Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Five: Brigadier-General the Earl of Shaftesbury, K.P., G.C.V.O., C.B.E., 10th Hussars and North Irish Horse, who commanded the South Western Mounted Brigade during the Great War, and was later Lord Lieutenant of Dorset and Lord Steward of the Household

British War Medal 1914-20 (Brig. Gen. Earl of Shaftesbury.); Coronation 1902, silver; Coronation 1911; Jubilee 1935; Coronation 1937, mounted as worn and housed in a fitted case, good very fine (5) £600-800

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Collection of Medals to Members of the Nobility and The Royal Household.

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K.P. London Gazette 19 June 1911.

G.C.V.O. London Gazette 1 January 1924.

K.C.V.O. London Gazette 15 May 1906: ‘On the occasion of the visit of Their Royal Highnesses the Prince and Princess of Wales to India.’

C.B.E. London Gazette 3 June 1919.

Order of St. John, Knight of Justice London Gazette 5 June 1923.

Anthony Ashley-Cooper, 9th Earl of Shaftesbury, was born on 31 August 1869, the only son of the 8th Earl of Shaftesbury and his wife Lady Harriet, daughter of the Marquess of Donegall; and the grandson of the 7th Earl of Shaftesbury, the great Victorian social reformer. He was commissioned into the 10th Hussars in 1890, and was promoted Lieutenant the following year. Appointed Military Secretary and Aide-de-Camp to the Earl Brassey, Governor of Victoria, in 1895, he served in that role for three years, before being promoted Captain in 1898. Transferring to the Reserve in the Dorset Imperial Yeomanry in 1899, he was promoted Lieutenant-Colonel and took up the command of the North Irish Horse on 12 March 1902, an appointment that he held for the next ten years, subsequently becoming Honorary Colonel of the Regiment. Appointed Lord-Lieutenant for Belfast in 1904, and Lord Mayor of Belfast in 1907, he was created a Knight of the Most Illustrious Order of St. Patrick at a ceremony held at Dublin Castle on 10 July 1911- he and Field Marshal the Earl Kitchener of Khartoum were the last two Knights of the Order of St. Patrick to be created, and were personally invested by H.M. King George V in what was the last visit by a British ruling monarch to Dublin for 100 years. Later that year he was appointed Lord Lieutenant for County Antrim. On the outbreak of the Great War he was appointed to command the 1st South Western Mounted Brigade, and was promoted temporary Brigadier-General. He served throughout the Great War, going out to France on the Staff in 1916, before relinquishing his command on 1 March 1919, when he was granted the honorary rank of Brigadier-General. He was not entitled to the Victory Medal.

Upon the death of his father on 13 April 1886 Lord Shaftesbury succeeded to the Earldom as 9th Earl of Shaftesbury, as well as the subsidiary titles of Baron Ashley and Baron Cooper. He married Lady Constance Grosvenor, eldest daughter of Earl Grosvenor, son of the 1st Duke of Westminster, on 15 July 1899, with whom he had two sons and two daughters. He subsequently served as Lord Lieutenant of Dorset, Lord Chamberlain to H.M. Queen Mary (having served as Chamberlain to her whilst she was Princess of Wales); and Lord Steward of the Household. He died on 25 March 1961, and was succeeded to the Earldom by his grandson, his eldest son having pre-deceased him. The title is extant, with the present earl being the recipient’s great-grandson.