Queen's South Africa 1899-1902, 5 clasps, Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal, South A...

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 5 clasps, Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (4485 Pte. L. J. W. Doggett, 2/D. Gds:) a somewhat later issue (see footnote), with first initial officially corrected, light contact marks, very fine £140-£180 --- M.M. London Gazette 21 September 1916. Leopold John William Doggett was born in Malta on 11 October 1880 and served with the 2nd Dragoon Guards (Queens Bays) in South Africa during the Boer War. However, a note on the medal roll shows that his Queen’s South Africa Medal was forfeited after a conviction by a District Court Martial for stealing on 1 September 1903. On discharging from the Army, Doggett worked as a gunsmith in Horncastle. He has several newspaper articles about his wild behaviour pre-Great War involving alcohol and assaulting the Police, and one newspaper article dated 1909 mentions his previous 16 convictions and being sentenced to 1-month hard labour. Despite this, he was a Special Reservist from at least 1909 (as per newspaper article and the new service number 3/8216), and his Queen’s South Africa Medal was restored to him on 1 June 1911. On the outbreak of the Great War, Doggett attempted to re-join the 2nd Dragoon Guards but was posted to the 3rd Battalion Lincolnshire Regiment as a Sergeant. Tried by District Court Martial on 15 April 1915 at Grimsby for being Absent without leave he was reduced to the ranks and was posted to the 2nd Battalion Lincolnshire Regiment, serving with them during the Great War on the Western Front from 25 May 1915 as a Private. He was invalided home a couple of months later but returned to France on 16 June 1916 with the 184th Company, Machine Gun Corps. The following month he was awarded the Military Medal for his gallantry during the attack at Fromelles on 19 July 1916 (London Gazette 21 September 1916). According to a contemporary account published in the Boston Guardian, 2 September 1916, Doggett was awarded the M.M. for ‘bringing into safety one Captain, one Lieutenant, one Sergeant, one Lance-Corporal, and five Privates. Hearing his comrades calling for help, Doggett stripped himself of his equipment and jacket and went to give help although he had to pass through an area swept by machine guns and shells. Wading waist deep through two ditches of foul black muddy water, he came across five Privates badly wounded and by tremendous exertion managed to place each man in a place of safety. He returned again and again bringing in Sergeant Young of the Berkshire Regiment who was dangerously wounded and also a Lance-Corporal. His last venture was to assist two officers who were exhausted and suffering from shell shock. He got back to his lines without injury’. Promoted back to Sergeant, it would appear that Doggett remained in the Machine Gun Corps until demobilisation on 17 February 1919. He was granted a disability pension for a ‘dislocated cartridge in his knee’, and died in Southwark, London, on 8 March 1953. His brother, Corporal Albert Edward Doggett, Royal Army Service Corps, was also awarded the Military Medal. Sold with copied medal roll extract and copied research.