Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A rare and well-documented Second World War Italy operations Stretcher Bearer’s M.M. group of six awarded to Corporal E. J. Slade, Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment

Military Medal, G.VI.R. (13020903 L. Cpl. E. J. Slade, Bedfs. & Herts. R.), in its original card box of issue, complete with outer packaging and registered envelope; 1939-45 Star; Africa Star, clasp, 1st Army; Italy Star; Defence and War Medals, M.I.D. oak leaf, with original addressed card forwarding box for the latter, and two Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment badges, the first with minor official correction to unit, extremely fine (6) £1800-2200

One of just 14 Military Medals (M.M.) awarded to men of the Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment in the 1939-45 War.

M.M. London Gazette 8 March 1945. The original recommendation for an immediate award states:

‘On 18 September 1944, Lance-Corporal Slade was attached as a Stretcher Bearer to a Company attacking C. Brioli. During the assault the Company Commander and his runner were hit by M.G. fire. By himself, with complete disregard to his own safety, Lance-Corporal Slade went forward at once across the open and, amidst the firing, dressed the wounds of the officer and man and brought them back to the safety of a house. He then supervised the dressing and evacuation of the other casualties on the bullet swept battlefield.

On the night of 30 September 1944, his Company were still holding their position and subject to heavy shelling, which buried three men. Helping to unearth the men with the shells still falling around him, Lance-Corporal Slade tended to them, comforting two of them who shortly afterwards died in his arms.

This N.C.O. has been almost continually in action for eight months and these acts of courage are merely the culmination of sustained and unselfish devotion to duty of the highest order.’

Mention in despatches London Gazette 29 November 1945.

Edward Joseph Slade, who was born in London in November 1916, was a fish salesman prior to enlisting for the duration of hostilities in April 1940. Posted to the 2nd Battalion, the Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment in October of the same year, he went on to serve in North Africa and in Italy, mainly as a Stretcher Bearer, and was awarded the M.M. and a “mention” for the latter theatre of war. He was discharged to the Army Reserve in June 1946.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including Buckingham Palace King’s letter for the M.M., in the name of ‘13020903 L./Cpl. E. J. Slade, M.M., The Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment’, together with related War Office forwarding letter, dated 18 April 1945, and a copy of the London Gazette announcing the award; M.I.D. certificate in the name of ‘Lance-Corporal E. J. Slade, M.M., The Bedfordshire and Hertfordshire Regiment’, dated 29 November 1945, with envelope and related Infantry Record Office forwarding letter, this dated 25 July 1947, and War Office communication forwarding the oak leaf; a First Aid booklet, carried no doubt by the recipient while serving as a Stretcher Bearer; his Post Office Savings Bank book; Soldier’s Service and Pay Book; Soldier’s Release Book, Class ‘A’; Certificate of Transfer to the Army Reserve; Record of Service card; an Army Medical Service British I.D. card, issued in February 1945; a medical chart recording the recipient’s ‘renal glycosuria curve’, dated 8 January 1946 at No. 97 (B.) General Hospital; several wartime photographs, and half-a-dozen or so hand drawn Christmas and birthday cards, as sent by the recipient to his wife while on active service; and assorted cloth uniform rank, regimental and divisional insignia.