A Small Collection of Awards to Channel Islanders

Victory Medal 1914-19 (114704 Gnr. E. Amy, R.A.), mounted as worn, very fine £60-80

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Small Collection of Awards to Channel Islanders.

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Edward Charles Amy, who was born at St. Saviour’s, Jersey in December 1893, was awarded the M.M. for his gallant deeds at Passchendaele on 29-30 October 1917, while serving as a Bombardier in ‘A’ Battery, 95th Brigade R.F.A., and was one of just 92 Channel Islanders to be similarly decorated in the Great War. The following notice was published in the Jersey Evening Post:

‘Bombardier Edward C. Amy of the Royal Field Artillery, a young Jersey man who joined up in October 1915 and who has been in France since September 1916, has been awarded the Military Medal for gallantry in the field during the night of 29-30 October, when 25 of a party of 30 gunners were gassed, and it was then left to the remaining five, who included Bombardier Amy, to continue working the guns. This they did quite successfully for upwards of 24 hours, saving a dangerous situation. The enemy at this point had advanced to a position less than 4,000 yards away.’

At the time of the German occupation in 1940, Amy was resident at 2 Highfield Villas, Rue a la Dame, St. Saviour’s, Jersey - a copy of his German I.D. card and photograph is available from the Jersey Heritage Trust Archives; sold with copied research, including a portrait photograph in uniform, believed to have been taken from Heroes Fund for Soldiers, a publication established by the Constable of St.Helier to honour the island’s decorated servicemen, and confirmation of his entitlement to the British War Medal 1914-20, in addition to the M.M.

The figure of 92 awards of the MM to Channel Islanders in the Great War actually refers to men from Jersey, as per the "Jersey Roll of Honour" published in 1919