Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A rare Defence of Legations Military Order of the Dragon pair awarded to Mr L. H. R. Barr, Student Interpreter, H.B.M. Consular Service, who died at sea in 1915 having recently been appointed one of H.Ms. Vice-Consuls in China

China 1900, 1 clasp, Defence of Legations (L. H. R. Barr. Consular Service) officially impressed naming; U.S.A., Military Order of the Dragon (Leslie H. R. Barr H.B.M.C.S. No. 1139.) complete with pagoda top suspension brooch and original ribbon, this somewhat distressed and detached from suspension, nearly extremely fine and extremely rare (2) £6000-8000

Sold with original Post Card, dated 26 May 1906, from the Military Order of the Dragon, Office of the Secretary, addressed to Mr L. H. R. Barr at the British Consul, Shanghai, advising him of the dispatch under separate cover of the Certificate of Membership in the Military Order of the Dragon. Original correspondence from this society is of the highest rarity, only a small handful of any such examples being known to have survived. According to the membership roll of the Military Order of the Dragon only seven recipients of the medal also received the British medal for the Defence of Legations. The pair is also accompanied by a piece of modern replacement ribbon for the Military Order of the Dragon, and four copied group photographs which include Barr in Pekin before and during the siege.

Leslie Harry Rupert Barr was born in 1877. He was appointed a Student Interpreter in Her Britannic Majesty’s Consular Service, in China, Japan, or Siam, in the London Gazette of 6 June 1899.

The British Consular Service in China had been founded in 1842 and, by the end of the nineteenth century, there were twenty-seven British consular posts in China, staffed by two Consuls-General, twenty-one Consuls, three Vice-Consuls, eleven First-Class Assistants, twenty-two Second-Class Assistants and twenty-five Student Interpreters. This last category, the most junior grade, was made up of new entrants who spent their first two years in Pekin studying the language with only minimal office work.

Leslie Barr was thus in Pekin when the Boxer rebellion broke out in 1900, and was present throughout the defence of the Legations from 20 June to 14 August. The Student Interpreters were formed into their own little Corps, properly armed, so that they could fully participate in the siege. It is recorded that when, on the 5th July, several solid iron shots crashed through the north wall of the students’ quarters, Barr’s room suffered most.

The death in action of Student Interpreter Henry Warren on 15 July was followed the following day by the death of Captain B. M. Strouts, R.M.L.I. Both men were buried at 6 p.m. that same evening with all foreign ministers and officers in attendance. Sprouts’ coffin was borne by six officers, Warren’s by eight students, including Barr. As the two bodies were being laid side by side in the Legation cemetery, three shells dropped consecutively over the assembled crowd. At the same time a messenger to the Chinese arrived under a flag of truce bearing the first letter from the outside world since the siege began.

According to the diary of another Student Interpreter, Lancelot Giles, writing on 28 July, ‘A rather amusing story is going about with reference to Barr. He gets very riled when chaffed about it. He was on watch in the Hanlin one night when the patrol went round. The patrol (a marine), seeing a head above the barricade, called out, “Who’s that?”. Barr hastily answered: “Ba, ba.” The marine, thinking it was a Chinese soldier rotting him, levelled his rifle, when Barr hastily dashed forward into the light. As the sergeant said afterwards, Barr should really prefix Mr. to his name.’

After the lifting of the siege Barr continued in the Consular Service in China, becoming a First-Class Assistant in January 1910. In February 1915 he was appointed to be one of His Majesty’s Vice-Consuls in China (London Gazette 6 April 1915 refers) but died at sea shortly afterwards on board the S.S. Kaiping on 25 June 1915, aged 38.