IDENTIFIERS
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id:	141445
accession number:	CM.1351-2009

DATE AUDIT
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created:	Saturday 6 August 2011
updated:	Monday 15 January 2024

DESCRIPTIVE DATA
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object type: Just as in 1848 the extensive land campaigns of the Napoleonic Wars and the other conflicts of the pre-Victorian era were recognised by the issue of the Military General Service Medal, those serving in the Navy at the time were recognised with the Naval General Service Medal. As with the Army equivalent and the East India Company's related award, many of the battles for which the medal was awarded had been fought so long ago that few if any claimants survived.
In addition, bars were awarded for many actions whose significance and size were, despite the heroism displayed by those involved, relatively minor. The result was that many of the bars were issued in tiny numbers, with some combinations all but unique, and the medals command a very high price among collectors because of this rarity and individuality. This in turn, along with the manufacture in most cases of more bars than were eventually issued, has led to the `improvement' of many common awards where recipients' names are shared with those present at `rarer' battles. The medal also shares with the Military General Service and Army of India Medals the oddity that Queen Victoria, whose portrait they bear, was not the ruler under whom the battles for which it was awarded were fought.
The battle that this bar commemorates was fought off Genoa, after two vessels of the French Toulon squadron had collided during a flight from the British Mediterranean Fleet under Admiral Hotham. In the subsequent skirmishing, which included then-Captain Horatio Nelson in HMS Agamemnon, two French ships were lost for one British. The larger context of the fighting was the British control of Corsica, which such successes permitted to continue. A French attempt on Napoleon's birthplace in 1796 however succeeded, whereafter the British lost control of the Mediterranean for some years.
This medal was awarded to Private William Kingston, of the Royal Marine contingent aboard HMS Romulus; the Medal Roll records its award to a William Kingstone. Lester Watson purchased this medal from the dealer Gifford in 1928.
title:	Naval General Service Medal (1793-1840)

NOTES
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type: history note
value: Gift of L. Hoyt Watson; ex Lester Watson Collection, bt Gifford before 1928


LICENSING
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text license status:	CC0
image license status:	CC-BY-NC-SA

OWNERSHIP
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instutition: The Fitzwilliam Museum
department: Coins and Medals
collection:	Lester Watson Collection
creditline: Given by Lester Watson through Cambridge in America, 2009

STABLE URL
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url:	https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/id/object/141445





TECHNIQUES
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struck

CATEGORIES
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category: medal

DATING
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creation date:	1849 - 1851
creation date earliest:	1849
creation date latest:	1851

CREATORS
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maker: London
maker: Victoria (1837-1901)
maker: Wyon, William
maker: Victoria regina

DIMENSIONS
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dimension: Diameter
units: mm
value: 36.3

dimension: Weight
units: g
value: 34.76



CITATIONS
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British Battles and Medals 7th edn
British and other Campaign and Gallantry Medals From the Collection of Lester Watson (d. 1959)
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