Man who found medal wants to return it to family
A MAN who found a First World War medal buried in his back garden wants to reunite it with relatives of the soldier who won it.
John Griffiths-Colby found the medal 18 months ago while digging in the garden at his home in Reigate, Surrey. It was awarded to Clement Cecil Clay for his service as a Royal Engineer with the Royal Navy Reserve during the First World War.
After tenacious research, Mr Griffiths-Colby found out that Mr Clay came from Nuneaton and that if he has surviving relatives they probably live in the Hinckley area. But he hasn’t been able to track any of them down.
He said: “I’ve no idea why the medal was in my garden but I’m on a mission to get it back to at least a blood relative.
“I’ve been searching for eighteen months to trace a family member to return it to.
“The name and number on it were for a Sapper from Chilvers Coton, Nuneaton, named Clement Cecil Clay. Just about the most common surname and boys given name in 1887! I’ve traced his relatives to Hinckley in the 1960s but now I’m stuck without local knowledge.”
Mr Clay was a former petroleum worker and enlisted in 1915 serving in the Royal Naval Reserve as a Royal Engineer. In 1916 he was accidentally gassed at the Somme when a British phosgene gas shell exploded prematurely. He recuperated in Cardiff and Pontypridd and was finally discharged back to Nuneaton in 1919, with defective vision and myalgia, the medical name for muscle pain.
In the 1920s he and his older brother Sholto and sister Mabel all moved to Surrey to live in the road next to the one where Mr GriffithsColby now lives. At that time the site of Mr Griffith Colby’s house was a field owned by Mr Clay’s brothers in law. Mr Griffiths-Colby’s house was built in 1966.
Mr Griffiths-Colby said: “Clement was a tough old bird and died in 1973 aged 87, but he didn’t marry or have children. His brother only had one daughter born in 1930 but she didn’t marry until she was 51 – and that to a vicar in his eighties! I can’t trace her but she would be 88 by now.”
“His sister also married late – age 61 in 1945 and so their branch of the family has died out.
“Clement’s father was an only child but his mother, Elizabeth Pullen of Higham on the Hill, born in 1857 had at least three siblings.
“I have been able to trace her brother John’s descendants to an Eileen Mayne (nee Pullen) born in 1939 who married in Hinckley in March 1961. She may still be alive and would be Clement Clay’s first cousin twice removed. She had three children in the 1960s – Ian R Mayne, Claire R Mayne and Lisa M Mayne.”
Mr Clay was also awarded the Victory Medal leaving Mr Griffith-Colby wondering if that will turn up his garden as well.
Anyone who can help Mr Griffiths-Colby can e mail him at jcolby@btinternet.com.