Medals for Services at Sea from the Collection of the Late Oliver Stirling Lee

Six: Captain (E.) G. T. Sullivan, Royal Navy

1914-15 Star (Mte., R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (Eng. Lt., R.N.); Defence and War Medals; Jubilee 1935, the second with slightly slack suspension, generally very fine and better (6) £100-120

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Medals for Services at Sea from the Collection of the Late Oliver Stirling Lee.

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George Thomas Sullivan was born in Plymouth in June 1889 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy Artificer in September 1905. In November 1914, however, while serving aboard H.M.S. Lion, he became one of the first ratings ever to be appointed Mate (E.), R.N., and shortly afterwards joined the battleship Marlborough. He is believed to have shared in her honours at the Battle of Jutland 18 months later, when she was hit by a torpedo that caused a 70 ft. long by 20 ft. deep hole but still maintained her position in the battle line throughout, her gunfire inflicting considerable damage on at least two enemy capital ships.

Sullivan ended the War as an Engineer Lieutenant aboard the Agincourt and gained further advancement to Commander (E.) prior to his retirement at the end of 1937. Recalled shortly before the advent of hostilities in 1939, he was employed for the remainder of the War by the Admiralty’s Department of Naval Ordnance at Vickers Armstrong’s Elswick Yard, Newcastle-on-Tyne, and was placed back on the Retired List in the rank of Captain (E.), R.N., in 1945-46.