Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

British South Africa Company Medal 1890-97, reverse undated, 3 clasps, Mashonaland 1890, Matabeleland 1893, Rhodesia 1896 (Tpr. Christison, T. J. - Pioneers.) nearly extremely fine £3,000-£4,000

Only 16 medals issued with these three clasps.

Thomas James Christison was born in Scotland on 2 June 1863. He served in Mashonaland 1890 with the Pioneer Corps at Trooper No. 164. He was a Lieutenant in the Salisbury Horse during the Matabele rebellion of 1893, and as Captain and Adjutant in the Salisbury Field Force in the 1896 rebellion.

According to The Pioneers of Mashonaland by Adrian Darter, Christison was onetime adjutant of the Capetown Highlanders. The same author also recounts an incident in which Christison discharged his revolver in Darter’s direction, unwittingly forgetting that he had put the revolver away loaded in one chamber - ‘There was a report and the earthenware pot I was sitting over and dropping the sweet potatoes in, fell shattered to atoms.’ Christison died at Broken Hill, Northern Rhodesia, on 30 October 1932.