Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Waterloo 1815 (Capt. W. H. Stopford, Royal Foot Artillery) fitted with replacement steel clip and ring suspension, light contact marks and bruise in obverse field, otherwise very fine £1800-2200

William Henry Stopford was the third son of Lieutenant-General Hon. Edward Stopford, 3rd Foot Guards. He entered the Royal Artillery on 15 September 1804, becoming Lieutenant in July 1805 and Captain on 1 April 1815. He served on the expedition to Rio de La Plata, South America, 1806-07, and in the Netherlands and France from April 1814 to October 1818. As second-in-command of Captain Sandham’s Brigade of Foot Artillery, he was present at Quatre Bras and Waterloo, where he received a contusion, and at the capture of Paris. This Brigade, with five 9-pounders and one 5.5-inch howitzer, remained in the same position in the front line throughout the day at Waterloo, and yet all five officers remained unscathed, despite a furious charge by a body of Cuirassiers. This troop claims to have fired the first Anglo-Allied cannon shot of the battle, a claim disputed by other units, including Captain Cleeve’s battery of the K.G.L.

Stopford, who assumed the additional surname of Blair on succeeding to the Penninghame estate, County Wigtown, retired on half-pay as Brevet Lieutenant-Colonel on 20 December 1841, and was promoted to Colonel on 20 June 1854. Colonel Stopford-Blair died on 23 September 1868.