Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A rare and emotive Great War group of three awarded to Private P. Oatley, Royal Marine Light Infantry, who, in company with another Private in his unit, became the first motorised armoured warfare casualty of the war, when they were killed in action while serving in the R.M. Armoured Car Section near Ypres on 18 October 1914

1914 Star, with clasp (Ply. 14197 Pte., R.M.L.I., Armoured Cars); British War and Victory Medals (Ply. 14197 Pte., R.M.L.I.), nearly extremely fine (3) £1800-2200

Philip Oatley, a native of Dulcote, near Wells, Somerset, was born in September 1887 and enlisted in the Plymouth Division of the Royal Marine Light Infantry at Shepton Mallett in October 1907. He subsequently enjoyed several seagoing appointments prior to the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, when he was posted to the R.M. Armoured Car Section in readiness for embarkation for France.

Equipped with a variety of requisitioned motor vehicles, which had been hastily clad in boiler-plate and fitted with machine-guns prior to embarkation, and commanded by Captain C. F. Graham, “The Motor Bandits” (as the R.M. Armoured Car Section quickly became known) arrived in France in September 1914, and were allocated the task of assisting the R.N.A.S. Armoured Car Section in protecting the airfields around Dunkirk from attack by forward elements of the German cavalry.

On 3 October, as the Germans advanced on Antwerp, Captain Graham’s section was the first British unit to arrive in aid of the town’s defence, and in the following week provided the armed motor escort to the visiting First Sea Lord, The Rt. Hon. Winston Churchill. Following the subsequent withdrawal from Antwerp, “The Motor Bandits” accompanied the Naval Brigade to Ostend, where they were one of the last unit’s to depart as the Germans arrived, and journeyed thence back to Dunkirk. A few days later, however, the unit was ordered to carry out reconnaissance patrols in the Ypres sector. Blumberg’s history, The Sea Soldiers, takes up the story:

‘About 16 October Captain C. Graham was sent from Poperinghe by Commander Sampson with a section of three cars and 20 men to report to Sir T. Capper, commanding 7th Division, who sent them to recoinnoitre and get in touch with the German Cavalry, and this they did well in front of the Menin-Roulers road. On the 18th they went out again and got into action at 50 yards range, losing two men killed [Privates Oatley and Treagus]; fortunately the cars had been turned about and approached their objective backwards, so that they were able to pick up the men and effect their escape, whilst the 7th Division Artillery demolished the objective, a mill; the killed were buried in a field near Bercelaere.’

Today, Privates Oatley and Treagus lie side-by-side in the Aeroplane Cemetery, Ypres. Oatley left a widow who was resident at Smith’s Court, New Inn, Wells, Somerset.