Description

Offered is a pair of Indian & Boer War medals to Lance Sergeant Vicary, who died of Enteric Fever at Pietermaritzbug, South Africa on 17th April 1900.

India General Service Medal (1895 – 1908) with 1 clasp PUNJAB FRONTIER 1897 – 98, period engraved 3456 Corpl T.S. Vicary 1^stBn Devons Regt, & Queens South Africa Medal (1899 – 1902), 2 clasps TUGELA HEIGHTS, RELIEF OF LADYSMITH, impressed named 3456 P^TET.S. VICARY. DEVON : REG^T. Medals court mounted for display. Comes with copies of medal rolls, newspaper articles, picture of his grave register of soldiers effects, 1881 census.

Lance Sergeant Thomas Sherwood Vicary, was born in Devon (possibly Higher Holcombe) in 1873, a farmer by trade he enlisted with the 1^stBattalion Devon Regiment in about 1892.

He survived the Punjab expedition and deployed from India to Natal, South Africa with his battalion before the war started. They were sent to Ladysmith and were brigaded with the 1st Manchesters and 2nd Gordons under Colonel Ian Hamilton. They fought at the battle of Elandslaagte on 21 October and then withdrew into Ladysmith and became part of the garrison during the siege.

It is probable that Vicary was on detachment, as he was not with the Battalion for the siege. The majority of the 1^stBattalion men do not have the clasp Tugela Heights, nor Relief of Ladysmith. His clasp entitlement reflects this.

On the 16^thApril Lance Sergeant Vicary fell ill and died of enteric fever (typhoid) at 14th Stationary Hospital, Fort Napier, Pietermaritzburg, Natal (aged 26 years). He was buried in Fort Napier Cemetery and is also commemorated on the Devonshire Boer War memorial in the North Transept of Exeter Cathedral.

Date of death recorded as 16 April 1900 on his Pietermaritzburg record of death and by ‘In Memoriam’ by S Watt. Recorded as 17 Apr 1900 on the Natal Field Force Casualty Roll.