Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A rare Great War ‘Escaper’s M.M. group of four awarded to Private W. J. Perry, Coldstream Guards, who provided a vivid account of the harsh conditions endured by German-held Prisoners-of-War

Military Medal, G.V.R. (12522 Pte. W. J. Perry. 1/C. Gds.); 1914-15 Star (12522 Pte. W. J. Perry. C. Gds.); British War and Victory Medals (12522 Pte. W. J. Perry. C. Gds.) polished, fine and better (4) £1200-1600

Provenance: Sir Torquil Matheson Collection.
Bill and Angela Strong Collection, Dix Noonan Webb, May 2011.

M.M. London Gazette 30 January 1920:
‘In recognition of gallant conduct and determination displayed in escaping or trying to escape from captivity, which services have been brought to notice in accordance with terms of Army Order 193 of 1919.’

William John Perry was born in Camberwell, London, in 1880 and attested for the Coldstream Guards at Caterham on 15 September 1914. He served with the 1st Battalion during the Great War on the Western Front from 9 January 1915, and was captured by the Germans at La Bassee on 25 January 1915. He was held as a prisoner-of-war in camps at Giessen, 28 January-20 February 1915; then at Merseburg, 20 February-7 April 1915. At this camp, Perry refers to a punishment inflicted on prisoners: ‘One of the punishments was to stand a man on two bricks and tie him to a tree, then when he was properly trussed up, kick the bricks away and leaving him with just his toes on the ground for two or three hours’. He was then held at Haselbach, 7 April 1915-17 January 1916. Here, Perry refers to the guards at that camp as ‘very rough and on one occasion when one of them thought I was not working hard enough he dealt me a heavy blow on my back with the butt end of his rifle, causing an abscess to form later’. Perry was then transferred back to Giessen, 17 January-16 February 1916; and then to Quedlinburg, 16 February 1916-18 January 1917. It was at this camp that Perry attempted to escape. A tunnelling attempt was brought to a halt by the presence of water but by sawing through the bars of a window he and six others made a bid for freedom on 18 January. Separating from the others, he was recaptured later in the month near Osnabruck, having walked some 400 miles. For his temerity, he was sentenced to 10 months’ imprisonment and on 29 January 1917 was taken to Cologne and held in a penal camp in the fortress there. Notwithstanding the extra harsh conditions there, Perry contrived to escape on 10 April 1917 when having volunteered for a work detail, he slipped away from the guards in the midst of a sudden snow storm. Five days later he was able to cross into Dutch territory at Venlo. Then via the British Consul at Rotterdam he was sent to Hull, arriving on 24 April. Perry was discharged as no longer physically fit for war service on 18 December 1917.

The lot is sold with a quantity of copied official papers in which Perry provided vivid details of the conditions at the various camps he was held in. Camp discipline, the behaviour of guards, behaviour of the locals, German moral, prisoner’s food, clothing, and food parcels, medical and sanitary conditions are all commented upon.

Food was invariably bad - often little better than bread and water; prisoners walked around in rags; sanitary conditions were shocking and medical attention often non-existent. Conditions were at their worst at the penal camp at Cologne. Perry recalls men suffering months of solitary confinement; men being placed in straight jackets as punishment; others being prodded with bayonets at the slightest provocation, until blood was drawn; others dying of starvation. Perry mentions two men by name who died in this way - one a Private Brooks ‘of the Canadians’ and another man, named ‘Banks’, regiment unknown, who had done over 10 months of a 12 month sentence. The Germans gave the cause of his death as ‘dying of congestion of the lungs’, whereas he had died of cold and privation, having just finished 10 days in the cells on short rations for daring to report sick. These and other issues highlighted by Perry were brought to the Prisoner of War Department at Downing Street and the Secretary to the Army Council, prompting an urgent protest to the German Government.