| His rank seems to be indicated by the star and crown on his shoulder boards as well as by the number of rows of braid on his tunic's sleeves. If the star and crown combination followed regular British Army standards of the era then this would place this man's rank at that of Lieutenant-Colonel. His campaign medals showing in detail below are worth closer examination. |
| First it should be noted that he is wearing his medals separate from the ribbons. The ribbons appear to be worn sewn in a row on the tunic with the medals having been pinned ribbonless below the ribbons. It can also be observed that there appear to for four ribbons but only three medals. The first medal on the right of the photograph would appear to be - based on the ornate and unique style of its suspender bar to be the British South Africa Company Medal with one clasp. This medal first issued in 1896 (for campaigns Mashonaland, Matabeleland and Rhodesia between 1890 and 1897) was awarded without clasps for the first the first campaign in which the recipient took part and with clasps for subsequent actions. If this identification is correct then this man took part in two campaign for the British South Africa Company after 1893 since the "Mashsonaland 1890" clasp was not authorized until 1927. The central medal appears the have a slightly large planchet than the other medals. Most British campaign medals were around 36mm is diameter while this medal appears to be of the slightly larger 39mm or 39.5mm diameter variety. This coupled with the straight bar suspender and large sized clasp would probably make it out to be the 1897 Khedive's Sudan Medal which was issued for services between 1896 and 1908. While often accompanied by the Queen's Sudan Medal is was issued alone for actions that took place after Kitchener's defeat of Mahdist forces in 1896-98. The only other possibility for a medal of the style and size would be Royal Niger Company's Medal which was first issued in 1899 for action that took place in Nigeria between 1886 and 1897. The third and center most medal appears to be of the standard 36mm variety which couple with the large size single clasp and straight bar suspender could be either the 1895 Central Africa Medal or the 1899 East and Central Africa Medal - either of which were relatively rare when issued to European officers or men since most were issued to local forces. Based on the above possibilities the only the Sudan Medal would have been issued to this officer while in Anglo-Egyptian service the other two would have been acquired prior to him joining the Khedival forces. Of course the above possibilities do not take into the fact that there appear to be four ribbons on this officers tunic. Cabinet Photograph Unknown Location - Possibly Egypt or the Sudan Unknown Photographer Early 1900s |