This medal was sent to me the other day, anonymously, with a note saying that the sender had bought it at a car-boot sale and would like me to return it to the family of the person named on it or send it on to a museum.
Although it might indeed be precious to the descendants of 171538 Private E. McGrath of the West Yorkshire Regiment (and if any of them would like to get touch with me, I'll gladly pass it on), I suspect that there might already be plenty of these Victory Medals in museums, as 5,750,000 of them were cast and distributed in 1919 to commemorate the victory of the Allies.
Researching their history took me into the world of Pip, Squeak and Wilfred, this particularly medal being a Wilfred.
It's in lacquered bronze and bears the classical figure of Athene Nike, the goddess of Victory. On the reverse is an inscription, "The Great War for Civilisation 1914-1919". The surviving attached silk ribbons (this one doesn't have one) are red in the centre, with green and violet on either side shaded to form the colours of two rainbows. The medal is suspended from a plain ring.
Anybody who received a Mention in Despatches was authorised to wear, sewn on to the ribbon, a single emblem of oak leaves in bronze. When the ribbon alone was worn, a smaller version of the emblem was fixed to it.
The medal, designed by W McMillan, was struck by the Royal Mint and was awarded to all those who entered a theatre of war. All three services were eligible.
Dipping into the wealth of information on the internet, I learn that Victory Medals continued to be awarded after the Armistice, for the British forces who saw action in North Russia (up to October 12, 1919) and Trans-Caspia (up to April 17, 1919) also qualified - which explains why the dates are 1914-1919, and not 1918. The recipient's regiment and number were inscribed around the rim.
And I also learned that Pip, Squeak and Wilfred are the names given to the trio of commemorative medals issued to members of British and Empire forces who took part in the Great War. The 1914 Star (and 1914-15 Star), the British War Medal and the British War Medal themselves are not gallantry medals and have only a small monetary value.
They were named after characters in a comic strip which first appeared in the Daily Mirror newspaper on May 12, 1919. The author of the script was Bertram J Lamb and the artist was Austin B Payne. The naming of the characters in the strip is due to Payne's wartime batman who for unknown reasons was known as "Pip-Squeak"
In the comic strip Pip was a dog, Squeak a penguin and Wilfred (who did not appear until later in the series) was a rabbit. Pip and Squeak were portrayed as being Wilfred's parents and there was a supporting cast of a Russian bomb maker and his dog "Popski". Another jaded and elderly penguin known as "Auntie" made an appearance.
The comic strip became a craze in the 1920s. The issue of the medals coincided with the start of this craze and they soon became known as Pip, Squeak and Wilfred.
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