Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The mounted group of seven miniature dress medals worn by Colonel H. S. Moberly, C.B., Indian Army, the gallant C.O. of the 66th Punjabis during the siege of Kut, ‘who made it his nightly practice to go to the listening point nearest the Turkish lines and from it shout at the enemy curses and insults of the most lurid kind’

The Most Honourable Order of the Bath, Military, gold and enamel; China 1900, no clasp; 1914-15 Star; British War and Victory Medals, M.I.D. oak leaf; India General Service 1908-35, 1 clasp, Waziristan 1919-21; Delhi Durbar 1911, mounted as worn, the second somewhat polished, otherwise generally very fine (7) £240-280

Hugh Stephenson Moberly was born in August 1873, the fifth and youngest son of Colonel Charles Moberly, late Indian Army, and was educated at Malvern College and the R.M.C. Sandhurst. Commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant in January 1895, he joined the Indian Army in the following year and was serving as a Double Company Commander in the 16th Madras Infantry at the time of the Boxer Rebellion in 1900. Advanced to Captain in August 1902, he removed to the 66th Punjabis in September 1909 and was serving in the rank of Major on the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914.

Ordered to join General Townshend’s force in Mesopotamia, the 66th Punjabis became besieged at Kut, where Moberly, who had been advanced to Lieutenant-Colonel in June 1916, commanded the Regiment - and the respect of his men, who greatly admired his taunting of the enemy, as recounted by Russell Braddon’s The Siege:

‘The Colonel commanding the 66th Punjabis made it his nightly practice to go to the listening point nearest the Turkish lines and from it shout at the enemy curses and insults of the most lurid kind.’

Almost certainly taken P.O.W. at the fall of Kut, Moberly remained in the Indian Army after the War, gaining advancement to Colonel in April 1920 and the C.B. in 1926. He was placed on the Retired List in May 1928 and settled in South Africa, where he died in September 1947; sold with full research and an original page taken from the recipient’s photograph album, comprising six images, including of him on horseback.