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Auction: 26002 - Orders, Decorations and Medals
Lot: 197

(x) A Great War ‘Western Front’ M.C. group of seven awarded to Captain H. H. McColl, West Riding Regiment, later Royal Flying Corps, Royal Air Force, and Indian Army

Military Cross, G.V.R., unnamed as issued; 1914-15 Star (Lieut. H. H. McColl. W. Rid. R.); British War and Victory Medals, with small M.I.D. oak leaves (Capt. H. H. McColl. R.A.F.); 1939-1945 Star; Burma Star; War Medal 1939-45, mounted court style for display, very fine (7)

M.C. London Gazette 14 January 1916.

M.I.D. London Gazette 1 January 1916, 24 December 1917.

Hugh Herbert McColl was born on 7 September 1893, the son of an old Cliftonian and one of six brothers educated at the school in 1907-12. He represented the school in Boxing at Aldershot and went up to Christ’s College, Cambridge in 1912. He was the winner of the Freshmens' Lightweight Boxing that year and represented Cambridge University at Boxing. He afterwards won the 3rd Army Officer’s Lightweight Boxing Championship in 1916. He was commissioned as 2nd Lieutenant on 17 September 1914; Lieutenant on 1 July 1915; and temporary Captain on 5 February 1917.

McColl was commissioned into the 9th (Service) Battalion, West Riding Regiment, which was formed at Halifax in September 1914. He landed in France on 15 July 1915, at Boulogne. Captain McColl was later transferred to the Royal Flying Corps and qualified as an Observer in the Royal Air Force on 31 May 1918, before returning to France where he served in No. 38 Squadron. He was wounded three times during the war.

Following the end of the war he remained with the R.A.F. until transferring to the Indian Army in 1921, having gained a Forestry Diploma at Cambridge earlier in that year. He was appointed Assistant Conservator of Forests, Indian Forest Service in 1921; Captain, Indian Army Reserve of Officers on 26 August 1929, with Seniority 16 February 1925; Major in 1931; and Deputy Conservator of Forests in 1933.

At the outbreak of the Second World War, he was a Captain serving with the Reserve of Officers on the Army in Burma; Commandant, Japanese P.O.W. Camp, Burma, 1939; Staff, Italian P.O.W. Camp, India, 1941-42. He resigned from the Army in June 1944 and resigned from the Forest service in 1947. He was the author of the Working Plan for the Myitttha Forest Division, for the period 1937-38 and for the Burma Government 1951-52; sold together with copied research including London Gazette entries.

Subject to 5% tax on Hammer Price in addition to 20% VAT on Buyer’s Premium.

Estimate
£700 to £900

Starting price
£550