Lot Essay
Sold with a superb 'Diary of Battalion Movements' kept by the recipient while serving as a Captain and Adjutant of the 2nd Battalion, Cheshire Regiment in South Africa between December 1899 and May 1900, the extensive handwritten entries including a 'Battle Plan' and description of the action at Karee Siding on 29.3.1900, the whole incorporated in an accompanying typed transcript; together with one or two related newspaper and magazine cuttings, one of which refers to the recipient's participation in the Roger Casement affair.
Lieutenant-Colonel M.V. Moul was born in Kensington, London in December 1865 and was commissioned into the Cheshire Regiment in August 1886. Quickly seeing action in the Burma operations of 1887-89, he had risen to the rank of Captain by the outbreak of hostilities in South Africa. Subsequently employed as Adjutant to the 2nd Battalion between January and April 1900, he was present at the action at Karee Siding, and afterwards in the engagements at Vet and Zand Rivers and in the Transvaal operations of May to June 1900, including the actions near Johannesburg. Again employed in the Transvaal between November 1900 and May 1901, he served variously as an Acting Garrison Fort Adjutant, an Assistant Provost Marshal and as an Assistant Press Censor at Potchefstroom.
Having been placed on the Retired List in the intervening period, Moul rejoined the Colours and was employed as an Assistant Provost Marshal out in Dublin at the time of "The Troubles". As referred to above, an accompanying newspaper obituary credits him with involvement in the Roger Casement affair and states that before his execution, Casement 'gave his be-jewelled personal pistol to Colonel Moul, who for many years kept it among the war-like relics on the walls of his house'. Certainly Moul was Mentioned in Despatches (London Gazette 30.3.1917 refers).
The Colonel, who retired to East Looe, where he was a keen fisherman and gardener but latterly 'something of a recluse', died in August 1951, aged 85 years. A gifted linguist, he had been fluent in French, German and Afrikaans, and even spoke a little Hindustani.
Lieutenant-Colonel M.V. Moul was born in Kensington, London in December 1865 and was commissioned into the Cheshire Regiment in August 1886. Quickly seeing action in the Burma operations of 1887-89, he had risen to the rank of Captain by the outbreak of hostilities in South Africa. Subsequently employed as Adjutant to the 2nd Battalion between January and April 1900, he was present at the action at Karee Siding, and afterwards in the engagements at Vet and Zand Rivers and in the Transvaal operations of May to June 1900, including the actions near Johannesburg. Again employed in the Transvaal between November 1900 and May 1901, he served variously as an Acting Garrison Fort Adjutant, an Assistant Provost Marshal and as an Assistant Press Censor at Potchefstroom.
Having been placed on the Retired List in the intervening period, Moul rejoined the Colours and was employed as an Assistant Provost Marshal out in Dublin at the time of "The Troubles". As referred to above, an accompanying newspaper obituary credits him with involvement in the Roger Casement affair and states that before his execution, Casement 'gave his be-jewelled personal pistol to Colonel Moul, who for many years kept it among the war-like relics on the walls of his house'. Certainly Moul was Mentioned in Despatches (London Gazette 30.3.1917 refers).
The Colonel, who retired to East Looe, where he was a keen fisherman and gardener but latterly 'something of a recluse', died in August 1951, aged 85 years. A gifted linguist, he had been fluent in French, German and Afrikaans, and even spoke a little Hindustani.