Sultan Of Zanzibar's Medal

[oamotme]

Gentlemen,

I have recently acquired an example of this silver campaign service medal :

Obverse & Reverse: "Al Saeed Hamed Bin Thwaini Sultan Zanzibar 1313" (Corr. to 24 June 1896 - 11 June 1896)

with clasp "Pumwan" bearing the stamped /die punched namimg:

678.SURUR FERAJI

From my limited experience of this medal I have not seen another named example. Any ideas / suggestions? Is SURUR a name or rank?

Regards & thanks,

Owain Raw-Rees (OAMOTME)

[oamotme]

Gentlemen, Further to recent correspondence from Peter Liversidge, I detail below his comments. My thanks to Peter for is input. Kind regards, Owai

It was awarded by the Sultan to local troops (his own and those of the East Africa Protectorate's forces, essentially) and to a handful to British officers, for putting down insurrections against the Sultan in his territorial possessions on the East African mainland in the first half of the 1890s. It was generally given in conjunction with the East & West Africa Medal for Witu and Mwele. It seems that local troops got it unnamed (as they did the E&W medal), and subsequently some of those who continued serving with the East Africa Rifles (later 3 KAR) had their medals named along with their unnamed AGS medals for Jubaland, in the typical local crude style using hand punches. I know of about half a dozen named examples to native troops, all done in the local style, most of them in groups with E&W and AGS medals and sometimes other more exotic things; a few went on to get First World War trios or pairs. There are no surviving rolls for the Sultan's medal or the E&W medal to local troops, which is a pity.

Your example to Surur Feraji is, unfortunately, part of a very broken group (Surur, by the way, is not a rank but the first half of his name). 678 Surur Feraj was an EA Rifles/3 KAR soldier. I know from the later rolls that he received a three-clasp AGS and also a trio, the last named to a reserve number since he presumably re-enlisted in 1914 and was give a new number with the prefix 'R'. He would almost certainly have had an E&W Africa for Mwele and/or Witu. It appears that the group was broken up before 1982 when some (but not all) his campaign medals were sold by Hamiltons and are goodness only knows where now. I think I know where one medal is, in a private collection, but the other survivors haven't been seen since the early 1980s. I suppose that they will pop up again one day.

[Chris Boonzaier]

Hi,

is it possible to post some photos, this sounds nice and exotic :-)

All the best

Chris