Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A Great War O.B.E., Balkan War group of five awarded to Dr. C. J. R. MacFadden, St. John Ambulance Brigade

The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire, O.B.E. (Civil) Officer’s 1st type breast badge, silver-gilt (hallmarks for London 1918); Coronation 1911, St. John Ambulance Brigade (Hon. Surg. C. J. R. McFadden.); St. John Service Medal, with two Additional Award Bars (1335. Dist. Surg: C. J. R. Mac.Faden. M.D. No.1, District. Surgeon. S.J.A.B. 1918.); British Red Cross Society Medal for the Balkan Wars 1912-13, 1 clasp, Bulgaria, with top ‘Balkan Allies War 1913’ riband bar, silver-gilt and enamel, reverse inscribed ‘C. J. R. MacFadden M.D.’; Bulgaria, Kingdom, Order of Civil Merit, 5th Class breast badge, 68mm including crown suspension x 45mm, with crown, silver and enamel, good very fine and better (5) £1000-1400

O.B.E. London Gazette 18 June 1919:
‘For valuable service rendered in or in connection with Military Hospitals, Territorial Hospitals, War Hospitals, Auxiliary and Civil Hospitals, Command Depôts, Convalescent Camps, or any other duties of a similar nature in the United Kingdom in connection with the Army during the War.’

Commander, Order of St. John London Gazette 24 June 1927

Cecil John Read MacFadden was educated at Edinburgh University, graduating as M.B. in 1894 and M.D. in 1898. ‘He served as surgeon to the British Red Cross Hospital, Bulgarian Relief Section, in the second Balkan War, and was appointed a Chevalier of the Bulgarian Order of Civil Merit. For his service in connection with the European War he received the decoration of the O.B.E. Since 1919 he has been a Divisional Surgeon to the Metropolitan Police; Assistant Commissioner of the Prince of Wales’s district of the St. John Ambulance Brigade; and an honorary life member, examiner, and a member of the executive committee of the Hampstead Division of the British Medical Association. He died on 26 June 1930, aged 59.’ (recipient’s obituary in the British Medical Journal refers).

Sold together with a copy of the Hampstead and Highgate Express, 5 July 1930, containing a photograph of the recipient and a report of his funeral.

Note: The recipient’s miniature awards sold in these rooms in March 2014.