Orders, Decorations & Medals - British Groups

Lot 2657    SESSION 13 (11.30AM THURSDAY 23RD NOV)    Orders, Decorations & Medals - British Groups

Estimate $4,200
Bid at live.noble.com.au
SOLD $2,600

CB GROUP OF FOUR: The Most Honourable Order of the Bath, Companion breast badge with brooch bar suspender; India General Service Medal 1854-95, - two clasps - Burma 1885-7, Burma 1887-89; Afghanistan Medal 1878-80; Coronation Medal 1911. First order unnamed as issued, Major F.W.Hemming 5th Dn Gds on second medal, Capt: F.W.Hemming. 5th D G. Gds on third medal, last medal unnamed. The named medals engraved, the second in script style. Heavy contact marks on the second and third medals, otherwise fine - extremely fine.

Ex Barry Hibbard Collection from Status International Sale 256 (lot 9668).

CB: Supplement to LG 23/5/1900, p3327 - Colonel (temporary Major-General) Frederick Wilson Hemming, Commanding Cavalry Brigade, Aldershot (temporarily).

An obituary published in The Times, London read as follows.
'Major-General Frederick Wilson Hemming, C.B., who died at Brighton yesterday at the age of 84, was a cavalry officer of the old school, whose manners were as perfect as his seat on a horse. A veteran of the Second Afghan War, he was not a Staff College graduate, but qualified for staff employment by service in the field. From the number of personal appointments he held at different times he might have been described in his younger days as the perfect A.D.C.

The son of Mr. F.Hemming, late of Lisar-hall, Londonderry, and Merrywood, Somerset, he was born in August, 1850, and after leaving Clifton purchased a cornetcy in the 4th Hussars in April, 1868. He joined his regiment in India and got his first step in October, 1871. In June, 1877, he became A.D.C. to Lieutenant-General F.F.Maude, V.C. - father of Sir Stanley Maude, the victor of Baghdad in the Great War - in the Bengal Command, and accompanied him on active service when the Second Afghan War began in 1878. Thus he was in the two Bazar Valley expeditions and gained brevet majority after having been promoted captain into the 5th Dragoon Guards in October, 1878.

He rejoined his regiment at home at the end of 1879, and from April to December, 1881, was A.D.C. to Sir Henry Havelock-Allan, then commanding a brigade at Aldershot. In April, 1882, he went to the Eastern District as A.D.C. to Major-General Sir H.H.Clifford, V.C., but in September he returned to Aldershot on appointment in a similar capacity to the staff of Brigadier-General H.Rowlands, V.C. In March, 1883, he returned once more to regimental duty and received his promotion to major in December, again becoming A.D.C. to General Rowlands when the latter took over command in Madras in April, 1884. From December, 1885, to February, 1886, he was staff officer for Intelligence duties with the forces engaged in Upper Burma, and was then appointed Military Secretary to Sir C.G.Arbuthnot, Commander-in-Chief, Bombay, and afterwards Commander-in-Chief, Madras. Nevertheless Major Hemming saw more service in Burma, 1887-9, being twice mentioned in dispatches for his services there and gaining another brevet.

In March, 1891, he left Madras and was promoted brevet colonel in December, 1894, going on half-pay in January, 1897. In the following March, however, he reached the substantive rank of colonel, and was appointed military attach? at Tokyo, but reverted to the half-pay list again in June, 1898. In October 1899 at the outbreak of the South African War, he gained command of the South-Eastern District Cavalry Brigade, and in February, 1900, that of the 1st Cavalry Brigade at Aldershot. The whole of this period was chiefly devoted to the training of the recruits who passed through the reserve squadrons and regimental depots. In 1900 he was created a C.B. He spent from April, 1903, to September, 1906, on half-pay, and then retired from the Army with the honoray rank of major-general.

General Hemming married Ada Cecil, the second daughter of his chief, Sir Frederick Maude, in 1878; she died in 1886.

The funeral service will be held at St. Mark's, Brighton, to-morrow, at 10.30.'

With research.