The Bill and Angela Strong Medal Collection

A Great War M.C. group of four awarded to Captain C. S. Dyer, Gloucestershire Regiment, onetime attached North Staffordshire Regiment, who was awarded the Order of St. Anne for services in North Russia in 1919

Military Cross, G.V.R., unnamed as issued; British War and Victory Medals (Capt. C. S. Dyer); Russia, Order of St. Anne, Third Class breast badge, with swords, 35 x 35mm., bronze-gilt and enamel, unmarked, slight enamel damage to the last, otherwise good very fine or better and the last a unique award to the regiment (4) £1000-1200

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Bill and Angela Strong Medal Collection.

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M.C. London Gazette 8 March 1919:

‘For conspicuous gallantry and initiative near Sweveghem on 20 October 1918 when the Battalion was forming up in the assembly position, Battalion Headquarters was fired on by machine-guns from the left rear. Battalion Headquarters immediately took up a fire position and engaged the enemy with rifle and machine-gun fire. He dashed out and forced the survivors of the enemy to surrender, accounting for one of them personally.’

Captain Cecil Spencer Dyer was born in Brighton in September 1887 and enlisted in the Gloucestershire Regiment December 1915, when he was posted to the 3/4th Battalion. Remaining in the U.K., he was discharged to a commission in the same unit in August 1916, went out to France in October 1917, and was attached to the 4th Battalion, North Staffordshire Regiment at the time of winning his M.C. at Sweveghem in Belgium in October 1918.

In common with other officers, Dyer subsequently volunteered for further active service with the British Mission to Russia, and he served in his old unit, the 4th Battalion, Gloucesters, in Archangel Command, being awarded Order of St. Anne, 3rd class, with swords (War Office statement, dated 16 July 1921 refers). He died in London in January 1934.