Medal group awarded to Major General Harold Henry Blake, Royal Army Medical Corps

Medal group (from left to right): Order of the British Empire; 1914-15 Star; British War Medal 1914-20; Allied Victory Medal 1914-19 with oak leaf for Mention in Despatches;India General Service Medal 1908-35, with clasp, 'North West Frontier 1930-31'; Delhi Durbar Medal 1911; Coronation Medal 1937, George VI.

Harold Henry Blake was born in 1883. He initially served with the Northumberland Fusiliers until qualifying as a doctor in 1907. He was commissioned into the Royal Army Medical Corps as a Lieutenant in 1908. He served in World War One (1914-1918) and was Mentioned in Despatches twice before being awarded the OBE in 1919. He continued to serve across the globe and was appointed Deputy Director of Medical Services, Western Command during World War Two (1939-1945). After the War, Blake served as Superintendent of Stoke Mandeville Hospital and was part of the medical team who revolutionised the treatment of spinal injuries and established what would become the Paralympic Games.