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Auction: 5019 - Orders, Decorations, Campaign Medals & Militaria
Lot: 290

A Most Interesting and Intringuing Crimea Medal to Corporal W. Courtney, 44th Foot, Shot Through the Eye in the Trenches Before Sebastopol, ´Reportedly´ Recommended for the Victoria Cross, and One of Only Three Survivors of the 44th´s Volunteer Sharp-Shooters for the Action Crimea 1854-56, three clasps, Alma, Inkermann, Sebastopol (Corpl. W. Courtnay. 44th Regt.), officially impressed, top lugs missing, minor edge bruising, contact mark to obverse, otherwise good very fine, together with duplicate issue Crimea 1854-56, three clasps, Alma, Inkermann, Sebastopol (Corpl. W. Courtney. 44th Foot.), contemporarily engraved in upright serif capitals, contact marks therefore very fine, with a letter from Brigadier-General W. McMahon, 44th Foot to Horse Guards (dated 22.7.1863); a copy of Lieutenant Colonel C.W.D. Stavely´s original V.C. Recomendation for Sergt. W. McWheeney and subsequent correspondence, a copy of ´The Illustrated London News´ picturing in a sketch both Sergeant McWheeney and Corporal Courtney (dated 20.6.1857); and copies of Courtney´s correspondence (2) Estimate £ 700-9003820 Corporal William Courtney, born in Brighton, Sussex; attested 6th Foot, 1842; Sergeant 1849; transferred 55th Foot, 1850; transferred 44th Foot, 1854; Corporal 1854; severely wounded before Sebastopol 4.12.1854 (London Gazette 29.12.1854); discharged the same year. Courtney was to cause some debate and controversy in relation to his reported part in Sergeant William McWheeney´s award of a Victoria Cross. The citation (London Gazette 24.2.1857) states, ´William McWheeney, Sergt., 44th Foot. Volunteered as a sharp-shooter at the commencement of the siege, and was in charge of the party of the 44th Regt.; was always vigilant and active, and signalized himself on 20.Oct. 1854, when one of his party, Private John Keane, 44th Regt., was dangerously wounded on the Woronzoff Road, at the time the sharp-shooters were repulsed from the Quarries by overwhelming numbers. Sgt. McWheeney, on his return, took the wounded man on his back, and brought him to a place of safety. This was under a very heavy fire. He was also the means of saving the life of Corpl. Courtney. This man was one of the sharp-shooters, and was severly wounded in the head, 5 Dec. 1854. Sergt. McWheeney brought him in from under the fire, and dug up a slight cover with his bayonet, where the two remained until dark, when they retired. Sergt. McWheeney volunteered for the advanced guard of General Eyre´s Brigade in the cemetery on 18 June , 1855 and was never absent from duty during the war." Courtney stipulated that this account of the events that unfolded that day was untrue, and furthermore apportioned the award and the honor to the wrong man in the shape of McWheeney. An example of his version of the action can be seen in a letter he wrote to a military publication soon after the gazette of McWheeney´s V.C., ´I trust that you will kindly give insertion to this letter. There are two statements in that paragraph which are utterly false. The first, in which it is asserted that the skirmish which took place on October the 20th 1854, between a party of our regimental sharp-shooters and the Russians in which Private John Keane was dangerously wounded, that Sergeant McWheeney took the wounded man on his back and conveyed him to a place of safety under a very heavy fire. Now, I shall prove this to be an utter and shameless falsehood. It was I who carried John Keane on my back to a place of safety and I then returned to the spot for another man who was also wounded, by his, Private John Keane´s side on the Woronzoff road and brought him into the same palce of safety.....I then ventured my life to go up to the entrenchments, a distance of several hundred yards, to procure a stretcher to bring in the wounded men and procuring a stretcher from my own Commanding officer returned with it to where I had left them and sending Private Keane on the stretcher I took the other wounded man on my back and never left them alone for one moment until I had placed them in the safety of our entrenchments......Then, in the left attack, I was the last man to leave the Quarries on that day, and in doing so I had to fight my way out and received two bayonet wounds slightly on my right side...... As for Sgt. McWheeney having saved my life, that is also entirely untrue. I was left for many hours on one side after I was wounded, and as to the assertion that I and McWheeny retired after dark, any one with any common sense would see how impossible that was. I received three balls in my head at once and my right eye was shot out besides other injuries. Of course I was utterly incapable of moving and it was equally impossible for anyone to have recovered me as McWheeney is said to have done......I ask not praise, I only did my duty to my Queen and Country. All I request is justice.´ (Courtney´s letter to the ´Naval & Military Gazette´, dated 4.3.1857 refers). Courtney´s brave conduct at least, seems to have been confirmed by a letter from Brigadier-General W. McMahon (a Major in the 44th at the time of the event) to J. Carter, Adjutant General´s Office, Horse Guards, dated 22.7.1863 in which he writes ´Sergt. McWheeney won the Victoria Cross for repeated acts of devotion and gallantry - He and Lc. Corpl. McGann and Courtney were the only survivors of our Volunteer Sharpshooters the two latter were wounded - and Courtney was recommended afterwards for the Victoria Cross - he was desperately wounded and invalided. He was represented sitting on a gun in the ´Illustrated London News´.´ Despite this mention of a recomendation for the Victoria Cross for Courtney, there seems to be little in the way of other supporting evidence for his account with both the Return of Killed and Wounded in the 44th from 1.10.1854 and the Commanding Officer´s attachment to his original Recommendation for McWheeney´s Victoria Cross providing factual alternatives. The Surgeon´s statement for the former stipulates that Courtney was not hit by three balls as he claimed, ´that the above was the only time Corpl. Courtney was in the Regt. Hospl. for wounds, also that the lacerated wound on the left eye brow was to all appearances caused by the same Ball which destroyed his right eye´, and indeed he makes no mention of the bayonet wounds. The 44th´s Commanding Officer at the time of the event, Lieutenant Colonel C.W.D. Stavely, mentions in his original Recommendation for McWheeney´s V.C. (dated 16.10.1856) that he had written to Courtney to provide a report on the latter part of McWheeney´s distinguished service. In the follow-up letter, however, he clearly states, ´I have the honour to inform you that I have ascertained that Cpl Courtney was in a state of insensibilty at the time he was brought in and remained so until after he had been taken to camp, consequently could not know what took place on the occasion referred to." Despite such evidence and indeed McWheeney being awarded the V.C., Courtney continued in the years following the Crimean War to bombard Horse Guards and the Press with letters referring to the great injustice done to him.

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£1,500