Dead man's medals - issued or not?

[Tim Bowler]

Hi, apologies as I am sure somebody's asked this before, but I can't see it in any FAQs

Looking at the index card for my great uncle, William Leslie Gordon Spinney I see he was entitled to the 14-15 Star, British and Victory Medals.

He died in a RAF training accident on 24.2.21 and the card is marked Deceased. I am trying to see if the medals were actually issed.

Under Correspondence on his index card it says (I think)

A/m fwds Form 488 claiming admin of no medals 19/11/23.

Then his widow's address is listed underneath. Mrs Frances Spinney, Geraldine Road, SW18. Her first name has then been crossed out and overwritten as (widow) W.L.G. which would have been the more formal way of addressing her, I suppose.

Is it likely that the medals had not been issued and she was trying to get them two years' after her husband's death - or that she didn't want them and the Air Ministry was trying to decide what to do with these medals?

Finally - and this is a long shot - if they do exist and anybody has them in their collection I would love to hear about it.

Best wishes, Tim

[Old Owl]

Hi Tim,

Checking his MIC the 1914/15 Star Trio were issued on: 28th December 1923. These are named 2/Lt W.L.G.Spinney, A.S.C. on his star and Lieut.W.L.G.Spinney, on the BWM and VM. He obviously did not serve overseas with the RFC/RAF and hence the comment 'No Medals'.

I am pretty certain that this will be 100% correct.

Robert

[Tim Bowler]

Hi Robert

That's very kind of you, thank you for this.

ASC marked Trios must be fairly common, I would guess, and also not as noteworthy as a line infantry unit, say. Do you know if there would be any way of checking to see if these have come on the market? Apart from going through medal autioneers' websites? They could be almost anywhere, I suppose

best Tim

[Old Owl]

Hi Tom,

ASC Trios are fairly common to other ranks, but obviously not to officers, as there were not as many!! There is no simple way to find out if the medals have been on the market other than possibly by googling his details in various combinations of name and initials, etc. You may just be lucky---otherwise you will probably need to advertise in a magazine such as the Medal News, which has a Medal Tracker service which I believe you can also access this on-line, there will however be a charge for this and the chances of coming up with a positive hit are not that good--but you may get lucky!! I believe that some Dealers do a 'wants' column, but may charge.

Good luck,

Robert

[nhclark]

Hi Tim,

Checking his MIC the 1914/15 Star Trio were issued on: 28th December 1923. These are named 2/Lt W.L.G.Spinney, A.S.C. on his star and Lieut.W.L.G.Spinney, on the BWM and VM. He obviously did not serve overseas with the RFC/RAF and hence the comment 'No Medals'.

I am pretty certain that this will be 100% correct.

Robert

Yes, I concur that you are correct.

The legend next to the bracket on the front of the card means "Issue Voucher X5484. Medals despatched 28th December 1923. File NW/8/25061." Unfortunately, the meaning of the prefix "NW" is not known precisely, but it is a prefix used for files relating to medal issues.

Then on the "Correspondence" side, the reverse of the card, "A/M" is "Air Ministry" and Form 488 is a form that this ministry used in connection with medal entitlements.

Just in passing, though, I'm surprised that William's death was classified as a "war death." He is listed by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Would there be a particular reason for this?

[Tim Bowler]

Hi Old Owl and Aussienoel,

Thank you for your help and advice about the medals. Yes it has puzzled me why Gt uncle Leslie (he never seems to have used William and it was only in peacetime that the RAF seemed to require him to use his first name) should be classified as a war death.

He died in a peacetime training crash with 4 Sqn RAF at Farnborough in Feb 1921. It wasn't as if it was a lingering illness as a result of combat. I haven't found anything in his records as to suggest why the CWGC list him as such. I think I may have to ask the CWGC to see if they can tell me. Or see if the local paper had anything on his death or burial at the time.

best Tim,

[nhclark]

Tim,

There's a very brief report here: http://www.flightglobal.com/pdfarchive/view/1921/1921%20-%200162.html. Also by entering various search terms here http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/ you can come up with several newspaper reports of the accident. The latter is a pay-to-view site, so to get the full articles you will have to buy a few credits. They're not expensive however.

Noel

[CGM]

Hi Old Owl and Aussienoel,

Thank you for your help and advice about the medals. Yes it has puzzled me why Gt uncle Leslie (he never seems to have used William and it was only in peacetime that the RAF seemed to require him to use his first name) should be classified as a war death.

He died in a peacetime training crash with 4 Sqn RAF at Farnborough in Feb 1921. ...............

best Tim,

Tim,

The CWGC qualifying dates for commemoration are 4th August 1914 to 31st August 1921.

For the UK the war ended on 31st August, 1921, as fixed in the Termination of the Present War Act of 1918.

This is the official date on which the British Government declared the war to be at an end and is therefore the cutoff date for CWGC commemoration.

(Thanks to Tom Morgan for this information)

Your Great Uncle was in service when he died so is automatically commemorated.

CGM

[nhclark]

Well, well. I confess my complete ignorance of that and apologise for my question. For anyone who hasn't seen it, may I suggest looking at http://www.infromthecold.org/war_grave_criteria.asp

There must be a number of commemorations, albeit small in percentage terms, as "war deaths" where the person concerned was nowhere near the war at all. For example, someone who joined one of the services in early 1921 but died before the cut-off date.

Many thanks for explaining this CGM.

Noel

[CGM]

Noel, please don't apologise - it's very useful information for anyone who was not aware of it before and therefore good to have it here.

CGM

[Tim Bowler]

Aussie Noel, CGM, thank you both for your helpful posts. I had just found newspaper reports of the crash at the Colindale Archive. I did go there a few years ago on another topic, but having (some) of them digitised and searchable is wonderful. However, I still think I am going to have to go there and look at the papers they haven't yet got round to digitising.

On the subject of my Gt Uncle's fatal crash, his pupil, Allan Hesketh had a lucky escape - bruises and a broken nose.

But then a year later he seems to be involved in a repeat of this fatal crash - again surviving an Avro 504 smash while his instructor died , according to http://www.rafweb.org/Biographies/Hesketh.htm

"On 8 February 1922, he was flying with Flight Lieutenant R C Jenkins in Avro 504K (H9829) as his instructor. The aircraft failed to climb after take-off and struck telegraph wires on the Farnborough Road followed by the left wing striking a tree and the aircraft coming down on its nose. Allen Hesketh was either thrown out or jumped out before the aircraft came to rest, but Jenkins suffered a fractured skull and died later that afternoon in hospital."

Was he STILL learning to fly with his squadron - why not go to a flying school - or were these somehow one-off flights as he contemplated going for his pilot's wings.

He seems to have done well for himself - ending up as Air Vice Marshal Alan Hesketh CB, CBE, DFC, retiring in 1954.

best wishes

Tim