Orders, Decorations and Medals Including five Special Collections

A Great War M.C. group of nine awarded to Lieutenant-Colonel R. D. Baird, Rifle Brigade

Military Cross, G.V.R.; 1914 Star, with clasp (2. Lieut., Rif. Brig.); British War and Victory Medals, with M.I.D. oak leaf (Capt.); India General Service 1908-35, 1 clasp, Waziristan 1919-21, naming erased; 1939-45 Star; Defence and War Medals 1939-1945; Coronation 1937, first war trio polished, therefore about nearly very fine, otherwise generally good very fine or better (9) £600-700

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Fine Collection of of Great War Medals to the Rifle Brigade.

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Collection

M.C. London Gazette 3 June 1918.

Rifle Brigade Whos Who sates Mentioned in Despatches twice during the Great War.

Robert Douglas Baird was educated at Winchester and commissioned in the Rifle Brigade from the Special Reserve on 14 August 1914. The same month he accompanied the battalion to France, commanding a platoon in “A” Company. He was in the Retreat From Mons and Battles of Le Cateau, Aisne and First Ypres. He was wounded on 22 November, at duty, and again in an attack at Ploegsteert Wood on 19 December. His name was forwarded for recognition in connection with operations in 1914. Baird returned to France August 1915-October 1916 as ADC to Gen. Chetwode & remained his ADC as a Corps Commander in Palestine. He obtained a field posting as a company commander in 2/24th London Regiment in July 1917 and was wounded for a third time in the attack on Beersheba on 7 October. ADC to Chetwode once more, 1918-19 then returned to regimental soldiering with the 4th Rifle Brigade at Quetta, 1920-22. The Waziristan IGS, a very rare medal to the R.B., was earned thus: “The Colonel and Baird went to the Expedition against the Mahsud tribe in Waziristan in February and stayed there just over a month, while Baird again went to Waziristan in November to take part in operations against the Wana Wazirs” (R.B. Chronicle, 1920). 1st Bn. in India and the U.K. 1922-1939 when he retired, having been promoted Major in 1934; recalled in 1939 and served with the Training Battalion and on the staff as a GSO2 until finally retiring in 1948. All medals confirmed in the RB Who’s Who.

The India Office Library contains a letter book of Baird’s 1914-18 correspondence, some copies of which accompany the group, with much interesting detail, e.g., Retreat from Mons: “There is one thing I wonder if you could get me, and that is a Sam Browne belt… I had to discard mine at Ligny on August 26th… I also lost all the accoutrements there… I lost my things at Ligny like this. The glasses (those lovely ones of father’s) were smashed by a shot. The other things are hanging up, perhaps, still in the hedge on the railway at Ligny. When we did our bolt on the railway, my sword and water bottle got caught in the hedge, and I got stuck in it and was being shot to pieces more or less in the back so the only thing to do was to slip out of my belt and bolt without anything, and I only just got away in time too.” Crossing the Aisne: “Mine was the leading company of the Battalion... Well, if you please, at 1 a.m. on a pouring night, we got to a bridge only half of one of whose supports was left (the others having been blown down). We proceeded to cross in single file & 10 paces between each man… no scouts had gone on to see what was on the other side! …our Battalion all alone marched up the hill in front with no scouts, or covering party out. We reached the top at dawn to find some enemy on three sides of us. We remained up there all day alone and unassisted, facing what we afterwards discovered to be 3 divisions…”

Sold with copy group photo.