MEDALS ROUNDTABLE: Orders, Decorations and Medals | April 2026

The Spink Medals department is back for another exciting roundtable. Each specialist talks us through the selected highlight lots of the auction and shares the fascinating stories behind them. As always, bringing our catalogue to life in the most delightful way.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello there and welcome to the Spink Auction Round Table. Harry obviously knew we were filming on this Friday, and so he has taken some holiday today. He obviously enjoyed the last video so much. This is the second of these round tables. We all enjoyed the first one so much around the round table, we've come around a square table instead. And we thought we would just um kind of talk in the round about a few of our favourite lots uh that we've got in the auction on St. George's Day in a couple of weeks and give you an opportunity to just hear a few of the sort of inside lines and the things that we've enjoyed and um you know bring you up to speed. So I think there's a socking grate uh gold and velvet uh cushion in the middle of the table. So Annabelle, I think you've you've got a story.

SPEAKER_03 0:54

I do have a story. Um this is um the collar chain um of the sheriff of um the city of London. It dates to around 1910, which was when um Henry Cecil Buckingham served as um the sheriff. Um, and what makes this chain so interesting is that all the most fundamental parts of Buckingham's life are shown via coats of arms around the chain. So I won't pick up the main bit because it's very, very heavy, but I'll pick up the centre bit. Um so as we can see, um it traps Buckingham's life. Um, it shows um the Harrow uh coat of arms where he was educated, which is around the chain over here. Um it also shows his heritage, so his father was from Cornwall. Um so we can see uh the Cornish coats of arms of specifically Truro on that um side over there, um, and also the various livery companies that he also worked at from 1888. So he started at Skinners, which is over here, um, and he worked in a number of livery companies um until he eventually became sheriff um in 1910, um, and he served for the year. And um afterwards um he was knighted, he became an MP in 1922, which was an office he held until 1931 when he died. Um so it's amazing that you can see the history of a man's life um on the chain.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

In the chain, yes. I mean, when when it first came in, I think I was probably quite lazy and just did a very brief description, and you kind of wrestled it away and said, no, no, this is we need to do a bit more on this.

SPEAKER_03 2:37

Really exciting, yeah. Um and just the quality of the chain itself. You were commenting just before we started how every single piece, every single one of these links that you see um is hallmarked 18 carats. So if you are to wear it, it's rather heavy. Um but yeah, it's it's a really exciting piece, and I I can't say we get them very often.

SPEAKER_00 3:01

No, I think with the the really lovely thing, you know, we love uh a medal or an order where you can put a face to a name, and there's a really um lovely um photograph of an original oil painting of Buckingham in his finery, wearing all of his um you know traditional court dress, isn't there, which is in the in the print catalogue. Um and also the fact this is nearly 900 grams of you know high quality gold. Uh obviously is a price driver. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 3:34

The estimate is, so the top estimate is 80,000. Um and we do currently have some bids, but I'm really hoping it will start a bidding war when we get on the rostrum because it's a really beautiful piece, an astonishing piece of craftsmanship.

SPEAKER_01 3:47

Um Yeah, it's it's beautiful, isn't it? And I think we're probably very lucky to to be able to offer it because one would automatically assume, being such an official part of the history of the City of London, that when he finished his tenure as as one of the sheriffs, that it would be handed to the city and sort of stay in the mansion house and and never see the light of day again. So um so I think he was a very lucky chap to be able to keep hold of it and uh and that we are equally fortunate to be able to uh to offer this wonderful bit of bit of city history, yeah. In in the sale.

SPEAKER_00 4:24

Yeah, exactly. And it's great. And we I haven't been able to trace another example of one of these coming up. Um, you know, obviously with the price of gold being where it is and where it has been over the years, it's amazing it hasn't been melted down, given that you know, it's not like um you know, a CBE or an OBE that maybe passed down a family and put on the wall, you're not going to put up nearly a kilo of of fine gold on the wall, are you? Um and it's so ornate. Um, you know, it's just you know, it's a really, you know, we love saying rare survivor, but it is a rare survivor. Um that it's gone down the family a direct line, and then to come come back up is um is a real treat. So, you know, when we when we were propositioned with it, it was an easy thing to say, you know, we'd love to have it and um give it a spin in the room and see see who's out there that you know hopefully it will go to a good home, yeah. Maybe somebody with with close links to the city, and we'll see what happens on the day.

SPEAKER_02 5:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:18

So certainly a question that that comes to my mind when looking at this is why does it exist? What is what is the point of it? Yeah. Uh and who uh who created it, uh and also I presume such things still exist today. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 5:38

Um really interesting question. So the office of the sheriff of the of the city is hundreds and hundreds of years old. It starts in 1131 with Henry I. Um, so you know, we're talking before Magna Carta and all these important things. Um, and it's lasted hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. And actually, the tradition of having your personal history on a chain still exists. The Sheriff of London of the City of London at the moment will have a chain denoting their fund fundamental parts of their life, um, which I think is a really, really delightful and personal touch that perhaps we don't see in other offices. Um, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 6:20

Um and do you you know, is it so when it is obviously it's a very personal thing worn by the individual, do you know, is it commissioned and indeed paid for by them as a person, or does the City of London pay for it sort of for them as part of their tenure? That's quite a sort of an interesting one. Wonders if he outlaid a significant s personal sum of money to to have this thing made, or whether the city sort of as a as a corporation uh contributed to to it because he was fulfilling a role for for the benefit of the city, as it were.

SPEAKER_03 6:59

Yeah. Um I would say more probably more more likely the m uh the the latter. Um it was made by the goldsmiths and the silversmiths of of the city, so I'd imagine it was more in-house with the City of London rather than going out to a personal commission. Um yeah. That's that's what I've got to say about the chain.

