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Auction: 24002 - Orders, Decorations and Medals
Lot: 208

A superb ‘Second Battle of the Somme 1918’ M.C. and Second Award Bar group of three awarded to Captain J. C. Lindsay, 6th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment, who was thrice wounded and later joined the Royal Irish Constabulary, being involved in an ambush on St. Stephens Green in 1921

Military Cross, G.V.R., with Second Award Bar, reverse contemporarily engraved ‘2/Lieut. J. C. Lindsay. Middlesex Regt.’; British War and Victory Medals (2. Lieut. J. C. Lindsay.), very fine (3)

Provenance:
Cross Collection, J. B. Hayward, January 1973.
D.N.W. 2020, Jack Webb Collection.

M.C. London Gazette 7 November 1918:

'For conspicuous gallantry and good work on patrol. Under heavy fire he led his patrol through the enemy wire and located a strong enemy post which he attacked. Later, although his company had been relieved in the front line he volunteered to take out a strong patrol with which he lay out all day in "No Man's Land" and obtained valuable information.

Second Award Bar to M.C. London Gazette 2 December 1918:

'For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty during an attack. With twenty men he rushed and captured an enemy post and machine gun. He then carried on and gained the first objective and held his position until reinforcements arrived. He showed splendid leadership and initiative throughout.'

John Clyde Lindsay was born at Lille, France, on 26 April 1899 to Scottish parents with his father John Orr Lindsay living near Lille and working as a machinery agent at the time. Appearing on the 1911 census aboard the S.S. Burma anchored at Burmondsey he appears to have returned home that year where he was educated at the King's School, Canterbury.

Attesting for the Royal Highlanders on 3 July 1916 serving with them during the Great War on the Western Front from 1 February 1917. Lindsay was commissioned 2nd Lieutenant into the 6th Battalion, Middlesex Regiment on 18 December 1917 and transferred to 'A' Company, 4th Battalion in April 1918.

He was three times wounded in action, the first time during the action which won him the M.C. by gun shot to the right thumb on 24 August 1918. The Battalion War Diary for that day states:

'Capt. Procter and Capt. Klaiber worked hard reorganising the Battalion and were ably assisted by 2/Liuet. J. C. Lindsay, who with a small party captured a M.G. post on the Bapaume-Arras Road.'

He was to suffer a gunshot to both knees later in 1918; and a scalp wound from a shell near Cambrai on 11 October 1919. The latter occurred in the aftermath of the Second Battle of Cambrai and he appears on the casualty list for the next day after a major Battalion attack. It is quite possible given his wounding that this was the engagement which won Lindsay the Bar to his M.C.

After the Great War. he resigned his commission in June 1919 and re-enlisted in his own regiment as a Private but was soon discharged at his own request. He joined the Royal Irish Constabulary as a Cadet on 6 April 1921 and was posted to 'C' Company at Portobello Barracks, Dublin. While there he was in one of two open topped Crossley Tenders that came under grenade attack at St. Stephens Green on 29 May 1921, the Special Report relates:

'Two open Crossley Tenders when passing Stephen's Green at about 11.30 hrs. were ambushed. One bomb was thrown at the rear car from the corner of Cuffe St. The leading car pulled up at the side entrance to Stephen's Green almost opposite the College of Surgeons when three more bombs were thrown and revolver fire opened from the bushes on the Green, range about 15 yards. Both cards debussed and a party was sent round Stephen's Green South to intercept the fleeing ambushers. The rear car swung round the other flank through Stephen's Green North and succeeded in capturing Leo Fox of Cruzdel Campo, Harold's Cross, occupation Cleaner at the Inchicore Engine Works, who was identified by T/Const/ Driver H. Brabham and T/Cadet Lindsay as the man who threw one of the bombs from the Green. He is now in custody in the Guard Room of the R. Berks. Regt. During the Resulti[…] search for civilians three men lying prone on the pavement got up and opened revolver fire on T/Cadet Cafferate who was about 20 yds. distant. They missed him and fled away from the Green towards Cuffe St. Area. He pursued, returning their fire and hit one man who was seen to fall, who picked himself up and got away in the crowd. Subsequent search failed to find this man.

This is the third ambush in which members of this company have noticed that after the rebels have opened the action a proportion of them lie prone in the position from which they fired.'

Lindsay continued to struggle when it came to his career, being forced to leave the R.I.C. on disciplinary grounds in November 1921. He joined the Royal Air Force in April 1922 on a short service commission but this did not last the year and he left in November 1922. Enlisting again, this time with the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry in January 1923, briefly leaving the Indian Army Service Corps he was back with the Ox and Bucks in 1927.

Leaving the Regiment in 1930, Lindsay travelled to India to work as a tea planter. He was to die out there the next year in Calcutta on 5 March 1931 of 'acute lobar pneumonia', his address being listed as Rhoni Tea Estate Kuhseong near Darjeeling. Despite this he was not described as working there on his death certificate but rather as 'unemployed late Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry'.

Sold together with copied research including medal rolls, service history and the report on the St. Stephen's Green Grenade attack.

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Sold for
£1,600

Starting price
£1100