Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

An outstanding Chaplain’s ‘Great War’ D.S.O. group of five awarded to The Reverend Professor D. M. Kay, Army Chaplains’ Department, attached Royal Naval Division, later Royal Scots and Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, who was four times Mentioned in Despatches, and rendered ‘self oblivious’ service under fire, being ‘uncomplaining when death was grim and busy’

A pivotal figurehead in the life of the University Town of St Andrews, Kay was revered as military hero, teacher, author and missionary: Chaplain to the Royal and Ancient Golf Club from 1924-30 and a good player in his own right, he took great pride in having once been crowned ‘Champion Golfer of the Ottoman Empire’

Distinguished Service Order, G.V.R., silver-gilt and enamel, with integral top riband bar; 1914-15 Star (Rev. D. M. Kay. A.C.D.); British War and Victory Medals with M.I.D. oak leaves (Rev. D. M. Kay); Territorial Decoration, G.V.R., unnamed, lacking integral top brooch bar; nearly extremely fine and better (5) £2,000-£2,400

D.S.O. London Gazette 6 June 1917:
‘For excellent work at the Front with 1st Battalion, Royal Scots, and courage and devotion to duty. A man of considerable age, who is a splendid example to the younger men.’

M.I.D. London Gazettes 25 September 1916, 6 December 1916, 21 July 1917, and 30 January 1919.

David Miller Kay was born in Wigton, Cumberland, on 9 July 1866, the son of tenant farmer Peter Kay of the Drummond Castle Estate. Educated at Muthill public school and Morrison’s Academy - where he was dux medallist - Kay proceeded to St Andrews University in 1883, graduating M.A. and BSc., with first class honours in mathematics and second class honours in classics in 1890. He subsequently crossed the Firth of Forth to Edinburgh University where he was awarded the Pitt Club Scholarship and graduated B.D. in the Faculty of Theology. From 1895 to 1897 he was assistant to the Professor of Hebrew at Edinburgh University and later studied Semitic subjects at the Universities of Leipzig and Berlin. In 1898 he went to Constantinople to become Head of the Church of Scotland Mission there; this correlated with a period when Turkey wished to build herself a Navy and was keen to engage Scottish engineers - it was these men who Kay was sent to minister, as well as carry out missionary work.

For five years Kay dwelt on the Golden Horn and laid the foundations of his great knowledge of the East; a knowledge which proved valuable to his country during the Great War. Returned home around 1905, he joined the University Battery of the Fife Royal Garrison Artillery and won the Waveney Cup in 1906 - which was hotly contested by all R.G.A. auxiliary batteries throughout the Kingdom. Four years later Kay was appointed Captain and Chaplain to the St Andrews Officer Training Corps. Volunteering his services at the outbreak of the Great War, Kay was appointed Temporary Chaplain to the Forces 4th Class and was posted to B.E.F. Headquarters at St. Omer on 2 January 1915. He arrived at a time when the demand for Chaplains was a pressing concern; the war which many initially believed ‘would be over by Christmas’ was in fact still in its infancy and there was an increasing need for experienced churchmen to tend to the spiritual and emotional needs of the wounded.

Easter 1915 saw Kay transferred to the beaches of Gallipoli where he served with the Naval Division and later with the 29th Division. After the evacuation of the peninsula, he saw further service as Chaplain in Egypt, Salonika and Bulgaria, latterly with the 1st Royal Scots and 1st Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders. For these services he was awarded the ‘richly deserved’ Distinguished Service Order. To fully appreciate his impact upon those whom he ministered, his friends and colleagues at this time, it would be most appropriate to consult the words of Professor Baxter of St Andrews University, as published in the St Andrews Citizen on 12 April 1930:
‘In Salonika, where, already an older man who might have justifiably sought and obtained a quieter and less strenuous post, he gave an example of devotion, strength and self-forgetfulness that must not be measured only by his ribbon and medal, but by the admiration and love he gained from men who were not easily impressed. I seem to hear still the stories, from some of his own men, of self oblivious service under fire, and healing comfort in the trenches, and stern, racking, uncomplaining service at the guns when death was grim and busy... He was a strong and single hearted man, noble in that he lived not for himself but, from faith in the Eternal, disciplined and subdued himself, giving his all freely and with fervour for the right and good.’

Returned home to St Andrews, Kay became Chaplain to the Royal and Ancient Golf Club, succeeding Dr. P. M. Playfair in that post of honour. A keen curler, he later became deeply versed of the ‘mysteries’ associated with the icy game. Appointed Elder of St Andrews Parish Church, he developed a reputation as a vigorous and thoughtful preacher and a staunch Conservative. In consequence of his high standing in academia, the artist Gertrude Mary Coventry (1886-1964) was commissioned to paint his portrait; the splendid oil painting of Reverend Kay proudly wearing his medals was donated to the Museum Collection in 1930 and today hangs in the Great Hall.

Displaying deep reverence and a whimsical humour to the end, Reverend Kay died on 5 April 1930 having been poorly for a number of months. Large and sympathetic crowds later lined each side of South Street to witness his funeral procession wend its way to the burial plot in the grounds of St Andrews Cathedral: ‘First came the scarlet gowned men and women students, then the assistants and lecturers, the members of the University Senatus and the Court, all in academic robes, the Principal of St Mary’s College being proceeded by three mace bearers.’

Next came a large representation of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club, led by the Captain, Lieutenant-Colonel P. G. M. Skene, preceded by two officially carrying the cross clubs and a collection of historic golf balls draped in black. Amidst such scenes of reverence, Kay was buried to the sounds of the O.T.C. pipe band and the ‘Last Post’ by a bugler from R.A.F. Leuchars.