TOPIC:

Rory’s recent posting of his medal named to a Portuguese national who was a recipient of a medal named to the Farmer’s Guard has induced me to ‘show case’ another pair of medals awarded to a “foreign national’ who also served in the Farmer’s Guard. This recipient, James Robert Emerson, went on to serve with the Somaliland Burgher Corps in Somaliland in late 1902.

Pair – QSA two bars: OFS, SA’01 (13 Tpr. J.R. Emerson. Farmers Guard.);
Africa General Service Medal one bar: Somaliland 1902-04 (63 Corpl. J.R. Emerson. Som. Bur. C.)

Much has been written in various records of the ABW about the Farmer’s Guard which was previously known as the Burgher Police. It was raised in the Bloemfontein in November 1901. At about the same time a Municipal Police Force was raised in Bloemfontein which together with the Orange River Colony Mounted Police was amalgamated with the South African Constabulary in February 1902. The Famer’s Guard was also administered as a policing function and we thus find that the medal roll of the Guard was signed by Lieut. Colonel Fair in his capacity as the Divisional Commandant of the Orange River Colony Division of the S. A. Constabulary at Syndenham. the Head Quarters of the Constabulary, south east of Bloemfontein on 3 December 1904. Lieut. Colonel Fair had previously served with the 12th Lancers.

It is not my intention to repeat the full story of the Farmer’s Guard, nor the story of the Somaliland Contingent in their fight against the “Mad Mullah” in Somaliland but rather to highlight the nationality of this recipient. Kroonstad became the headquarters of the National Scouts who were raised in the ORC. It was from the experiment of these two units, the so-called Farmer’s Guard and the National Scouts, that the idea of raising the Somaliland Burgher Force as a joint Boer and Burgher Expeditionary Force developed and presumably the reason why Captain Bonham put forward his extensive list of employment recommendations which were clearly intended to foster the beginning of an improved relationship between Boer and Brit in South Africa.

James Robert Emerson was a 6th generation American and was born in Pike County, Missouri in about 1868 where he resided until about 1888. He married Mary Jessie Elson the daughter of Charles Palmer Elson and his wife Jessie Alexandria Armour. Mary was born in Epsom in Surrey on 28 January 1862. She was baptised in St Mary’s church in Ewell on 5 May 1862 and was living with her parents and siblings in Banstead in 1871. Her family is recorded as having moved to Cuddington in 1881. Mary was a widow, having married George Edward Armour Easton with whom she had a daughter named Jessie Florence Armour Easton in 1886. After her first husband’s death Jessie emigrated to South Africa where her brother and sister were living. Her daughter’s movements are unclear but it is evident that she spent her adult life in England. Late in life she married the surviving husband of her mother’s elder sister Clara King Elson.

James (this medal recipient) and Mary were married in South Africa and their eldest child, a son named James Robert was born in Cape Town on 20 January 1900. Soon thereafter a daughter named Annie Elizabeth Agnes Emerson was born in Bloemfontein on 19 October 1902. I have not yet been able to establish when James arrived in South Africa but he was clearly a pre-war resident of Bloemfontein. Archival records reflect that he was an importer of stock, importing horses and mules and giving his address as P.O. Box 128 Bloemfontein.

Numerous members of the Somaliland Burgher Corps were involved in the “affair near Gumburu on the 16th April” which preceded the disastrous Action at Gumburu on 17 April 1903 when a significant British force was surrounded in the thick bush and attacked at close quarters and virtually annihilated by a far superior force of the Mullah’s mounted riflemen. Interestingly, besides highlighting the names of three men for the award of the Distinguished Conduct Medal, Captain Bonham singled out the names of a further four men of his Burgher Corps in the following manner: “All these men have done exceptionally good work throughout the campaign. It is not recommended that they should receive any military reward or decoration, but, if the General Officer Commanding thinks fit, that their names should be submitted to Lord Milner with a recommendation that their services should be rewarded in such manner as may seem good to the Colonial Government, either by assistance in re-settlement or employment in Government service.” In fact, it would seem that at the conclusion of the campaign in Somaliland Captain Bonham commented on all the men who served in the Burgher contingent and in the case of James Robert Emerson he recorded that he was “Specially Recommended” and that he would like employment in a Government Stud Farm.

After returning from Somaliland, James became involved in an unsuccessful expedition to Somaliland to prospect for diamonds and garnets in 1906. After living in South Africa for a few years he and his family returned to the United States in 1910, this soon after the death of his father on 2 September 1908, before leaving for England in November 1913 where he died the following year on 13 November 1914 leaving an Estate valued at £126 5s 5d to his widow Jessie. At that time his address was recorded as the “Queen’s Head Inn” in Hadley in Middlesex. In 1916 his widow and two children returned to live in the United States.

The Emerson family is thought to have originally sprung from one Aimeri de Taillebois, the arch deacon of Carlisle and Durham from 1196 to 1214 and high sheriff of Northumberland from 1214 to 1215. He was the nephew of Bishop Philip of Poictou, Prince Bishop of Durham in 1195 and was previously the clericum et familiarem of Richard Coeur de Lion. The Emerson family came from Aquitania, but the name is Norse, not French. Ralph Emerson, the progenitor of the family in England was granted arms in 1535 and was described as of Foxton, county Durham.

James’s earliest American forbear was the Reverend Joseph Emerson who was born on 25 June 1620 in Bishop's Stortford in Hertfordshire, England before moving to America. His father was named Thomas Emerson and his mother Elizabeth Brewster. In 1646 their son, the Reverend Joseph Emerson, married Elizabeth Woodmansey in Ipswich, Essex in Massachusetts Bay Colony in what was then known as British Colonial America. They were the parents of Edward Emerson who was born in Mendon, Worcester in Massachusetts on 26 April 1670 when his father was already 49 years old. Edward in turn married Rebecca Waldo and their son, another Reverend Joseph Emerson was born on 20 April 1700, in Chelmsford, Middlesex in Massachusetts Bay. He married Mary Moody on 27 December 1721 and served as the first Minister of Mendon where he died in 1767. Their son, this medal recipient’s great-great-great-grandfather, the Reverend John Emerson was born in 1745. James’s paternal line then followed through to Edward, born in 1778 (died in 1860) and then to his son, yet another Edward, who married Catharine Peay in 1850. This Edward and Catherine were the parents of his father Edward Dyer Emerson.

These rather complicated details all go to show that James Robert Emerson, the recipient of this pair medals who served as a Trooper in the Farmer’s Guard, was a real American and that the hobby of medal research is much more fun than the current craze of genealogical research! It is clear however that he cannot be held in the same light as the many “wretched Joiners and Hensoppers” who served with the Guard.

Actually, these details were not too difficult to unravel as some of James’s close relatives were very well-known in America. They included the American essayist and philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson of Concord, Massachusetts and William Howard Taft who followed Theodore Roosevelt as the 27th President of the United States of America!

After her husband’s death whilst he was staying at the Queens Head, in Hadley in High Barnet, Middlesex in November 1914, Mary Jessie and her their two children returned to live in the United States of America. Although I have located photographs of both his son James Robert and his daughter Annie Elizabeth Agnes and his widow Mary Jessie but I have not, as yet, been able to locate a photograph of James Robert himself. Jessie was much loved by all her many nephews and nieces as Great Aunt Mary and returned to live in England and died in Barnett in Middlesex in 1933.

A fascinating account, Rob. Many thanks.

A capital account Rob - well done!

Great research Rob, Bravo Zulu

Mike