Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria

Six: Chief Stoker W. G. Wicks, Royal Navy

Egypt and Sudan 1882-89, dated reverse, 1 clasp, Alexandria 11th July (Stkr. 2 Cl., H.M.S. Sultan); Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, no clasp (Ch. Sto., H.M.S. Terrible), single initial ‘W.’; China 1900, 1 clasp, Taku Forts (Ch. Sto., H.M.S. Fame), second initial ‘J.’; Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., V.R., narrow suspension (Ch. Stoker, H.M.S. Howe); Khedive’s Star 1882; Marine Society Reward of Merit, silver (William George Hicks, 16 May 1907), contact mark and edge bruising but generally very fine or better and a rare combination of awards (6) £700-900

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, The Barrett J. Carr Collection of Boer War Medals.

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Collection

Ex Captain K. J. Douglas-Morris, R.N. collection, 12 February 1997 (Lot 373).

538 no-clasp Queen’s South Africa Medals were awarded to the ship’s company of H.M.S. Terrible.

Just 65 China 1900 Medals were awarded to the ship’s company of H.M.S. Fame, 58 of them with single “Taku Forts” clasp.

William George Wicks was born in Hampstead, Middlesex in August 1863 and entered the Royal Navy as a Stoker 2nd Class in January 1882. Quickly drafted to H.M.S. Sultan, he was present at the bombardment of Alexandria that July, and, as a recently appointed Chief Stoker, was awarded his L.S. & G.C. Medal in May 1894. Further active service followed in the Terrible, when he served off South Africa from October 1899 to March 1900.

Wicks next sailed for China, where his service record reveals that he removed to the Barfleur that May, but not the fact he was loaned to the destroyer Fame in time for the Taku Fort operations of 17 June (ADM 171/55 confirms). To the latter ship - and the Whiting - fell the unenviable task of capturing four Chinese destroyers, lying between Taku and Tongku, which were threatening the Allied attack on the forts. Commanded respectively by Lieutenants R. Keyes, R.N. (afterwards Admiral of the Fleet) and C. MacKenzie, R.N., each ship also towed into action a whaler manned by a dozen “Bluejackets”, all of them volunteers - it was one of the last occasions boarding parties went into action with the cutlass. In his subsequent report to the Rear-Admiral, China Station, dated 27 June 1900, Keyes stated:

‘After a slight resistance and the exchange of a few shots, the crews were driven overboard or below hatches; there were a few killed and wounded; our casualties were nil. No damage was done to the prizes, but the Fame’s bow was slightly bent when we closed to board, and the Whiting was struck by a projectile about 4 or 5 inches abreast a coal bunker. This was evidently fired from a mud battery on the bend between Taku and Tongku, which fired in all about 30 shots at us, none of the others striking, though several coming very close ... There was a good deal of sniping from the dockyard so I directed all cables of the prizes to be slipped and proceeded to tow them up to Tongku.’

Wicks returned to the U.K. via Tamar in early 1902 and was pensioned ashore in May of the same year, when he enrolled in the Royal Fleet Reserve. He served in the latter capacity until being discharged for a final time in August 1913, aged 50 years, but not before adding the Marine Society’s handsome Reward of Merit to his assorted accolades.