Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Pair: Private J. Phillips, Grenadier Guards, with his personal diary of the South African War

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 6 clasps, Belmont, Modder River, Driefontein, Johannesburg, Diamond Hill, Belfast, (7504 Pte. J. Phillips. Gren: Gds:); King’s South Africa 1901-02, 2 clasps, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (7504 Pte. J. Phillips. Grenadier Guards.) mounted as worn, lightly polished with minor contact marks, very fine (2) £260-£300

John Phillips was born in Briton Ferry, Glamorganshire and attested for the Grenadier Guards at Neath on 27 June 1898, at the age of 21, declaring prior service with No. 5 Company, Glamorgan Artillery Volunteers. He served with the 3rd Battalion in South Africa during the Boer War, arriving in South Africa on 26 October 1899. He remained there until 21 July 1902, when he returned ‘Home’. He later re-engaged for an additional period of four years in 1910 and was discharged on 27 June 1914.

Whilst on campaign in South Africa not only did he maintain his personal diary up to the taking of Pretoria but he also wrote letters home to his mother, one of which was re-printed in the Swansea and Glamorgan Herald and Herald of Wales, of 5 May 1900.

Sold with the recipient’s personal diary of his service in the field in the South African War from his arrival in Cape Town on 15 November 1899, up to the occupation of Pretoria in June 1900, notebook very distressed, loose covers and with unbound pages, chipped and yellowed but with fascinating personal notes of his experiences in the South African War, for the most part legibly completed in black ink though the latter pages in pencil; together with copied service papers and medal roll extracts.