Bid for a piece of Peterborough's military history
A GALLANTRY medal awarded to a Peterborough-born war hero is set to fetch up to £1,200 at an auction in June.
A GALLANTRY medal awarded to a Peterborough-born war hero is set to fetch up to 1,200 at an auction in June.The Military Cross was won by Captain Campbell Ross Bridge for his exploits in the decisive second Battle of the Marne, which took place near Paris in the summer of 1918, and which was the last German offensive on the Western Front.
It was also one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War as more than a quarter of a million men were either killed or injured in the three-week battle.
Capt Bridge – who served with D Battery, 95th Brigade, Royal Field Artillery – was born in Peterborough in 1888 and lived at 5 Geneva Street with his parents, James and Amy Bridge.
James Bridge was a travelling salesman in the drapery business and was sufficiently prosperous to be able to employ a live-in servant, Annie Rignall, who was 20 when the 1891 Census was taken.
From Peterborough, Captain Bridge moved to Bedford and then to London,where he became a stockbroker's clerk, before emigrating to Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in 1912.
According to family tradition, Capt Bridge was present at the last cavalry charge of the First World War and he was later wounded while attacking the Hindenburg Line.
After treatment at Rouen hospital, he convalesced at the Overseas Rothschild Home, in Deauville.
When he was awarded the Military Cross in 1918, the citation said it was "...for conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty when in temporary command of a battery. He skilfully carried out all tasks allotted him, inflicting heavy casualties on the enemy. During successive retirements he fought his battery with great courage, frequently under heavy observed hostile fire. The example set by him contributed materially to the successful work done by the battery."
Capt Bridge survived the horrors of the First World War and in 1919 he returned to Ceylon.
There, during the Second World War, he was made a Justice of the Peace, police coroner and Iinspector of local police, police stations and government hospitals.
He also became area commandant of some 250 square miles of the island, with responsibility, in the event of Japanese attack, for arranging the destruction of bridges, petrol stations and industrial plant and for the evacuation of European residents.
He retired in 1946 and returned home to England. He was in his early 90s when he died at Eastbourne in October 1981.
Captain Bridge's Military Cross will be auctioned – along with his British War and Victory medals – at Morton & Eden at Sotheby's in London, on June 10.
The Military Cross has been put up for sale by the recipient's family.
There are several reasons why this Military Cross is worth more than some other examples.
Capt Bridge served with the Royal Field Artillery, which is a popular regiment for collectors. It is also a good citation.
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Thursday 18 March 2010
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