Exceptional Naval and Polar Awards from the Collection of RC Witte

A rare Great War Kut operations D.S.C. group of eight awarded to Commander R. D. Merriman, Royal Indian Navy, late Royal Indian Marine, who plied the Tigris in a motor launch and was closely involved in General Townshend’s negotiations to surrender the besieged town in April 1916

Distinguished Service Cross, G.V.R., hallmarks for London 1918; 1914-15 Star (Lt. R. D. Merriman, R.I.M.); British War and Victory Medals (Lieut. R. D. Merriman, R.I.M.); Defence and War Medals 1939-45; Jubilee 1935; Coronation 1937, mounted court-style as worn, very fine and better (8) £2000-2500

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Exceptional Naval and Polar Awards from the Collection of RC Witte.

View
Collection

D.S.C. London Gazette 23 August 1918:

‘For valuable services in connection with the defence of Kut-el-Amara.’

Reginald Douglas Merriman was born in Weybridge, Surrey, in November 1887, and attended Stubbington House, Fareham, and the training ship Conway prior to being appointed a Sub. Lieutenant in the Royal Indian Marine in December 1908.

Recalled from leave on the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, and having been advanced to Lieutenant in the previous year, he was initially posted for general duties in Bombay, prior to being ordered to Rangoon.

The Siege of Kut

Then in July 1915, he was embarked for Mesopotamia in the R.I.M.S. troopship Mayo, where, in common with other naval personnel, he found himself actively employed in small boats on the Tigris, in his case in a Thorneycroft motor launch. And following General Sir Charles Townshend’s retirement to Kut after the battle of Ctesiphon, he found himself enrolled as a despatch bearer between the General and Halil Pasha, the Turkish Military Commander of Mesopotamia, as the former entered into negotiations for surrender.

A good account of these trips on the Tigris may be found in Ronald Millar’s Kut, in which Merriman receives due recognition, his motor launch, with white flag, being a memorable sight in the closing stages of the siege in May 1916, as it plied back and forth between the two forces, sometimes with Townshend embarked:

‘The 27 April dawned quietly. The Turkish snipers and artillery had been given orders to cease their activity. The stillness after almost five months of bombardment was uncanny. Cautiously in ones and twos and then in hundreds the British troops wandered along the river front. The rooftops became crowded with curious spectators watching the developments at the river bank.

Lieutenant R. D. Merriman, Royal Indian Marine, in white dress uniform, stood watching Captain S. C. Winfield-Smith as he tinkered with the engine of one of the motor launches. From the launch's ensign jackstaff fluttered a white flag. Shortly after 9 a.m. Townshend, accompanied by Lieutenant-Colonel Parr (G.S.O. 1), Captain Moreland (G.S.O. 3) and Captain Shakeshaft arrived at the river bank. The sun struck sparks from the highly polished metal on the officers' uniforms. The three men, Townshend rather unsteadily, clambered into the launch and with a few preliminary blips of the engine they departed upstream.

Before leaving his headquarters Townshend had informed Lake of Halil Pasha's uncompromising attitude and said that he would propose to the Turkish Commander-in-Chief that the final details of the surrender negotiations be conducted with British headquarters.

As Townshend's launch grew smaller in the distance its white flag fluttering gaily in the breeze, the rooftop watchers saw another craft appear from upstream. Halil Pasha, tactlessly, was using one of the launches captured from the British after Ctesiphon. Eyes glued to binoculars saw the two launches meet about a mile and a half upstream from Kut. Townshend and his officers were seen to board the Turkish craft. There was a brief introduction and Townshend went below, his officers, returning to their own craft, separated. The British launch arrived back at the river bank and Townshend came ashore with his officers. Townshend looked strained but carried his head high. The officers vanished into the headquarters building.’

And on another trip:

‘Townshend sent Shakeshaft and Merriman downstream with the launch and the Turkish officers, with a letter for Halil Pasha which said that he was waiting for instructions from Lake but that his final reply would be in the Turkish Commander-in-Chief's hands the following morning. The launch had just passed the fort when it developed engine trouble. The Turkish officers frantically signalled the bank for help and got the shouted assurance that aid would be on its way shortly. As the launch drifted downstream the British officers had plenty of time to examine their surroundings. The second flood was abating now and the river was dropping down its banks. An appalling stench came from a large number of bloated dead bodies which were floating in the reeds on both the right and left banks. The dead men appeared to be Arabs and Turks. As the water lapped the muddy banks sucking sounds came from the thousands of rat holes. The craft drifted around the bend and there was Fort Maqasis with the Julnar off the sandbank now moored inshore near the left bank. She was being unloaded and large quantities of stores were stacked near by. There was no sign of her British crew.

At last the launch drifted ashore and one of the Turkish officers departed with Townshend's letter. After about half an hour had elapsed an enormous Turkish engineer arrived, smiled jovially at the British officers and then began to flail the engine with a spanner. The Englishmen watched aghast at the apparent destruction of their engine, their only means of returning to Kut and possible liberty. The Turkish officers did not seem to notice that anything was amiss and were counting dead bodies. The flies were maddening. The engine at last responded to the treatment and in a few moments Shakeshaft and Merriman were on their way back upstream to report to Townshend.’

And judging by the following extract, it was Merriman who took Townshend on his final journey into captivity:

‘On the evening of 3 May a small Thorneycroft launch was observed making its way upstream from Kut towards Shumran. The prisoners of war at the camp on the bank of the Tigris recognised the small figures in the stern. It was General Townshend; with him were Colonel Parr and Captain Moreland. The troops rapidly lined the bank, some running, some limping, others being carried. As the launch passed slowly upstream cheer after cheer came from the scarecrows on the bank. Two days later on 5 May, the British and Indian officers were separated from their men. At 3.30 p.m. that afternoon the long march into captivity began.’

P.O.W.

Of Merriman’s subsequent movements little remains known, although he was certainly among the British officers held at Yozgad by 1917. Fellow internees included seven Naval officers, among them the submariners A. D. Cochrane and H. G. D. Stoker, who, with one other Naval officer, had attempted to escape from a camp at Kara-Hissar, but had been recaptured when within sight of the sea, and since spent ten months in a common Turkish jail. And Yozgad was no exception in terms of its inmates determination to escape, one party of officers, including Cochrane, making a home run in the summer of 1918 - see 450 Miles to Freedom, by Johnston and Yearsley.

Advanced to Lieutenant-Commander in March 1921 and to Commander in December 1928, Merriman was placed on the Retired List in November 1938, but he was recalled by the Royal Indian Navy on the renewal of hostilities, and remained actively employed until reverting once more to the Retired List in December 1942.