Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

The rare Relief of Wexford presentation Gold Medal given to Captain James Boyd, Wexford Cavalry, for being the ‘First at the head of his Lieutenant and Eight Privates of his troop to enter the Town on the 21st of June 1798’

Corporation of Wexford presentation gold medal, comprising oval convex and concave plates, approximately 70mm x 55mm, of low carat gold, unmarked, mated together within an oval band, the convex plate with finely engraved inscription: ‘On the 29th of June 1799 this medal was voted by the Corporation of Wexford to James Boyd Esqr., Captain of the Wexford Cavalry. In being the FIRST at the head of his Lieutenant and Eight Privates of his troop to enter the Town on the 21st of June 1798, then in pofsefsion of the Rebels, and thereby relieving many of the Loyal Inhabitants who expected a General Mafsacre. Eben Jacob, Mayor.’; the reverse or concave plate is similarly finely engraved with the following inscription: ‘On the other side is recorded but a single action of one whose public life has been steadily devoted to the Service of his Country and whose private has been Eminently distinguished by the practise of every social Virtue; Let it be permitted me to boast that I am, and for a series of years have been, one of his many sincere and applauding friends. Eben Jacob.’, lacking its original stirrup hinged retaining loop, very fine and very rare £2,000-£3,000

An account of the relief of Wexford town

“When General Moore’s army was within about two miles of Wexford, they perceived the house of a protestant in the suburbs on fire, from which they concluded, that the rebels were burning the town.
Mr. James Boyd, representative for the town, who commanded the Wexford Cavalry, trembling for the fate of his wife and children, asked permission of the general for him and as many of the yeoman cavalry as would accompany him, to push forward to the town and to make a desperate effort to save their families and their property.
The following persons, with great magnanimity, volunteered in that perilous service, and ran a risk of devoting their own lives to save the property and lives of the protestant inhabitants who remained in the town; they were all members of the corps but one. Captain James Boyd, member of parliament, Lieutenant Percival, high sheriff for the county, Corporal John Stetham, Corporal William Hughes, A.H. Jacob, of the Enniscorthy corps and the following privates, John Tench, Joseph Sutton, Archer Bayly, Marcus Doyle, Abraham Howlin, John Byrne, and William M’Cabe, Mr Boyd’s servant. Christopher Irwine, permanent sergeant of the troop, followed them rapidly on foot, his horse having been shot. They dashed into the town with a degree of valour bordering on despair, and announced with a loud voice, that the army was at their heels. This gave the rebels such an electric shock, that, panic struck, they fled in all directions, some over the bridge, others to the barony of Forth. Their consternation was so great, that very few of them attempted in their flight to injure the inhabitants of the town.”

Gold and silver medals were subsequently presented by Ebenezer Jacob, Mayor of Wexford, to Captain James Boyd and Lieutenant Edward Perceval, these in gold, and similar circular medals in silver to the corporals and privates. A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain and Ireland, by John Burke, confirms the award by the Corporation of Wexford of a medal in gold to Lieutenant Perceval. The silver medal to Corporal John Stetham was found in the Ontario bush, circa 2007/08, and that to Private John Byrne was sold by Whyte’s of Dublin in March 2016 (€2900).