Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Six: Chief Stoker P. T. J. Davis, Royal Navy, who was awarded the Naval M.S.M. for minesweeping operations during the Great War

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, no clasp (P. Davis, Lg. Sto., H.M.S. Sappho); 1914-15 Star (279947 P. T. J. Davis. Ch. Sto., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (279947 P. T. T. Davis. Ch. Sto., R.N.) note initials; Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., E.VII.R. (279947 P. T. J. Davis, Stoker P.O., H.M.S. Natal) surname officially corrected; Royal Naval Meritorious Service Medal, G.V.R. (279947 P. T. J. Davis. Ch. Sto. “Gaddesden” Minesweeping 1918) mounted on card for display, contact marks, otherwise very fine or better (6) £600-£800

Captain K. J. Douglas-Morris Collection, Dix Noonan Webb, October 1996; Dix Noonan Webb, March 2007.

Percy Thomas John Davis was born at Wingham, Kent in December 1875 and entered the Royal Navy as a Stoker 2nd Class in July 1895. He subsequently served in H.M.S. Sappho from August of the same year to September 1901, a period that witnessed his advancement to Leading Stoker 1st Class and service off South Africa. He was awarded his L.S. & G.C. Medal in September 1910, serving in HMS Natal. By the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, Davis was serving as a Chief Stoker in the battleship St. Vincent, but in November of the same year he transferred to the Auxiliary Patrol with an appointment in the destroyer Ure. Having served off the Belgian coast in the same ship 1915-16, he came ashore in October 1917, but returned to sea in the Hunt-class minesweeper Gaddesden in February 1918. And it was for his subsequent services in the latter ship that he was awarded his M.S.M. ‘For services in minesweeping operations between 1 July and 31 December 1918’ (London Gazette 24 March 1919 refers). Davis was demobilised in the same month that his M.S.M. was gazetted.

Sold with copied record of service.