World War I

World War I, Memorial to the six naval Victoria Cross winners from the SS River Clyde at the Gallipoli landings, 1915, large cast bronze medal, by Edward Carter Preston (1885-1965), and Herbert Tyson Smith (1873-1972), signed on reverse, "HTS INVT - ECP SCVLPT", the starboard bow of the SS River Clyde, her name clearly marked, with troops run down ramps to the side and into landing boats, on the deck maxim guns firing, in ex., V BEACH LANDING DARDANELLES APRIL 25 1915, rev., around an anchor, medallic images of the national animals of the four countries involved, rampant lion, kangaroo, kiwi and cockerel, regimental badges, legend in two lines around names the V.C. winners, 'COMMANDER EDWARD UNWIN, V.C. R.N. MIDSHIPMAN WILFRED ST. A. MALLESON, V.C. R.N. ABLE SEAMAN W. C. WILLIAMS V.C.' (inner) 'SUB. LIEUT A. W. ST. CLAIR TISDALL V.C. R.N.V.R. MIDSHIPMAN GEORGE L. DREWRY, V.C. R.N.R. SEAMAN R.N.R. GEORGE MCK. SAMSON, V.C., 145mm. As made, extremely fine and excessively rare.

It is curious that Edward Carter Preston, whose name is for ever linked with the Great War's most common medal, the Memorial Plaque or "Dead Man's Penny", should also produce this, surely one of the rarest of medals. The second signature is that of the sculptor Herbert Tyson Smith who was Carter Preston's brother-in-law. Today he is best remembered for the Liverpool Cenotaph which feature his reliefs. The medal was a private commission and the specimen in the National Maritime Museum still retains its explanatory label, "'Presented by a Liverpool Shipowner through the Imperial Service Merchant Guild in proud memory of great deeds performed in a Liverpool ship. Awarded to recipients of the VC, Dardanelles, 1915." The name of the shipowner is not known and it is not at all clear whether the V.C. recipients or their families ever received the medal, though that to Able Seaman William Williams is in the Chepstow Museum. A third specimen is in a private collection in New South Wales, Australia. The SS River Clyde was a collier built by Russell & Co of Port Glasgow, completed in March 1905, then requisitioned by the Admiralty in 1915. The regimental badges depicted on the medal are for the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, The West Riding Field Co. R.E., the Royal Munster Fusiliers and the 2nd Hampshire Regiment. Of the six Victoria Crosses, two (Samson and Malleson) are in the Lord Ashcroft Collection at the Imperial War Museum, those of Drewry and Unwin are also at the Imperial War Museum, the latter on loan. A famous painting by Charles Dixon shows a very similar image to that on the medal's obverse. On the same day, 25th April, 1915, the Lancashire Fusileers famously won "six VCs before breakfast".