Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A well-documented and highly emotive group of three awarded to Private J. Daymond, Royal Newfoundland Regiment, wounded on the “First Day of the Somme”, one of 684 casualties sustained by the 1st Battalion within 40 minutes of going “over the top” into a hail of enemy machine-gun fire: the site of the Newfoundlanders’ sacrifice is today the best preserved trench system on the Somme and boasts the famous Caribou memorial

1914-15 Star (607 Pte., R. Newf’d R.); British War and Victory Medals (607 Pte., R. Newf’d R.) good very fine and extremely rare (3) £800-1200

Joseph Daymond was born in St. John’s, Newfoundland in November 1896 and enlisted in the Royal Newfoundland Regiment in October 1914. He was a member of ‘B’ Company of the 1st Battalion on 1 July 1916, when he would appeared to have held the rank of Lance-Corporal, and was wounded in the face.

No better summary of the massacre of the Newfoundlanders can be found than in Martin Middlebrook’s definitive account The First Day of the Somme (Allen Lane, 1971):

‘The Newfoundlanders had heard the pre-bombardment, the explosion of the Hawthorn Redoubt mine and then the German machine-guns when the leading brigades made their attacks. An anxious wait followed while wounded and rumour brought the news that the attack had not been successful. ‘But it was recalled that the awards awaiting them were not confined to the honours of battle. For had not a prominent St. John’s society maiden let it be known, by confiding in her friends, and they to all who would listen, that she intended to marry the first V.C. in the battalion?’ (2nd Lieutenant C. S. Frost, 1st Newfoundland Regiment).

In his H.Q. dug-out, Lieutenant-Colonel Hadow, the English officer commanding the battalion, received his orders by phone from the brigade commander. These were simple. The Newfoundlanders were to leave their position as soon as possible and advance to the German front line. The 1st Essex, on their right, would also attack. Hadow asked questions: Were the German trenches held by British or Germans? He was told that the situation was uncertain. Was he to move independently of the Essex? Yes. Colonel Hadow must have been unhappy, but he had been given a direct order. He gave out his own orders and in a few minutes the battalion was ready.

The Newfoundlanders had to go 300 yards before reaching the British front line and then a similar distance across No Man’s Land. In view of the urgency of their orders they went straight over the top from the reserve trench, instead of going to the front line by way of congested communication trenches. As soon as they appeared in the open, the German machine-gunners spotted them and opened fire. No artillery bombardment kept the Germans’ heads down; no other targets distracted them, for the Essex had not appeared. They concentrated their fire on the 752 Newfoundlanders advancing over the open ground less than half a mile away. Before the men could even get into No Man’s Land they had to pass through several belts of British barbed wire.

As the Newfoundlanders bunched together to get through the narrow gaps in this wire, the German machine-gunners found their best killing ground. Dead and wounded men soon blocked every gap, but those still not hit struggled on, having to walk over their comrades’ bodies.

More experienced or less resolute men might have given up and sought shelter in such impossible conditions, but not the Newfoundlanders. Those who survived to reach No Man’s Land continued towards the German trenches, but they had no chance. A few dozen men could not cross No Man’s Land without any support in broad daylight and, inevitably, the German fire cut these down. The attack was watched by a survivor of an earlier attack from a nearby shell hole: ‘On came the Newfoundlanders, a great body of men, but the fire intensified and they were wiped out in front of my eyes. I cursed the generals for their useless slaughter, they seemed to have no idea what was going on’ (Private F. H. Cameron, 1st King’s Own Scottish Borderers). Only a handful of Newfoundlanders reached the German wire. There they were shot.

The attack had lasted forty minutes. Rarely can a battalion have been so completely smashed in such a short time. Of those who had attacked, ninety-one per cent had become casualties - twenty-six officers and 658 men. Every officer who had left the trenches had been killed or wounded, even some who had no right to be there at all: the quartermaster, a captain, whose normal duties kept him behind lines, was one of the wounded.

What had this battalion, which had sailed with such high hopes from St. John’s a year and a half earlier, achieved? It is probable that not a single German soldier was killed or wounded by their attack and no friendly unit had been helped to improve its position. The more experienced Essex battalion had insisted on going up the communications trenches to the front line before starting its attack; this manoeuvre had taken two hours, by which time the Newfoundlanders’ attack was over. The Essex, too, failed to reach the German wire, but their more careful approach kept casualties down to one third of the Newfoundlanders’ terrible total.’

The well-paid ranks of the Newfoundlanders, who were known to British troops as the “F-----g Five Bobbers”, and who had earlier served with distinction in Gallipoli, had more than earned their pay.

After the War, the Newfoundland government purchased the land at Beaumont Hamel that had witnessed their gallant countrymen’s sacrifice and established the Newfoundland Memorial Park. As Martin Middlebrook notes, ‘for many years the barbed-wire defences were also preserved but these had to be be removed as too many sheep were trapped in the wire’, but numerous iron picket bars that originally supported the wire remain in place. In fact, the park constitutes the best preserved trench system to be found on the Somme today, the whole overlooked by a spectacular bronze caribou, atop a mound of granite, the official memorial to Newfoundland’s fallen. A fine aerial photograph of the area appears on the front cover of The Somme Then and Now, by John Giles (After the Battle publications), as indeed do other images and information within the book.

Sold with a quantity of original documentation, including the recipient’s Soldier’s Pay Book (For Use on Active Service), the inside front cover stamped ‘Newfoundland Contingent, 56 Victoria Street, London S.W., Jul. 6 1916’ but actually with entries dating from August 1915; Army discharge certificate, in the rank of Lance-Corporal, dated at St. John’s on 29 December 1916, in consequence of ‘being no longer physically fit for war service’ - scars to his back, face and left-shoulder are noted; Government House, St. John’s letter of reference, dated 10 August 1917, which confirms that Daymond was ‘wounded in the lower jaw on July 1st 1916’ and that his ambition was to enlist in the R.F.C. ‘with his chum No. 585 L./Corp. A. E. Parsons, also honourably discharged’; Royal Newfoundland Regiment H.Q. letter of reference, dated on the following day, this confirming his discharge ‘as a result of wounds received at the Battle of the Somme, July 1st 1916’; Royal Flying Corps (Canada) transfer card, with entries for flying experience between 1917-18; regimental discharge certificate, in the rank of Sergeant, dated 14 March 1919; Mercantile Marine discharge certificates, in the rank of 1st Engineer, dated at St. John’s on 22 April and 16 August 1921; U.S.A. certificate of naturalization, signed and dated in the District of New Jersey on 29 November 1941, which notes ‘gunshot wound on right side of face’; and a copy birth certificate, dated 30 May 1942; together with two Great War period portrait photographs in uniform.

Private Daymond was one of the ‘First 500’ to leave Newfoundland on active service. These men were also known as the ‘Blue Puttees’