The 'Tirah 1897-98' D.S.O. group of three awarded to Captain J. A. L. Haldane, Gordon Highla...

The ‘Tirah 1897-98’ D.S.O. group of three awarded to Captain J. A. L. Haldane, Gordon Highlanders, afterwards General Sir Aylmer Haldane, G.C.M.G., K.C.B., D.S.O., who famously commanded the armoured train at Chieveley when he and Winston Churchill were captured with others and imprisoned in Pretoria from where they each escaped; after the Great War he rose to be G.O.C. in Mesopotamia where he successfully suppressed the Arab Rebellion of 1920-22 - his published writings included How We Escaped from Pretoria (1901) and his autobiography A Soldier’s Saga (1948) Distinguished Service Order, V.R., silver-gilt and enamel, with integral top ribbon bar, the ribbon additionally fitted with 1st type ‘laurel’ Second and Third Award Bars [to which he is not entitled]; India General Service 1854-95, 1 clasp, Waziristan 1894-5 (Capt. J. A. L. Haldane 1st Bn. Gordon Highrs.) naming officially engraved in running script as usual; India General Service 1895-1902, 3 clasps, Relief of Chitral 1895, Punjab Frontier 1897-98, Tirah 1897-98 (Captn. J. A. L. Haldane 1st Bn. Gord: Highrs.) naming officially engraved in running script as usual, mounted court-style as worn, good very fine (3) £4,000-£6,000 --- D.S.O. London Gazette 20 May 1898: ‘James Aylmer Lowthorpe Haldane, Captain, Gordon Highlanders. In recognition of services during the recent operations on the North-West Frontier of India.’ The insignia were presented to him by the Queen at Windsor on 25 June 1898. James Aylmer Lowthorpe Haldane was born on 17 November 1862, only son of the late D. Rutherford Haldane, M.D., and Mrs Haldane. He was educated at Edinburgh Academy and Wimbledon School, and passed with Honours, Royal Military College, Sandhurst, joining the Gordon Highlanders on 9 September 1882, as Lieutenant. He was Adjutant from 1 September 1888 to 31 January 1892, and became Captain on 8 April 1892. Captain Haldane served with the Waziristan Field Force in 1894-95, as Orderly Officer to Sir William Lockhart, Commanding the Force (Medal with Clasp). He served with the Chitral Relief Force under Sir Robert Low in 1895 with the 1st Battalion Gordon Highlanders (Medal with Clasp). He was A.D.C. to General Sir William Lockhart, 1896-99, and served in the campaign on the North West Frontier of India under Sir William Lockhart in 1897-98 with the Tirah Expeditionary Force as Deputy Assistant Adjutant Head Quarters Staff, and was present at the actions of Chagra Kotal and Dargai, and at the capture of the Sampagha and Arhanga Passes. Reconnaissance at and around Dwatoi and action of 24 November 1897. Operations against the Khani Khel Chamkanis. Operations in the Bara Valley 7 to 14 December 1897. Operations in the Bazar Valley 25 to 30 December 1897. He was mentioned in despatches (London Gazette 5 April 1898); received two Clasps to his India medal, and was created a Companion of the Distinguished Service Order. Haldane served in South Africa 1899-1902, with the 2nd Gordon Highlanders, taking part in the operations in Natal in 1899, including the action at Elandslaagte, where he was severely wounded. He was in command of the Chieveley Armoured Train on 15 November 1899, when it was ambushed by the Boers. The incident is chiefly remembered by the fact that Winston Churchill, who was present whilst serving as a newspaper correspondent for The Morning Post, was also taken Prisoner of War that day - his gallant conduct in action and daring escape from captivity captured the public’s imagination, propelled him into Parliament, and set him on the road to becoming Prime Minister. A full account of the incident is recorded in his Autobiography, My Early Life: ‘Nothing looks more formidable and impressive than an armoured train; but nothing is in fact more vulnerable and helpless. It was only necessary to blow up a bridge or culvert to leave the monster stranded, far from home and help, at the mercy of the enemy. This situation did not seem to have occurred to our commander. He decided to put a company of the Dublin Fusiliers and a company of the Durban Light Infantry into an armoured train of six trucks, and add a small six-pounder naval gun with some sailors landed from H.M.S. Terrible, together with a breakdown gang, and to send this considerable portion of his force out to reconnoitre towards Colenso. Captain Haldane was the officer he selected for the duty of commanding this operation. Haldane told me on the night of November 14 of the task which had been set him for the next day and on which he was to start at dawn. He did not conceal his misgivings on the imprudence of the enterprise, but he was of course, like everyone else at the beginning of a war, very keen upon adventure and a brush with the enemy. 'Would I come with him?' He would like it if I did! Out of comradeship, and because I thought it was my duty to gather as much information as I could for the Morning Post, also because I was eager for trouble, I accepted the invitation without demur. The military events which followed are well known and have often been discussed. The armoured train proceeded about fourteen miles towards the enemy and got as far as Chieveley station without a sign of opposition or indeed of life or movement on the broad undulations of the Natal landscape. We stopped for a few moments at Chieveley to report our arrival at this point by telegraph to the General. No sooner had we done this than we saw, on a hill between us and home which overlooked the line at about 600 yards distance, a number of small figures moving about and hurrying forward. Certainly they were Boers. Certainly they were behind us. What would they be doing with the railway line? There was not an instant to lose. We started immediately on our return journey. As we approached the hill, I was standing on a box with my head and shoulders above the steel plating of the rear armoured truck. I saw a cluster of Boers on the crest. Suddenly three wheeled things appeared among them, and instantly bright flashes of light opened and shut ten or twelve times. A huge white ball of smoke sprang into being and tore out into a cone, only as it seemed a few feet above my head. It was shrapnel - the first I had ever seen in war, and very nearly the last! The steel sides of the truck tanged with a patter of bullets. There was a crash from the front of the train, and a series of sharp explosions. The railway line curved round the base of the hill on a steep down gradient, and under the stimulus of the enemy’s fire, as well as of the slope, our pace increased enormously. The Boer artillery (two guns and a pom-pom) had only time for one discharge before we were round the corner out of their sight. It had flashed across my mind that there must be some trap farther on. I was just turning to Haldane to suggest that someone should scramble along the train and make the engine-driver reduce speed, when suddenly there was a tremendous shock, and he and I and all the soldiers in the truck were pitched head over heels on to its floor. The armoured train travelling at not less than forty miles an hour had been thrown off the metals by some obstruction, or by some injury to the line. In our truck no one was seriously hurt, and it took but a few seconds for me to scramble to my feet and look over the top of the armour. The train lay in a valley about 1,200 yards on the homeward side of the enemy’s hill. On the top of this hill were scores of figures running forward and throwing themselves down in the grass, from which there came almost immediately an accurate and heavy rifle fire. The bullets whistled overhead and rang and splattered on the steel plates like a hailstorm. I got down from my perch, and Haldane and I debated what to do. It was agreed that he with the little naval gun and his Dublin Fusiliers in the rear tru...