Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Pair: Captain E. Gardner, Royal Army Medical Corps, who later became an esteemed forensic pathologist; his testimony proving instrumental in the conviction of the notorious 1947 ‘Chalk Pit’ murderers

British War and Victory Medals, with copy M.I.D. oak leaves (Capt. E. Gardner.) good very fine (2) £80-£100

M.I.D. London Gazette 11 June 1918.

Eric Gardner was born in 1877 and is recorded in the Surrey Advertiser of 7 January 1914 as a Medical Practitioner and Chairman of Weybridge Urban Council. The recipient’s home address is confirmed by his M.I.C. which states ‘Portmore House, Weybridge’, and notes that he served in Salonika from 20 April 1917. Raised Captain and Mentioned in Despatches, Gardner returned home to Surrey and later became an esteemed forensic pathologist; he bore professional testimony to the ‘Mystery of Man hit by Express’ (train) as published in Reynold’s Newspaper on 31 July 1938.

This was followed by further grisly court cases which caught the attention of the British press in the 1940s; on 29 June 1940, he spoke at the inquest into the death of Violet Margaret Hookham of the A.T.S. who was struck and killed by a motor lorry at Reigate. This was followed on 9 January 1941 with a story published in the Daily News (London) where Gardner concluded that 77-year-old Mrs. Annie Jopling of Mortlake had been murdered by strangulation; and then in 1946 his testimony proved instrumental in the convictions of Thomas John Ley and Lawrence John Smith for the murder of John McMain Murdie in a chalk pit at Woldingham Common, Surrey: ‘There was evidence of rough handling. The body was tied up with rope and there was a mark where the rope had encircled the neck... There were signs of asphyxia and in my opinion the cause of death was asphyxia due to violence’.

Despite his long career and the high regard with which he was held in the Surrey community, Gardner eventually succumbed to one of the dangers associated with his job. The Belfast News-Letter of 15 November 1951, states:
‘Dr. Eric Gardner, the pathologist, who helped to solve the “Chalk Pit” murder in 1947, died yesterday at his home at Weybridge, Surrey. He was 74. Four years ago Dr. Gardner contracted a germ when conducting a pathological examination, and, despite a long stay in Switzerland, he did not recover.’