The Collection of Medals formed by the late Alan Wolfe

Pair: Able Seaman Henry Searle, Royal Navy

India General Service 1854-95, 1 clasp, Pegu (Hy. Searle, A.B. “Winchester”); China 1857-60, no clasp (H. Searle, A.B. H.M.S. Winchester) officially impressed, original but later issue, the first with edge bruising and polished, good fine, the second very fine (2) £200-250

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Collection of Medals formed by the late Alan Wolfe.

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Henry Searle was born at Southey, Middlesex, in about 1831. He served as an Able Seaman aboard Winchester in the Second Burma war and the early stages of the Second China war in 1857. He was paid off from Winchester on 14 May 1857. The China war medal roll states that his medal was ‘sent to party 13 June 1893’. Most medals to this ship were sent out in the early 1860s, so it seems likely that Searle left the service shortly after the campaign in China and did not claim his medal until many years later.