French gallantry group.
This is another set of french medals from my collection. These were obtained in a very dilapidated condition last January at the Liverpool arms fair, the medal ribbons of the Inter Allied victory medal and the Medaille Militaire were completely rotten and the medals suspended by nails pushed through the certificate - the Medaille Militaire had turned completely black. According to the certificate the medals were awarded to Pierre Bourlot of 317th Infantry regiment, but according to the records the only soldier with that name to have been killed in action served with the 62nd Infantry regiment. There was another soldier with the same surname who served with the 317th, but his name wasn't Pierre. Nothing is ever straightforward when researching French medals! But whoever the soldier was he was a very brave man, he had one mention in dispatches at regiment or brigade level - and one at divisional level. he was awarded two Croix de Guerre, the first being dated 1914/1916 - and the second is dated 1914/1918. I can't say as I have ever seen two CdG to the same man before.
I remounted the medals to the certificate, the ribbons of the two Croix de Guerre and the 1914-1918 victory medal were reversed to present the less faded side to the front, but I had no option other than to replace the ribbons of the medaille Militaire and the Inter Allies medal. The medals were carefully held in place with fine copper wire passed through to the back of the certificate. I was very fortunate to find a French medal frame on eBay, but when it arrived the condition of it was actually far-worse than the pictures suggested - and I came very close to scrapping it altogether. But I stuck with it and the end result was quite pleasing. Rather than use glass I used clear acrylic for the glazing. Yet another set of medals brought back to life!
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