Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Six: Chief Petty Officer J. Clifton, Royal Navy

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 1 (copy) clasp, Natal (190114 J. Clifton, Ord., H.M.S. Terrible); China 1900, 1 clasp, Relief of Pekin (J. Clifton, A.B., H.M.S. Terrible); 1914-15 Star (190114 J. Clifton, P.O. 1, R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (190114 J. Clifton, C.P.O., R.N.); Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., 1st issue (190114 James Clifton, P.O., H.M.S. Pembroke), together with standard pattern I.D. discs (3), and two old foreign coins, one of them, a silver German Mark of 1909, adapted for use as another identity disc, the whole contained in a Queen Mary 1914 Christmas Tin, with assorted ribands, the earlier awards with contact marks and edge bruising, but otherwise generally very fine or better (Lot) £600-700

James Clifton was born in Amersham, Buckinghamshire in October 1880 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class in August 1896.

Joining H.M.S. Terrible in April 1898, he went on to witness active service in the Boer War and Boxer Rebellion, including the relief of Pekin operations, but he was not entitled to the clasp for “Natal”.

Awarded his L.S. & G.C. Medal in November 1913, he was serving as a Petty Officer in the Blenheim by the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, in which capacity he remained employed until removing to the Implacable in July 1917. An equally brief spell having then been passed in the shore base Pembroke, he joined the gunboat Dwarf in October of the latter year and remained similarly employed until June 1919.

Pensioned ashore in November 1920, Clifton died in 1957, aged 77 years; sold with copied service record and several portrait photographs.