Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Four: Sapper G. H. Van Onselen, South African Engineer Corps, who was captured and taken Prisoner of War at Tobruk in June 1942

1939-45 Star; Africa Star; War Medal 1939-45; Africa Service Medal, all officially impressed ‘192287 G. H. Van Onselen’, good very fine (4) £100-£140

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Medals from the Collection of Lieutenant-Colonel Edward De Santis.

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Gerald Henderson Van Onselen enlisted in the South African Engineer Corps (S.A.E.C.) in Pretoria in August 1940 and was embarked for Egypt in 10 Field Company, S.A.E.C., in June 1941. Attached to the 2nd South African Division, the company undertook prodigious mine clearance duties in the Bardia, Sollum and Halfaya offensives, prior to being charged with bolstering the defensive perimeter around Tobruk in March 1942. The latter work entailed the laying of extensive minefields, but to no avail, for to everyone’s shock the garrison surrendered in June 1942. For his own part, Van Onselen was posted missing on the 20th, when his company came under sustained attack from enemy dive bombers, but he was confirmed as a P.O.W. in August. Initially incarcerated in camps in Italy, he ended the war at Stalag 18A at Wolfsburg in Austria, from whence he was repatriated via the U.K. in August 1945 and discharged in March 1946; he claimed his campaign medal in January 1953.