SOLDIERS' MEDALS.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXI, Issue 91, 19 April 1911, Page 11

SOLDIERS' MEDALS.

ARE THEY VALUED? THIRTY THOUSAND UNCLAIMED. From time to time a notice appears in the daily papers that medals and cksps awarded for the last of our wars are still awaiting ownership, and within the last few days the statement has been put forward that upwards of 30,000 South African war medals are still lying unclaimed at the ordnance stores, Woolwich (writes Colone' Harold Wylly in the London Evening News). It may, perhaps, therefore be of interest to explain the system under which medals are granted and issued in our Army, and to endeavour to find a reason why no claimants have come forward for so large a percentage of the rewards offered for service -in the Three Years War. First of all, it may perhaps be pointed out that with us the general distribution of medals for military service is a matter of comparatively recent institution. The first medal ever given appearE to have been awarded to those stout seamen of Elizabethan days who helped to defeat and destroy the great ocean-castles of the Armada, while the earliest military decoration ever awarded was that introduced in 1643 by Charles I. for presentation to soldiers distinguishing themselves in Forlorn Hopes, and which took the form of a silver badge. But the medal struck for the battle of Waterloo marks the first instance of the general isue to all ranks of a war medal under the orders of the Crown, although under the old East India Company the practice of giving medals equally to officers, non-commissioned officers, and men of the native army was commenced in 1784 for service by Bengal troops operating in the west of India, while medals were also awarded for the Carnatic campaigns, for the expedition to Ceylon, for the- expeditions to Egypt, Mauritius, and Java, for the capture of Seringapatam, and for the Nepaul War. But although for the earlier wars in Europe wherein British troops took part medals were not given at all to the rank and file, and only sparingly to subordinate officers, there can be no doubt that the omission was greatly felt. MEDALS CHEAPLY EARNED. Since the days of Waterloo we havegone, perhaps, to the other extreme ; it is said — and it cannot be denied that there are grounds for the assertion — that war medals are now .rather cheaply earned — that they are obtainable equally by the man who has served the whole cam. paign in the Valley of the Shadow, as by he who has not stirred from the base of operations or who has belonged to a unit taking the place of a .Regular regiment ordered to the front. But then it must be remembered that ours is not only a voluntarily enlisted Army, but a short service one, and that from the recruiting point of view it is eminently •desirable to popularise military service and to encourage the steady inflow of recruits by a more generous recognition of services in the field than appeared to be required under the old system, whereby men enlisted, for what was practically the term of their natural lives. It having then been decided to grant a medal \for a campaign or expedition, an Army Order is issued notifying the award, and giving detailed . instructions as to the preparation of nominal rolls of the individuals entitled to the medal. In the larger units — the Cavalry and the Infantry—these rolls are in the first instance compiled by the squadron and company commanders under whom the men have immediately served, and are then sent in to the regimental or battalion headquarters. Here they are. carefully checked, and from them fresh rolls are fjrepared in triplicate, on forms provided by the War Office, and when completed they are forwarded to the officers in charge of records at the headquarters of the thirteen different districts, who transmit them to the assistant director of ordnance stores at Woolwich Arsenal. When the medals are ready for issue, the rolls are returned from Woolwich to the record offices in order that thereon may be shown what has become of men no longer serving with the unit in which the medal was j earned. THE MEN WHO DIE. The medals are then issued — to the officer commanding the unit in the case of serving soldiers, and to the officer in charge ©f the records of the corps for individuals who have been transferred or who have taken their discharge. In the first case the medals are usually issued at a full-dress parade, the signatureb of the recipients being obtained ; While, in the latter, they are sent to tho individuals by registered post. There remains the case of men who die in the (service or after discharge ; the medals to which they are entitled are sent to the legate© or next-of-kin by the commanding officer or officer in charge of records, as the case may be. All these regulations seem so drawn up as to reduce to a minimum the likelihood of medals remaining unclaimed ; but there have always been such cast:;*, and quite recently the medal for service in the Indian Mutiny was handed over to a man who first became entitled to it more than half a century before. Do soldiers therefore not attach much value to a medal? Mr. Rudyard Kipinig, whose knowledge of the British soldier is extensive and peculiar, would have an believe that the value is comparative — that while no man would sell his Victoria Gross, he himself has seen "ihe Frontier Plaiater go for liquor on the toss." THE STRESS OF CIVIL LIFE. My experience is not in agreement with this inference ; I am unable to say how the ex-soldkr regards his medals \yhen the tremendous competition of civil life sets him with his back against the wall and the wovkhouse in his front, but I am sure that even then the medals are the last things with which he parts. There can, however, be no doubt that 'no soldier, professional or amateur, regulai or irregular, Home-grown or colonial, is callous as to the issue of the medal for the campaign from which he has just emerged ; and it is only possible to account for the enormous number of unclaimed South Airican medals by recalling the unusual conditions of service against. the Dutch Republics. The majority of these 30,000 medals which are going a-begging bear the names of members of irregular corps which the war created, corps which were recruited in distant colonies and reinforced by men picked up on the veldt; corps of which the commanders were regular officers of the British or Indian Army, colonial soldiers, and influential South African civilians : while of the men who composed them their antecedents were as unknown as was the destination to which they drifted when the war was finished and done with. _ In virtue of the fact that, by regulatipn all these unclaimed medals must next year be broken up, I would urge that to the bald announcement periodically published there might well' be added, " Colonial papers please* copy."

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