Beschreibung:

Captain William Daniel McSwiney, late of the 7th Dragoon Guards, who died at 12 Oxford Street on Friday after a long illness, was an an accomplished Russian scholar, and, indeed, a linguist of unusual attainments, for besides Russian he had qualified in Chinese, Arabic, French and German. He was a Special Service Officer with the China Expeditionary Force of 1900-01 and his tact and reliability in circumstances of great difficulty and delicacy and his services as a linguist were acknowledged by Sir Edmund Burrow, Chief of the Staff of the Expeditionary Force. He was Railway Staff Officer at Tientsin during the Anglo-Russian railway dispute, an incident which drew from the late Lord Hardwicke in the House of Lords the warmest commendation of the tact and self-control displayed by the British officers on the spot; and he acted as interpreter in Russian at the Court of Inquiry on the shooting of a Russian seaman by a Royal Marine. From China Captain McSwiney proceeded to South Africa and there took part in the operation in Transvaal and in the Orange River Colony in the autumn and winter of 1901 and the first three months of 1902. In addition to these war services Captain McSwiney did valuable work as an Intelligence Officer in Persia in 1890-91 and in China, Manchuria and Siberia in 1898-99. His reconnaissance work in Persia received the thanks of the Government of India and his work in the Far East earned the thanks of the Secretary of State ... ’ His obituary in The Times, 8 January 1906, refers. The regimentally unique Boxer Rebellion and Boer War pair awarded to Captain W. D. “Billy” McSwiney, 7th Dragoon Guards, a “Great Game” spy, explorer and linguist who was the only officer of the regiment so entitled as a consequence of his employment as a Special Service Officer: elected F.R.G.S. for his mapping and survey work in Persia, China and Manchuria in the 1890s, it is clear he undertook intelligence gathering work in the same period - work that won him the approbation of the Government of India and the Secretary of State Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 5 clasps, Cape Colony, Orange Free State, Transvaal, South Africa 1901, South Africa 1902 (Capt. W. D. McSwiney, 7/Drgn. Gds.); China 1900, no clasp (Capt. W. D. McSwiney, 7/Drgn. Gds.), mounted as worn, good very fine (2) £800-1200 Footnote William Daniel McSwiney was born at Kronstadt, Russia in March 1861, the fourth and youngest son of the Rev. John Henry Herbert McSwiney, Chaplain of the Russia Company at Kronstadt and his wife Emily Sarah, daughter of the late Admiral Hills, R.N. and second cousin of the late Sir Harry Verney. Young William was educated privately in Kronstadt and back home by the Rev. Thomas Nettleship Staley, Rector of Oakley. Having passed the Sandhurst Military College examinations - but failed to pass the medical board - he entered the Staffordshire Militia as a 2nd Lieutenant in April 1880. Advanced to Lieutenant in March 1881 and to Captain in January 1884, his linguistic skills gained a wider audience in the latter year, when he translated and published E. Paul’s The Future of Egypt from a French Point of View. In September 1886 - presumably by way of overcoming his Sandhurst medical report which prevented him from holding a regular army commission - he resigned his commission in the Militia and joined the 19th Hussars as a Private. If so, the ploy worked well, for he gained a commission in the 7th Dragoon Guards just over two years later. Intelligence Officer - The Great Game In April 1888, he embarked for India, where he joined his regiment at Mhow but, in 1890, on account of his linguistic skills, he was seconded to the Intelligence Branch of the Government of India's Quarter-Master General's Office Calcutta, where his brother Major E. F. H. McSwiney of the Indian Army was similarly attached. Here, then, the commencement of employment in the “Great Game”, for in December 1890 he made a reconnaissance trip with Major E. Bruce of the 19th Lancer