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Auction: 23113 - Orders, Decorations and Medals - e-Auction
Lot: 161

The India General Service Medal awarded to Lance-Corporal H. Flowerdew, Norfolk Regiment, late The Buffs, who was wounded in Normandy in August 1944

India General Service 1908-35, 1 clasp, Burma 1930-32 (6283466 Pte. H. Flowerdew, The Buffs), good very fine

Following his service in Burma with the Buffs, Flowerdew transferred to the Norfolk Regiment, for it was as a Lance-Corporal in that regiment that he was wounded in Normandy on 5 August 1944; WO 417/80 refers.

As a pre-war regular, it is worth speculating as to whether he was actively employed with the B.E.F., or indeed present at the Norfolks' last stand at Le Paradis on 27 May 1940, when nearly 100 men were massacred by a unit of the Totenkopf S.S. Division.

The Norfolks had two battalions deployed in France in August 1944, the 1st and the 7th. Both were heavily engaged and suffered heavy casualties.

Corporal Sydney Bates of the 1st Battalion was awarded a posthumous V.C. for his gallantry on 6 August 1944, and Major D. Jamieson of the 7th Battalion likewise decorated for his gallantry on 8 August 1944.

Given that Flowerdew does not appear on a July 1944 nominal roll of the 7th Battalion, it seems he was serving in the 1st Battalion when he was reported as wounded on 5 August 1944.

On the 5th, Flowerdew and his comrades were ordered to attack La Bistiere, deep in the Normandy Bocage. During the afternoon a two-company attack, without artillery support, was put in on the village, but a well-concealed Tiger tank caused major problems and one of the companies was 'badly mauled'. Here, then, the likely action in which he received his wounds.

In the fighting in the Bocage between 4-9 August 1944, much of it against the 10th S.S. Panzer Division, the 1st Battalion suffered casualties of 47 killed and around 200 wounded.

In addition to the posthumous award of the V.C. to Corporal Sidney "Basher" Bates, the Battalion's other ranks were awarded a D.C.M. and three M.M.s; see Thank God and The Infantry, John Lincoln's history of the Battalion from D-Day to V.E. Day, for full details.


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Sold for
£230

Starting price
£130