The Great War A.F.C. attributed to Captain A. G. A. Davis, Devonshire Regiment, attached...

The Great War A.F.C. attributed to Captain A. G. A. Davis, Devonshire Regiment, attached Royal Flying Corps and Royal Air Force, was wounded in action during the Second Battle of Arras April 1917 Air Force Cross, G.V.R., unnamed as issued, in John Pinches, London, case of issue, this with the original named investiture label, extremely fine £1,200-£1,600 --- A.F.C. London Gazette 1 January 1919. Arthur George Albert Davis was born in St. Aldates, Oxford in 1893 and served for two years prior to the Great War with the Queen’s Own Oxfordshire Hussars, before being commissioned Second Lieutenant in the 4th Battalion, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, on 14 September 1914. Having passed the Machine Gun Course he was attached to the 1st Entrenching Battalion, British Expeditionary Force, on the Western in June 1915. Appointed to a permanent commission in the regular army with the Devonshire Regiment on March 1916, he was seconded to the Royal Flying Corps as Flying Officer (Observer) on 14 May 1916, and is recorded as ‘observer flying at 300 feet when he extinguished with his machine-gun an enemy searchlight near Harnes serving with 18 Squadron in a F.E. 2b piloted by Lieutenant G.N. Teale on 11 July 1916’. Returning to England to undergo the Pilots Course at Oxford in August 1916, having passed as a pilot he proceeded to France with 35 Squadron in January 1917 and was wounded in action during the Second Battle of Arras on 10 April 1917. Returning to England and promoted Flight Commander, temporary Captain, he was appointed Flying Instructor with 17 and 38 Squadrons in August 1917. Returning to France in March 1918 he flew with 88 and 59 Squadrons before once again taking up an appointment as an Instructor at the Observer Training School at R.A.F. Manston in September 1918, being awarded the Air Force Cross in January 1919. Transferring to 97 Squadron he proceeded with them to India in July 1919. Posted to the 2nd Battalion Devonshire Regiment , then stationed in Quetta, on 1 November 1919, he relinquished his temporary Royal Air Force commission on return to Army duties on 5 February 1920. Posted to the 1st Battalion, Devonshire Regiment at Devonport on 6 March 1920 he finally relinquished his commission with the rank of Captain on 22 July 1921. In civilian life he took up employment as a Motor Car Dealer, dying from bronchitis at the early age of 32 at Paddington, London on 30 March 1926. Sold with a photographic image of the recipient; copied service records; and other research.