Family fury at war medals theft

Medals awarded to a first world war soldier have been stolen, leaving his family devastated.

Bombardier Nelson Piper’s youngest son Mr Gordon Piper, 77, has visited 15 battlefields where his father fought to try to gain an understanding of what he went through.

Since the theft, Mr Piper, of Ashworth Close, Newark, said it felt like it had all been for nothing.

“Whoever took the medals ought to be ashamed of themselves,” he said. “It’s been devastating for us.”

Bombardier Piper served with the Royal Field Artillery. He saw action at the Somme, Ypres, Arras, Menin Ridge, Passchendale, Ancre, Cambrai, and Picardy.

He survived the war and lived to the age of 99.

Mr Piper said his father never spoke about his experiences on the Western Front.

“I feel that I lost out on such a large part of his life by not trying to talk to him more about it and then it was too late,” he said.

“It is one of life’s regrets which is why we set about trying to visit as many of his former battlefields as possible.

“I feel it really is all for nothing now that the medals are gone.”

The medals — a 1914/15 Star campaign medal and Victory Medal, inscribed ‘N. Piper RFA (serial number) 46476’ on their rims — were stolen from a display case at the Newark home of Mr Piper’s 90-year-old older brother.

Mr Piper appealed for the medals to be returned. He said if someone had bought them in good faith, he would reimburse them just to get them back.

The back of the case was removed, the medals taken and the back re-applied.

The case was then returned to its original place.

Police believe it was hoped the theft, which happened some time between

June 24 and July 1, went unnoticed for as long as possible.

Bombardier Piper served in the Royal Field Artillery for six years from 1907.

He emigrated to Canada but, rather than wait to be recalled, re-enlisted as a volunteer when war was declared in 1914.

He was posted to France in 1915. The noise of the artillery fire had left him partially deaf by the end of the war.

He was demobilised in 1919 but felt disillusioned that there was little Government support for men like him who had served their country.

Mr Piper said his father held down three jobs to make ends meet.

He rented a 15-acre smallholding at Rolleston, met a girl from Averham, settling down and started a family.

Sergeant Simon Brooks, of Newark Police, said: “I would ask that anyone who knows where these medals are to help us reunite them with the family of the man who bravely earned them.

“They have huge sentimental value.”

Anyone with information should contact Newark Police on 101 or Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.