Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Seven: Petty Officer 1st Class A. Cuming, Royal Navy

Egypt and Sudan 1882-89, dated reverse, 1 clasp, Alexandria 11th July (A.B., H.M.S. Monarch); China 1900, no clasp (P.O. 1 Cl., H.M.S. Hermione); 1914-15 Star (102082 P.O. 1, R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (102082 P.O. 1, R.N.); Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., V.R., narrow suspension (P.O. 2nd Cl., H.M.S. Garnet); Khedive’s Star 1882, the first and the sixth with contact marks, otherwise good fine, the remainder good very fine (7) £600-800

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Medals for Services at Sea from the Collection of the Late Oliver Stirling Lee.

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Alfred Cuming was born at St. Andrew’s, Plymouth in August 1862 and entered the Royal Navy as a Boy 2nd Class in September 1877. He subsequently witnessed active service aboard H.M.S. Monarch in the Egypt operations of 1882, including the bombardment of Alexandria, and aboard the Hermione off China during the Boxer Rebellion. He had, meanwhile, been awarded his L.S. & G.C. Medal in January 1891 and been advanced to Petty Officer 1st Class. Cuming was pensioned ashore in May 1901, when he joined the strength of the Royal Fleet Reserve.

Recalled on the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, he joined the Goliath, in which battleship he served off the East African coast in pursuit of the German light cruiser Konigsberg, where, in November 1914, Commander Ritchie of the Goliath gained the first Naval V.C. of the Great War at the capital of German East Africa, Dar-es-Salaam.

After the destruction of the Konigsberg, the Goliath received orders to proceed to the Dardanelles, where she arrived in the middle of April 1915, but in the early morning hours of 13 May following, she was struck in quick succession by three torpedoes fired from the Turkish destroyer Mouavenet-Millieh, with the result that she sank so quickly that many of those below were drowned before they could reach the upper deck. Of her complement of some 750 men, about 570, including Cuming, were drowned.

Cuming, who left a widow who was resident at Anfield, Liverpool, is commemorated on the Plymouth Naval Memorial.