282

The Royal Fleet Reserve L.S. & G.C. Medal awarded to Able Seaman A. F. F. Gallup, late Royal Navy, who served in the 18-inch gun monitor 'Elephant & Castle'

Royal Fleet Reserve L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., coinage bust (J. 37905 (CH. B. 20462) A. F. F. Gallup, A.B., R.F.R.), good very fine

Amos Frederick Foster Gallup was born at Wandsworth, London on 24 June 1895 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class in April 1915.

His subsequent wartime appointments included the armed merchant cruiser H.M.S. Hidlebrand (August 1915-July 1916), the battleship Albion (July 1916-August 1917) and the monitor General Wolfe (October 1917-August 1918). During his time aboard the latter ship, she was fitted with an 18-inch gun, an extraordinary innovation summarised on Wikipedia:

'Wolfe had been taken in hand by Portsmouth Dockyard on 5 April [1918] for the structural modifications required to take the weight of the 18-inch gun and mounting on her quarterdeck. The total weight of the mounting was 384 tons, not including the weight of 60 shells and 72 full charges of cordite. The mounting, with its large box-shaped shield, so disfigured the stern of the ship that it earned Wolfe the nickname of Elephant and Castle.'

Coming ashore 'time expired' in June 1928, Gallup enrolled in the Royal Fleet Reserve in the same month. His subsequent career as a postman came to a grinding halt in September 1935, when he was convicted of 'opening and stealing out of a postal package' at Westminster Police Court. He was sentenced to four months' hard labour.

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Sold for
£50

Starting price
£20