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Auction: 24112 - Orders, Decorations and Medals - e-Auction
Lot: 574

The campaign group of three awarded to Sergeant H. E. Northeast, 1st Battalion Rifle Brigade, who was likely captured by the Germans during the Defence of Calais

General Service 1918-62, 1 clasp, Iraq (6907358 Pte. H.E. Northeast. Rif. Brig.); 1939-45 Star; War Medal 1939-45, mounted court style for display, light contact wear, very fine (3)

Understood to be a unique combination to the Rifle Brigade.

Harry Edmund Northeast was born at Poling, East Preston, Sussex on 12 July 1900, the youngest of seven children born to Charles Northeast, a labourer, and his wife Martha. He was baptised the next month on 19 August and the family is recorded in the 1901 Census as residing in Poling. Northeast later married Amy E. Bartlett in 1927 at Alverstoke, Hampshire. According to the 1939 Register, Northeast was then working as a lorry driver and living at Poling with his wife and widowed mother.

Northeast attested with the Rifle Brigade in 1919 and served in Iraq, India, Sudan and France. He was again called up for action during the Second World War, and was present at the famous Defence of Calais in 1940 in 'I' Company, 1st Battalion Rifle Brigade under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Chandos Hoskyns. The unit was part of the 30th Infantry Brigade, commanded by Brigadier Claude Nicholson, which sailed from Southampton on the personnel ship S.S. Archangel and disembarked at Calais on 23 May 1940 to relieve pressure on the retreat from Dunkirk. The German attack began the next day on 24 May and the Brigade was faced with heavy shell and mortar fire, followed by close fighting. Nicholson refused to surrender and on May 25, recieved a telegraph from Winston Churchill with orders to defend Calais until the last round of ammunition.

The heroic men of the 30th Infantry Brigade did not disappoint, and fought to their last. 20,000 prisoners were taken during the siege, and Churchill later remarked that 'Calais was the crux. Many other causes might have prevented the deliverance of Dunkirk, but it is certain that the three days gained by the defence of Calais enabled the Gravelines waterline to be held, and that without this...all would have been cut off and lost'.

Northeast was allegedly with 'Platoon Sergeant-Major Stevens (16 Platoon), with some sixteen men of "I" and "C" Companies', having fought until all their ammunition was exhausted, [who] hid in the houses round their positions for fourteen days before starvation forced them to surrender'. He later became prisoner of war on 7 June and was subsequently imprisoned by the Germans for the next five years.

Northeast was repatriated to England in March 1945 and later died at Worthing, West Sussex in spring 1973 at the age of 72; sold together with copied research including medal roll.

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Sold for
£180

Starting price
£100