Another British ribbon bar that's driving me nuts !

[Paul L Murphy]

This is another ribbon bar I purchased some time ago expecting it would be easy to pin down the wearer. So far I have not been able to do so, so any help is gratefully received. I thought the French Medaille Militaire would be the key since it is only awarded to other ranks or generals. Given the presence of the Order of the Bath, DSO, MC and bar etc I presumed this was for a WWII general who got the Medaille Militaire. Unfortunately the only British general to get it for WWII was Montgomery, and this combination of ribbons is not consistent with his awards (eg no 1914 Star etc). Hence, the Medaille Militaire must have been a WWI award as an other rank.

Soooo.... we have a ribbon group to a territorial other rank who fought in WWI and was possibly promoted to officer during that conflict. The Order of the British Empire is a civil ribbon which is curious. Leaving this aside, he must have reached a reasonably high rank to get at least a CB. Anyone got any ideas who it could be ?

[Graham Stewart]

Daft question this, but why has the Victory ribbon(with MID) been seperated from the MC & BWM, as I was under the impression they had to remain together and each row is skew-wiff?

[Paul L Murphy]

They do not have to remain together. I have seen a number of photos where WWI medal ribbons are split across two rows.

I agree the alignment on the ribbons is not great but some of the ribbons are different widths (eg DSO is narrower than the Victory Medal with MiD) and the left hand part of the cloth would have been under the tunic collar. I had put it down to these two factors.

[david grumpy]

Whoever it was didn't give a monkeys about appearance, so he was never an RSM or an Adjt!

I tried writing this man's life story from the ribbons ...... joined/went to Front TF after 31 Dec 1915, DCM in ranks, MiD, commissioned perhaps [which war?], MC and bar, [but could be as a WO], various TF awards, civil awards, GSM somewhere, served WWII all over the place Africa, Italy, Europe, you name it .....

Dread thought, they might not be kosher.

[Paul_1957]

The ribbon on the 3rd row from the top at the far right - isn't it for the Royal Navy LSGC medal? If not, what is it? The Africa General Service Medal positioned after the second world war medals must have been for service in Kenya in the 1950s.

Paul

[Mervyn Mitton]

Sorry to say it , Paul - but, the combinations are very far fetched. For your sake I hope I'm wrong, but with so many gallantry ribbons, if I were shown this in the shop , I would be thinking something made-up for a collection. With the CB it would have been as an officer - but, the uniform material does not look to be officer's quality ? I hope someone can find a match for the man.

[Paul L Murphy]

Some more details on the construction etc.

The ribbons are as follows :

1st Row : Order of the Bath; Order of the British Empire (Civil)

2nd Row : DSO; MC and bar; 1914-18 War Medal

3rd Row : Victory Medal with MiD; Territorial Force War Medal; 1908-36 Indian General Service Medal

4th Row : 1918-62 General Service Medal with MiD; 1939-45 Star, Africa Star with 8th Army bar;

5th Row : Italy Star; France & Germany Star; Defense Medal; War Medal;

6th Row : Africa Service Medal; Territorial Efficiency Medal or Territorial Decoration (same ribbon); French Medaille Militaire; French WWII Croix de Guerre

The ribbons are all original silk type material and all seem to be made over a cardboard core. The ribbons, thread etc. do not glow under a black light so if this was made up (which is always possible) then it was done a long time ago. The source for both this and the other ribbon group was an ebay seller who did not normally sell military items, listed them at £1 each (or thereabouts), and claimed that they came from a military tailor who had the job of disposing of old uniforms and who kept the badges and ribbons that he removed from these. A plausible stoty, but then again stories are easily made up and difficult to verify. For what I paid for this it was worth a punt on it being original since the component parts definitely are.

If it is original then what clues have we got so far ? His highest award could be a Companion of the Bath so this would open it up to Colonels etc. He has a post 1937 civil CBE ? He joined the territorial army before 1910 (4 years service before the outbreak of WWI was a requirement for the Territorial Force War Medal). He served in Kenya since this is the only post WWII bar to the AGS. He was awarded the French Medaille Militaire in WWI, which means he was an enlisted man for at least part of his active service between 1916-18. He was decorated for bravery three times after he became an officer (DSO and two MCs). While this is not impossible, it is implausible.

Mervyn's comment on the uniform cloth is very valid, and not something I had paid much attention to up to now. The cloth is consistent with WWII other ranks battledress uniform cloth, not officer's cloth. I have re-examined it from the reverse. It does not show up well in the photo but the fourth and fifth rows of ribbons are stiched with a much better quality of stich than the other rows. The top three rows have a large "tacking stitch" for want of a better expression. This continues onto the other rows but beneath it you can see a finer stich in rows four and five. The last row is stitched on with a different colour thread (white rather than cream). This leads me to conclude that the original ribbons for this are the GSM with MiD and the WWII medals, ie. rows four and five only. I suspect the rest were added later, even though they are all genuine parts. I will probably break it into its constituent parts and leave the original two rows on the cloth, unless someone out there still thinks that it is an original grouping.

:cheers:

[Graham Stewart]

The baffling bit to me is having the Territorial medals and two GSM's. Certainly they could be attributed to an ex-regular enlisting into the TF on Discharge, but you'd be hard pressed to find an officer or other rank of the TF doing 'general service' at this time.