Beschreibung:

Three: Lieutenant T. J. Walker Royal Indian Marine, who was present at the wreck of the Warren Hastings in January 1897 India General Service 1854-95, 2 clasps, Burma 1885-7, Burma 1887-89 (2d Gde. Officer, H.M.I.M.S. Sir W. Peel) second clasp loose; Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, no clasp (Lieut., R.I.M.S. Clive); China 1900, no clasp (Lieut., R.I.M.S. Clive), generally good very fine and rare (3) £1000-1200 Footnote Ex Captain K. J. Douglas-Morris, R.N. collection, 12 February 1997 and D.N.W. 7 March 2007. Just 42 Queen’s South Africa Medals were awarded to the Royal Indian Marine, 34 of them without clasp. Thomas Johnstone Walker, who was born in Melbourne, Australia in April 1863, was educated at King’s School, Peterborough before joining the training ship Worcester, following which he was apprenticed to the New Zealand Shipping Company. Appointed a 3rd Grade Officer in the Royal Indian Marine in April 1884, he was advanced to the 2nd Grade during the course of his active service in the Burma operations of 1885-87, aboard the Sir William Peel, Clive and Jaboona, but had risen to the rank of Lieutenant by the time he joined the troopship Warren Hastings nearly a decade later. He was subsequently present on the occasion of her loss off St. Phillipe in January 1897. The R.I.M. troopship Warren Hastings, sailing from India to Mauritius via Cape Town, started out on the second leg of her last voyage on 6 January 1897. The troops on board comprised four companies of the 1st K.R.R.C., four companies of the 2nd York and Lancaster Regiment and 25 men from the Middlesex Regiment - a total of 22 officers, four Warrant Officers and 940 N.C.Os and men. The only passengers were ‘four ladies, 13 women and 10 children’. For a week good progress was made, but on the morning of the 13th the glass fell and the wind shifted to the south. In spite of reduced visibility the ship’s officers felt no cause for concern. That night, however, a freak current carried the ship off course and, at about 2.20 a.m. on the 14th, a violent shudder accompanied by a ‘grating sound’ woke the O.C. Troops. Fearing the worst, they dressed hurriedly and reported to Commander Holland on the bridge. The ship was eight miles out of position and had struck the coast of the French island of Reunion. The night was stormy and intensely dark, indeed so dark that little could be seen beyond a few feet. Drenching rain fell in torrents, ‘making a great noise on the awnings and decks’, and a volcano in full eruption a few miles away could neither be seen or heard. Keeping the engines at full speed (until finally stopped by the inrush of water), Commander Holland ordered the troops to be fallen in below, and having received a report that the rock on which the ship’s bows were lodged afforded a landing space, sent two of his officers over the side with ‘blue lights’ to investigate the possibility of disembarking the soldiers by rope ladders either side of the bows. This having been deemed practicable at about 3.40 a.m., the troops between the decks were organised by regiments, with the K.R.R.C. lining the port side and the York and Lancasters the starboard, so that the two forward companions could be used simultaneously. The disembarkation had scarcely commenced at 4 a.m. when a heavy bump caused by the running swell sent the vessel lurching to starboard. Everyone was ordered on deck, and at 4.20 a.m. priority was given to ‘women and children and such sick as required assistance’. By the time they had been landed safely the starboard upper deck was awash and where possible men were ordered over to the port side. Commander Holland now considered his ship was in imminent danger of capsizing and probably sinking in shark infested deep water. Orders were shouted to discard rifles and boots in order to expedite the disembarkation, for such was the angle of the deck that it was impossible to move along it without the use of both hands. The torrential tropical rain persisted and at 4