A Fine Collection of Medals to Officers Who Died During The Two World Wars

Pair: Second Lieutenant C. L. Mackenzie, Highland Light Infantry, killed in action on 20 September 1914

1914 Star (2/Lieut., High. L.I.); British War Medal (2. Lieut.) the star with damage to one point and showing signs of corrosion, otherwise generally nearly very fine or better (2) £100-150

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Fine Collection of Medals to Officers Who Died During The Two World Wars.

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Colin Landseer Mackenzie was born at Malvern on 4 May 1892 and educated at the Naval School, Stubbington, and at Cheltenham College, ‘joining the O.T.C. at so early an age as to be unable to carry his rifle on a march.’ After passing the Army Competetive examination he was gazetted to the Highland Light Infantry as 2nd Lieutenant in May 1913.

Second Lieutenant Mackenzie was killed in action on 20 September 1914, shot in the head by a German sniper in an advanced trench near Verneuil, north of the River Aisne, and is buried in Vendresse British Cemetery, Aisne, France.

The following account of his death was communicated by an officer in Mackenzie’s company, and published in The Bond of Sacrifice, Volume I: ‘He was in the trenches at the time, defending a position, and was watching a charge of our men on his left front, and had turned round to tell his men to cease fire in case they hit any of their own side, when he was shot in the head, death being instantaneous...’

The following letter written by Mackenzie to his sister on 29 August 1914 is published in The British Roll of Honour, Empires Heroes, from which the following is extracted: ‘... About six miles from Mons we watched the Germans shelling the town, and houses burning, that was the first thing to make me realise for a moment that we were not on manoeuvres. The second thing that brought the war home to me was the night we left Genly, we marched through a village where the Royal Scots Fusiliers were billetted, and the men were lying all about. The village reeked of iodoform, one wondered who was dead and who was only wounded..’

A note with the lot states: ‘The medals were found ten years ago buried under a tree by a man walking his dog.’