Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Memorial Plaque (John Wynand Parks) good very fine £80-£100

M.C. London Gazette 1 January 1917.

John Wynand Parks was born on 2 May 1895 and was educated at Epsom College. He was commissioned Second Lieutenant in the East Lancashire Regiment and served with the 1st Battalion during the Great War on the Western Front from 9 December 1914. Promoted Captain, he was awarded the Military Cross, before being severely wounded during the operations in Picardy in late 1918, having half his jaw shot away. Awarded a Silver War Badge, he died whilst under anaesthetic during an operation on his jaw at Queen’s Hospital, Sidcup, on 12 August 1919, and is buried under a C.W.G.C. headstone in Chislehurst Cemetery, Kent.

Opened in 1917, Queen’s Hospital, Sidcup, provided pioneering plastic surgery under the guidance of Sir Harold Gillies to soldiers who had sustained facial injuries during the Great War.