Long Service Medal Group to A.W.O.1st Class Tom Cooper, Durham Light Infantry

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Sjt. Major TomCooper 1 st Battalion DurhamLight Infantry A fine First World War and Third Afghan War group of 5 medals awarded to Tom Cooper, acting Regimental Sergeant Major , 1 st Battalion Durham Light Infantry. 1914-15 Star (9869 Sjt. T. Cooper. Durh. L.I.) British War Medal 1914-18 (9869 A.W.O. Cl.1 T. Cooper Durh.L.I.) Victory Medal 1914-19 (9869 A.W.O. Cl.1 T. Cooper Durh.L.I.) I.G.S 1908-35 , G.V R., Kaisar-I-Hind obverse, 1 Bar ‘Afghanistan N.W.F. 1919’,(9869 C.Q.M.S. T.Cooper 1 Durh. L.I.), L.S.& G.C. G.V R. (4435092 Sjt. T. Cooper Durh. L.I.), (5) good very fine, mounted as worn. Tom Cooper was a regular pre-war soldier and served with the 1 st Battalion Durham Light Infantry throughout the First World War and Third Afghan War of 1919, rising to Acting Warrant Officer 1 st Class, (Regimental Sergeant Major) the rank on his two WW1 medals. 1 st DLI served in India throughout the First World War. Cooper entered the Indian Frontier Theatre of operations on 21 st August 1915. British India had been stripped of Imperial and Indian Army forces to fight on the Western Front and the Middle East, the risk of invasion from Afghanistan was always present and a succession of minor campaigns and expeditions had to be conducted against rebellious tribes and war parties. At the commencement of hostilities in August 1914 1 st DLI were stationed at Nowshera, part of the 3rd (Abbottabad) Brigade in 2nd ( Rawalpindi ) Division. They transferred during August 1914 to 2nd (Nowshera) Brigade in 1st ( Peshawar ) Division, serving on the North West Frontier during 1915, and 1916–1917. In November 1917 the Battalion transferred to 4th ( Rawalpindi ) Brigade in 2nd ( Rawalpindi ) Division, with whom they served in Afghanistan during the successful Third Afghan War of 1919. The Kingdom of Afghanistan had been held relatively peacefully if rather shakily since the end of the Second Afghan War of 1878-80. During the First World War the Amir, Habibullah, sought to play both sides in the European conflict off against one another to his maximum advantage, hosting a Turkish-German Mission, who encouraged Afghan national ambition and sought to involve Afghanistan in military operations against British India . He prevaricated over this, but was sufficiently influenced to increase Afghanistan ’s independence of Britain by demanding a place at the Versailles Peace Conference in 1919. This was refused by the Viceroy, Frederic Thesiger, 1 st Viscount Chelmsford , and before further negotiations could take place, Habibullah was assassinated and his place taken by a relative, Amanullah. The security of the British Raj itself was tenuous following the First World War. The finest British and Indian units, experienced in mountain warfare, had been sent overseas and decimated in France and Mesopotamia, leaving India policed largely by Territorial volunteers from Britain . These were now keen to be demobilized and return home, and were in no position to fight a hard campaign on the Frontier anyway. Many of the tribesmen were now armed with the Lee Enfield .303 and other modern equipment which made fighting them a far more dangerous business. Mounting opposition to British rule had reached a crisis at Amritsar , where Indian civilians were massacred by troops commanded by Brigadier General Reginald Dyer, who feared an uprising on the scale of the 1857 Mutiny. Faced with internal opposition and strife, particularly from hard line nationalists formerly led by his uncle whom he had arrested, and sensing weakness and rising civil unrest in the neighbouring Raj, Amir Amanullah decided to invade British India . That he was defeated within months was due in no small measure, ironically, to a decisive response by the same commander responsible for the Amritsar massacre, Reginald Dyer. In all, the 1 st Battalion served for in excess of 20 years overseas before finally returning to the UK The Battalion subsequently transferred to Germany , serving in Cologne , Upper Silesia and Hungary , where they acted as... read more

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