Orders, Decorations & Medals - British Groups

Lot 2943    SESSION 14 (2.30PM THURSDAY 1ST AUG)    Orders, Decorations & Medals - British Groups

Estimate $1,000
Bid at live.noble.com.au

SCARCE GROUP OF SIX TO A JEWISH JUDGE ADVOCATE: 1939-45 Star; Africa Star, - clasp - 8th Army; Italy Star; Defence Medal 1939-45; War Medal 1939-45; Efficiency Medal (GVIR Omn.Rex), with Territorial suspension. First five medals unnamed as issued, Lt. R.J.A.Romain. R.A. on last medal. The named medal impressed. Swing mounted, medals toned, otherwise good very fine.

Together with a matching set of swing mounted miniatures and a bronze Royal Artillery hat badge.^Roderick Jessel Anidjar Romain was born in London on 2 December 1916, the younger son of a Jewish solicitor, Artom Romain, who represented criminals. He was educated at Malvern College and Sidney Sussex College in Cambridge from where he graduated in law in 1938. By then war seemed inevitable so he enlisted in the Territorial Army with the Honourable Artillery Company. He was called to the Bar in 1939 but only appeared in court four times before the outbreak of World War II.^He was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant (No.126222) into the Royal Artillery in the London Gazette of 2 April 1940 and posted to the 27th Field Regiment. He then saw service in France with the British Expeditionary Force and participated in the fighting in Belgium and northern France and the retreat to Dunkirk before being evacuated on the paddle steamer Sandown Castle. From April 1942 he saw service in North Africa with the 8th Army assigned to the Judge Advocate General's Department, prosecuting and defending in several serious cases, despite his lack of experience.^He moved with the 8th Army through Italy and with the war's end he found himself as Judge Advocate in Germany, and conducted two war crime trials in June 1946 and January 1947. The first was of six Germans for the murder of a British airman who had been shot down over northern Germany in March 1945 and baled out only to be beaten to death while on the ground. One man was sentenced to death by hanging and the others received lengthy sentences of imprisonment. The second trial concerned the activities at Neuengamme forced labour camp where the seven defendants worked at a camp providing workers for a local arms factory. One defendant was sentenced to death and executed and three others were sentenced to fifteen years' imprisonment.^Romain was promoted to Major in 1949 before returning home to resume his career at the Bar in London but found professional life difficult so he joined his father's firm of solicitors, Freke Palmer Romain. In 1947 he was approached by Jews from what was then Palestine who wanted to recruit former British soldiers to fight to create a Jewish state. Despite being Jewish, he declined, stating that he had fought for King and Country for six years and was not then going to fight against them. In 1956, when many Spanish and Portuguese Jews had to flee Egypt following the Suez Crisis, he was heavily involved in their support and integration into the community and he was also instrumental in setting up the Wembley Sephardi Synagogue.^In 1971 Roddy Romain, as he was known, became a stipendiary magistrate, a position in which he gained a reputation for courtesy and fairness and was particularly lenient in sentencing those in possession of small amounts of cannabis. The London magazine, Time Out, ranked his Marylebone Magistrates' Court as top of the list from this point of view. He retired in 1983 and spent his time playing golf, walking on Hampstead Heath or relaxing at his club, the Garrick. Roddy Romain died on 11 September 2009. With research.