Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Family Group:

The British War Medals awarded to Mr. W. P. Hancock and Mrs K. G. Hancock, both students of the Bible Training College and Young Men’s Christian Association Volunteers who served in Egypt during the Great War

British War Medal 1914-20 (2) (W. P. Hancock; K. G. Hancock.) nearly extremely fine (2) £140-£180

William Philip Hancock was born in 1892 in Neath, Glamorgan. In the 1911 Census he is recorded as residing in his parents household at of 2 Bryn Road, Neath. He was sponsored by one of the missionary societies to attend the Oswald Chambers Bible Training College, at Clapham Common, and had as a fellow student Kathleen Ballinger. He joined the Y.M.C.A. at the outbreak of war and spent several months at the Y.M.C.A. refreshment centre at Salisbury Plain. He then served as a volunteer and ‘Y.M.C.A. Secretary’ (being the equivalent of officer rank in the army) in Egypt with the Y.M.C.A. In the meantime Kathleen Ballinger had also volunteered for service in Egypt and they married at Al Qahirah, Cairo Egypt, in 1918. After they married they worked together at Ismailia. The Y.M.C.A. medal roll notes that he was resident at the Y.M.C.A. Red Triangle Club, Carpenter’s Road, Stratford, London, and confirms that he has served in Egypt from 4 December 1915. They worked for some time as missionaries in Persia during the 1920’s. They both emigrated to the U.S.A. in 1929, landing in New York, he stating himself to be a Missionary, and she as housewife, their U.K. address being the Mission Guest House, Selly Oak, Birmingham, subsequently settling in Gustine, Merced, California, where they were still resident in 1930. They returned to the U.K., now with three children, landing at Southampton on the S.S. Mauretania in 1931, stating the family address to be St. Johns Wood Lane, London. William Philip Hancock died at Bath in January 1985.

Kathleen Gertrude Hancock, née Ballinger, was born at Aylburton, Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, in 1890. In 1911 she is recorded as a shop assistant working in Cheltenham at the Cavendish House store, and was a Boarder in accommodation provided by her employer. After attending the Bible Training College she also volunteered for service with the Y.M.C.A., and departed the U.K. for Egypt in September 1916, arriving in Post Said, Egypt in September 1916. She married William Philip Hancock at Al Qahirah, Cairo Egypt, in 1918. The Y.M.C.A. medal roll confirms that she had served in Egypt from September 1916 to May 1919, and that her address was at 12 Brook Street, Gloucester. She died in Bath, Somerset in 1974.

Sold with copied research including a photographic image of the couple with their eldest child.