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Auction: 25002 - Orders, Decorations and Medals
Lot: 103

A poignant Great War casualty group of three awarded to Captain F. R. E. Savory, King's Shropshire Light Infantry, attached South Lancashire Regiment, who died of wounds received in Gallipoli and was buried at sea in December 1915 - 'he was brave, bright and cheery' to the last

1914 Star (Lieut. F. R. E. Savory, Shrops. L.I.); British War and Victory Medals (Capt. F. R. E. Savory), good very fine (3)

Provenance:
Christie's, 10 November 1992, when sold as part of the Hal Giblin collection.

Francis Richard Egerton Savory was born at Old Letton Court, Staunton-on-Wye, Hereford on 2 April 1893 and was educated at Stonyhurst College and Sandhurst.

Commissioned in the 1st Battalion, King's Shropshire Light Infantry in February 1912, he was embarked for France as a Lieutenant in September 1914 but was invalided home with a knee injury at the year's end. Having then been promoted Captain, he was attached to the 6th Battalion, South Lancashire Regiment in Gallipoli, where he was wounded at Suvla on 1 December 1915. It was a serious wound - a heavy brass time fuse from a Turkish shell having smashed his right thigh bone - and he was transferred to the hospital ship Massila. Sadly, gangrene set in, and he died on 5 December 1915.

A fellow officer wrote:

'I was by his side when he was hit yesterday afternoon. We had landed too late in the early morning to get up to the ditch by dark, and were resting the day on the beach, when the Turks started to send shrapnel on to it. Your son was standing up talking to another officer when a bit of shrapnel caught his right leg just above the knee, severing the bone, but fortunately missing the arteries. We got him bound up and under good cover, and he kept on talking away to me as if nothing had happened almost. Soon after the doctor came up and after improvising some splints, I had him taken off to a field ambulance and saw to his kit getting to him right away. I should like to say how much I liked serving under him and how much everybody around at the time appreciated the plucky way in which he took the whole thing.'

And of his final hours aboard the Messila, the ship's captain wrote:

'The boy was brought on board on 3 December, suffering from a compound fracture of the right femur. The heavy brass time fuse of a Turkish shell had entered the thigh just above the knee, and, travelling up, had lodged near the hip joint. Gas gangrene had already set in, and the case was hopeless, but the missile was removed quickly and painlessly. At no time did he suffer any pain, as is frequently the case in gas gangrene, and was quite clear in his mind almost to the last. He was a dear boy, and out hearts bled for him and his dear ones at home. He was brave, bright and cheery all the time.'

Aged 22, Savory was buried at sea, off Mudros. He is commemorated on the Doiran Memorial, Greece and on a memorial tablet erected by his parents in St. Ethelbert's Church, Bargates, Leominster. His portrait photograph appears in The Stonyhurst College Roll of Honour 1914-1918 and on the dustjacket of Rob Walker's To What End Did They Die?

Poignantly, his lengthy entry in The Roll of Honour lists six of his cousins as fellow Great War fatalities.

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Estimate
£300 to £500

Starting price
£240