Beschreibung:

The unique Boer War D.S.O. and Albert Medal for Sea group of six awarded to Lieutenant-Colonel E. D. Thornburgh Cropper, West Kent Militia and Imperial Yeomanry, who was awarded the Albert Medal and Royal Humane Society Medal for gallantly trying to save the life of a waiter who had fallen overboard from the S.S. Idaho in San Francisco Bay on 6 August 1878, by diving into the treacherous Bay after him. Subsequently serving in Africa, he was Mentioned in Despatches for his conduct at Ulundi during the Zulu War, and again during the Boer War, where he was dangerously wounded in December 1900, awarded the D.S.O., and died three months later. Only 12 Albert Medals for Sea have been awarded to the Army, and Thornburgh Cropper’s A.M. is unique for an act of gallantry in the United States of America Distinguished Service Order, V.R., silver-gilt and enamel, with integral top riband bar; Albert Medal, 2nd Class, for Gallantry in Saving Life at Sea, bronze and enamel, reverse officially engraved ‘Presented in the name of Her Majesty to Captain E. D .Thornburgh Cropper of the West Kent Militia for attempting to save the life of Thomas Nolan of Steam Ship “Idaho” on 6th. August 1878.’, reverse of the crown with maker’s cartouché Phillips, Cockspur St., and officially numbered ‘No. 41’, with originally-ordained narrow riband; Jubilee 1897, silver (Captain E. D. Cropper. Pembroke Yeomanry Cavalry.); South Africa 1877-79, 1 clasp, 1879 (Capt. E. D. Thornburgh Cropper A.D.C.); Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 2 clasps, Cape Colony, Orange Free State (Major E. D. Thornburgh Cropper. 30/Co. Imp. Yeo.) re-engraved naming; Royal Humane Society, small bronze medal (unsuccessful) (Capt. E. D. Thornburgh Cropper. 6th. Aug. 1878) with top bronze riband buckle, mounted court-style for display purposes, dent to convex reverse of AM, otherwise very fine and better (6) £10000-12000 Footnote Provenance: Payne Collection 1911; W. F. Hughes Collection; Edkins Collection, Glendining’s, September 1986 D.S.O. London Gazette 26 September 1901. A.M. London Gazette 5 June 1879: ‘At 11 a.m. on 6th August, 1878, as the steamship “Idaho”, belonging to the Pacific Coast Steamship Company, was in the act of crossing the bar of San Francisco Bay, outward bound, about two miles from the shore, Thomas Nolan, a coloured waiter, threw himself overboard. Immediately there was a cry of “a man overboard”, and Captain Cropper, a passenger, without a moment’s hesitation, threw off his coast and waistcoat, rushed to the stern, and jumped overboard. Although Captain Cropper made a most gallant attempt to reach the drowning man, Nolan sank before he was reached. Captain Cropper was subsequently picked up by the steamer’s lifeboat, after being in the water five-and-twenty minutes. The steamship was going eight knots at the time, and there was a high sea running with a westerly wind.’ Royal Humane Society Case No. 20514: ‘At 11 a.m. on 6th August 1878, in San Francisco Bay, North America, Captain E. D. T. Cropper, West Kent Militia, jumped overboard into a rough sea 8 fathoms deep and 2 miles from the shore and swam through water towards the drowning man, Thomas Nolan, a Negro waiter from the S.S “Idaho”, but he sank before being reached and was drowned. Cropper then undressed in the water and waited forty minutes until he was picked up by a boat.’ Edward Denman Thornburgh Cropper was born at Swaylands, Kent, in 1855, and educated at Eton. Commissioned Sub-Lieutenant in the West Kent Militia on 20 May 1875, he was advanced to Captain on 20 March 1878. In August 1878, Thornburgh Cropper, having married a Californian lady by the name of Virginia in 1874 (although records about their marriage were destroyed in the earthquake and fire of 1906), and whilst a passenger on board the 1,077 ton, 3 deck steamship Idaho, two miles from the shore in the Bay of San Francisco, made an unsuccessful attempt to rescue the life of a suicidal crewman who had thrown himself overboard. For his unsuccess