Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

A Great War ‘Battle of the Somme’ M.M. awarded to Private E. A. Roberts, Royal Welsh Fusiliers

Military Medal, G.V.R. (15084 Pte. E. A. Roberts. 10/R.W. Fus:) minor edge bruising, very fine £200-£240

M.M. London Gazette 11 October 1916.

Edward Anderson Roberts was born in Llysfaen in 1895. Posted to France from 27 September 1915 with the 10th Battalion, Royal Welsh Fusiliers, he was awarded the Military Medal for his bravery on the Somme battlefield. The North Wales Weekly News of 19 October 1916, adds:
‘Recently he received a note from the Colonel of his Battalion to the following effect: “Your gallant conduct in the field on the 6th and 26th July has been reported to me, and I have much pleasure in bringing it to the notice of higher authority.”’

Transferred to the 24th Battalion, Roberts was treated for shell shock at the 19th General Hospital at Alexandria in July 1917; sent to the 6th Garrison Battalion at Cairo, he was discharged on 3 June 1919 and was later issued a Silver War Badge. He returned home to Denbigh and attempted to forge a life as a local plumber, but his experiences of the Great War resulted in what is recognised today as post traumatic stress disorder. Recorded in 1939 as an inmate of the North Wales County Mental Hospital, Roberts died in that institution on 17 May 1978.

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