The fine collection of attributed British Officers' Swords formed by Hal Giblin

Captain Raymond Meyrick Bussell, Dorset Regiment and 3rd Battalion, Parachute Regiment, Army Air Corps, captured after the fighting at Arnhem, escaped but was recaptured, and subsequently shot by the Gestapo 10th October 1944

A scarce Edward VIII 1897 pattern Infantry officer’s sword, blade 83cm by Wilkinson Sword Co, Pall Mall, London, (No 66033) etched with ERVIII cypher, Royal Arms, foliage &c., plated steel guard with ERVIII cypher, fish-skin covered grip with copper-gilt wire binding, in its leather covered field service scabbard, complete with Sam Browne frog and sword knot, blade retains almost all original polish, and although rather dirty the sword is in fine condition throughout £350-400

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The fine collection of attributed British Officers' Swords formed by Hal Giblin.

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Sword sold by Wilkinson to R. M. Bussell, Dorset Regiment, January 1937.

Raymond Meyrick Bussell, son of Raymond Evans Bussell, British Vice Consul, Samarang, Java, was born on 1 September 1917, educated at Blundell’s School, Tiverton and at Sandhurst, and commissioned into the Dorset Regiment in August 1937. He was an acting Captain by 1944, attached to the Airborne Forces. After the fighting at Arnhem, it would seem that Captain Bussell was captured but escaped, in company with Lieutenant Harry Michael Ashbrooke, but on recapture they were handed over to the Gestapo, and subsequently shot. They were buried in the garden of a local house and, after hostilities, were re-interred together by the C.W.G.C. in Vorden General Cemetery, Northern Holland. Their graves have been adopted by the local school children who frequently place flowers on them. Vorden is a remote spot, a good way North of Arnhem, and it appears that there was a Gestapo HQ in the area.