Lot 241: A Collection of Campaign Medals to the 3rd King’s Own Light Dragoons

Family group:

Army of India 1799-1826, 1 clasp, Bhurtpoor (O. Regan, 11th Lt. Dragns.) short hyphen reverse, officially impressed naming, good very fine

Pair: Private Owen Regan, 3rd Light Dragoons, who was killed in action at the battle of Chilianwala
Sutlej 1845-46, for Aliwal 1846, 1 clasp, Sobraon (Owen Regan 3rd Lt. Dragns.); Punjab 1848-49, 1 clasp, Chilianwala (O. Regan, 3rd Lt. Dragns.) edge bruising and light contact marks, otherwise good very fine (3)

Owen Regan Senior was born in 1793 and enlisted into the 11th Light Dragoons in Dublin in 1817. He was discharged to pension in the rank of Sergeant in June 1838, and died in Ireland in April 1873.

Owen Regan Junior was born in Meerut, India, and baptized there on 14 October 1825, and enlisted into the 3rd Light Dragoons at Dublin on 8 June 1844. He was killed in action at the battle of Chilianwala, 13 January 1849, one of 24 men of the 3rd Light Dragoons to be killed. He was also one of only 46 men in the regiment to receive the Sutlej medal with the Aliwal reverse. In his will, dated 25 November 1848, he bequeathed “to my Father Owen Regan my Sutledge Medal or any other Medal of Honor I may become entitled to”.

‘At Chilianwala the Cavalry on the [British] left were principally occupied in protecting the flank of Campbell’s Division, but the grey squadron of the 3rd Light Dragoons and the 5th Light Cavalry had an opportunity of executing a charge on a portion of the Sikh right, which in the case of the former was delivered with great gallantry and effect, though at the expense of many lives. The 5th Light Cavalry, being much broken in getting through the scrub, and coming under a severe fire of musketry, were unable to make an impression, and suffered a repulse.’

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