THE 1914-15 STAR TRIO AWARDED TO CAPTAIN R.A. YOUNG, 7TH BATTALION THE YORKSHIRE REGIMENT, WHO PRIOR TO WW1 WAS A TEACHER AT ETON COLLEGE. Three: 1914-15 Star (Captain, Yorkshire Regiment) British War and Victory Medals (Captain). Medals each individually mounted on safety pins, as worn, generally extremely fine and accompanied by their original boxes of issue.
Group accompanied by 11 pages of photocopied extracts from Captain Young's Officer's Papers file and photocopied Medal Index Card.
Born 14th October 1885 at Dharwar, India, Richard Alfred Young was the second son of Frederick Beaumont and Emma Young. Richard's father was, at the time of his birth, an Assistant Superintendent of the Southern Maratha Country Revenue Survey. Young was educated at Repton School. There he was a member of the Officer Training Corps Junior Division for two years, being discharged from the Corps on leaving school, in April 1910, with the rank of Cadet (Private). On discharge from the Repton College Officer's Training Corps his general efficiency was described as fair and his skill at musketry as "not qualified".
Subsequently, in the pre-war years, Young was employed as a teacher at Eton College. There he joined the Officer Training Corps, being appointed 2nd Lieutenant, Unattached List of the Territorial Force, in 1910 and by August 1914 had reached the rank of Captain. Young took part in a course of instruction with the 1st Battalion Coldstream Guards, 9th - 21st January 1911, his grades with regard to the various aspects of the course ranging from "good" to "very good", and underwent another course of instruction with the 1st Battalion King's Royal Rifle Corps, 8th - 20th January 1912, when he received equally glowing reports, being described as "very keen and hardworking", with ability and intelligence "of a high order", and having a "good word of command". Following the outbreak of WW1 Young applied for a commission in the regular army, 23rd November 1914, the application being granted on 2nd December 1914. Young was gazetted Captain, 7th Battalion Yorkshire Regiment, The Green Howards, on 26th December 1914 (Youngs captaincy was announced in the London Gazette of 2nd March 1915, page 2098, where the date of his captaincy is incorrectly given as 26th September 1914). The character reference on Youngs application for a temporary commission in the regular army was signed by the Headmaster of Eton, Edward Lyttelton (Headmaster 1905-1916), who stated that he had known Young for four and a half years. Youngs address on the application for a commission is given as Westons Yard, Eton College, Windsor. Captain Young is recorded in the regimental history as being among the officers of the 7th Battalion Yorkshire Regiment who were with the battalion when it first landed in France, and he remained at the front with the battalion until he was struck down by enteric fever on 24th March 1916. He was evacuated from France on 26th May, and transferred to the Bristol Royal Infirmary for convalescence. Young never returned to the front, and was transferred to the 11th Battalion Yorkshire Regiment, a Home Service battalion, on 30th May 1916, and on 1st September 1916 was transferred again to the 3rd Training Reserve Battalion.
Captain Youngs Medal Index Card indicates that he saw service with the Northumberland Fusiliers as a Captain after service with the Yorkshire Regiment, but this cannot be confirmed either from his service papers file or from the army lists of the period.
List of Etonians who fought in the Great War 1914-1919 by Philip Lee Warner (Medici Society 1921) confirms Young as one of 22 Eton College teachers who saw service during WW1.
