A PHOTOGRAPH of Captain Coutart de Butts Taylor whose bravery during World War 1 has been featured previously has been found in a Welsh Museum.

The Royal Welsh Fusiliers’ Museum at Caernarfon has given permission for the photograph to be published after considerable detective work on their part to find it.

They learnt of the efforts being made by Barrie Bertram, of the CI Great War Study Group to find out more about Capt Taylor  who died on Christmas Eve, 1918, having served for over two years as Sergeant Charles Edward Collins.

He changed his identity, having had his commission with the Royal Irish Rifles removed because of a minor infraction. His exceptional bravery after rejoining under a false name led to him being recommended for a commission in May 1918 and this led to his true identity being discovered.

‘Early in 1919, his commission as a Captain in the Royal Irish Rifles was reinstated posthumously, an almost unique event in the British Army, and as far as is known, the only occasion when this was done throughout the Great War,’ said Mr Bertram.

Capt Taylor, who served with the Jersey Militia between 1902 and 1915, has at least one descendant living in the Island. And in researching her family tree, Christine Lloyd has discovered that Coutart married 24-year-old Lilian McEnnery at St Brelade’s Church on 11 July, 1901, and that their three children were born in Jersey – Lilian in St Brelade (16 March, 1902), Terence at Havre des Pas (8 June, 1903) and Doreen in St Lawrence (15 May, 1905).

Captain Taylor had a number of siblings, the eldest being Charlotte who married a naval officer, Lieutenant Edward Lloyd in Malta in October 1883.

Mrs Lloyd is the great-grand-daughter in law of Charlotte and Edward Lloyd.