Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A Great War ‘Western Front’ M.C. group of five awarded to Captain G. Young, Royal Army Medical Corps

Military Cross, G.V.R., unnamed as issued; 1914-15 Star (Capt. G. Young. R.A.M.C.); British War and Victory Medals (Capt. G. Young.); France, Third Republic, Médaille d’honneur des Épidémies, silver, the reverse embossed ‘Captain Young 1917’, lacquered, good very fine (5) £700-£900

M.C. London Gazette 8 July 1918:
‘For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty in attending to the wounded under heavy machine gun fire. He worked up to the leading wave and searched the whole ground for wounded under continuous fire and owing to his exertions, all the wounded were evacuated with great rapidity. Later he showed great courage and devotion to duty in rescuing wounded from destroyed dug-outs under shell fire.’

Gavin Young was born in Rutherglen, Lanarkshire, in 1892 and was educated at the University of Glasgow (where he was a member of the University’s Officer Training Corps), graduating MB ChB in 1914. He was commissioned Lieutenant in the Royal Army Medical Corps on 19 October 1914, and was promoted Captain on 1 April 1915. He served during the Great War on the Western Front from November 1915, and spent the entire war in France, with only short periods of leave, originally with the 30th General Hospital, and subsequently with the 16 Field Ambulance, 2nd York and Lancaster Regiment, and the 12 Convalesce Depot. In 1918 he was awarded the Military Cross for attending wounded under heavy machine gun fire. He was also awarded the French Médaille d’honneur des Épidémies, awarded for medical services.

Young was appointed Acting Major on 4 September 1918 and was demobilised on 14 April 1919. He resigned his commission on 16 July 1920 and then worked as a medical specialist in Glasgow in ear, nose and throat surgery, being elected a Fellow of the Royal Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons in Glasgow in 1920. He died in Ayr in 1977.

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