Three medals awarded to an Aberdeen soldier after World War II sold for more than £4,500 at auction yesterday.
The treasures went under the hammer alongside two medals belonging to a Huntly soldier, which also sold for well above their estimated price.
Private Robert Dunbar, who served with the 1st Battalion Gordon Highlanders, was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal – the second highest honour in the Army – the 1939-1945 Star and the War Medal.
Pte Dunbar, from Aberdeen, was taken prisoner in France in 1940, the year he turned 21.
Hundreds of soldiers were captured at Saint-Valery-en-Caux and forced to march to camps in Poland but Pte Dunbar, along with a cousin and a friend, escaped. The trio were given food and clothes while hiding at a house in France, and then split up. He then spent some time posing as a French waiter, but was later recaptured by the Gestapo and sent to a prison camp. He managed to flee again and was shot in the hip trying to escape.
Pte Dunbar made a further escape attempt after he found himself in the custody of French authorities sympathetic to the Nazis in May 1941.
He was later awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal which went under the hammer at Spink’s auction house in London yesterday. His medals were bought by a mystery bidder for £4,560.
Master Gunner Robert Jessiman’s medals were also snapped up. The soldier, born in Huntly in 1831 and who went on to serve in the Royal Artillery, received the Crimea 1854-1856 Medal with Sebastopol clasp and the Army Long Service medal. They went for £384.