SPEAKER_01 7:19

Splendid. I think it's an absolutely stunning thing, as you say, all the and as Marcus, you know, you mentioned, it's must be so unusual, indeed rare, to have a complete thing because one might expect, you know, the enamel uh shields and and the centre as well might be kept because of its its beauty as an a piece of craftsmanship. But it would have been so easy to, you know, take the links off and scrap them for the for the gold value and you know, put the enamel shields in a in a frame or something like that and just display those. So I think as you uh you know quite rightly observed earlier, to have the complete thing here is is is really, really unusual.

SPEAKER_00 8:04

Yeah, and the weight of gold, you know, it makes me think about the um the prelates badge of the Order of the Garter that we you know sold for a world record price um back in November. And again, you know, Robert was up there wielding the gavel and that we were working the phones and all of that, and the internet eventually won. But you know, that originally would have had a heavy gold link chain, you know, with the painting of of the wearer. So again, you can see the appendant badge surviving, but to see the chain itself, and again, it's so beautifully, you know, hand chased and hand finished. It is, you know, exhibition quality goldsmithing. So, you know, in its own right, you know, it deserves to be, it deserves not to go to the pot. So, you know, we are very much hoping that um it is a proper collector that that takes it home on the day. So we'll just you know, we'll see what happens. Yeah. Um but um yeah, the bidding's already opened, and um, you know, I think the you know the melt value of it is in the you know, is around 80,000 pounds, give or take. So um we'll we'll see what happens on the day. Yeah, but I'm sure it will go well. Um so um yeah, no, uh a bit of a unusual one and not one we're gonna get every sale. So we thought it would be silly not to display this. You know, Avon's done a lot of work in the in the background and the you know the story of it, because on the face of it, you know, what the hell is it? What does it mean? But actually the significance of it is is is quite it's yeah, it's great.

SPEAKER_03 9:31

Yeah, it's really beautiful. So we're in the early 20th century. Where do we want to go next? We can go back in time.

SPEAKER_01 9:38

Always back in time. We can go back in time. We can go back in time. Uh I'll probably talk about maybe two things now and then come back again later to the final one. Um But of course, uh it needs absolutely no introduction to to say that I enjoy talking about my Napoleonic medals, and we're very, very fortunate that, or I've been very fortunate in this particular sale, that again we've had a really good run of interesting Napoleonic stuff to research and and put in the catalogue. And hopefully when I stand up there on the rostrum, it'll all sell extremely well. So I'm going to talk about two naval general service medals, or certainly to show them to you as well. Um one that I've uh especially enjoyed. Now, of course, we do see a fair number of naval general service medals with a clasp, obviously, for Trafalgar, the one of the most famous naval battles of all time. But I can't remember the last time we had a medal uh to someone uh who was aboard none other than HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar. Uh can you remember the last time we we had one here?

SPEAKER_00 10:50

I think in all my time we've sold one, so that's coming up for 12 years now, I think it is. So yeah, you know, there's only 1,500 odd Trafalgar class claimed, and we probably sell four or five, maybe six a year. So, you know, over the years, fifty or sixty have come through the room here. No.

SPEAKER_01 11:09

Yeah, yeah. So it's it's just astonishing to to think that, you know, not only was this individual, he was a a a boy, uh, his rank on the on the on the role is boy, uh uh his name was William Pope, and it's yeah, it's it's really sort of quite stunning to think that not only was he at Trafalgar, but he was on the same ship as obviously none other than Nelson himself, and of course that victory still exists today down at Portsmouth. So, you know, the the owner of this medal could take this down to Portsmouth and tread the same decks as as this man, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

With with him being a boy, um, you know, that was quite, you know, quite normal that people were taken on at quite a young age in this era. Um, you know, we don't see so many medals to drummer boys and things like that, but we see them to um ships' boys. What was their kind of role in the battle, for example?

SPEAKER_01 12:15

Um, so I believe Pope was 17 at the time of the battle, so he was one of the older uh individuals with that rank on victory. So boys were generally anywhere between sort of 12 and 18 years old. Um, and their role seems to have been pretty diverse in that they were almost able to do anything. They could be literally fetching powder from the magazine to bring up to the guns, or they could be apprentice seamen, so they could be up in the rigging in the sails, again learning from the the senior sort of able seamen how to operate the vessel. Um and some of the boys, again, if they had a little bit of certainly what they called at the time interest, i.e. sort of family connections with officers aboard the ship, they might have even been taken on as sort of apprentice midshipmen. So learning a little bit about how to command at a in a small scale to then hopefully be sort of raised, almost raised from the lower deck to the quarter deck, to take on a more uh sort of um commanding role as as the years and their service and experience progressed.

SPEAKER_00 13:33

Because I think you in the listing it notes that Pope actually is noted as a volunteer at one point, which maybe suggests he is from a family with a naval connection, like you say.

SPEAKER_01 13:45

Yeah, um it's not totally clear from the sources that I've looked at exactly what's what in that respect. So on the actual role itself, he is listed as a boy. So the medal role says boy. However, a couple of other sources um do say, as you quite rightly mention, that he was a volunteer. Now a volunteer suggests that he was being possibly sort of prepped for uh more command responsibility in going down the officer route, but I cannot find any source that suggests that he was eventually given a commission and and did go that way. Um what I do find really quite nice about this medal as well and about about young Mr. Pope is that he was actually also born in Portsmouth in 1788. And so you've also got that connection. So victory is today in Portsmouth. And being born in 1788, he would have known nothing other than war, essentially, and conflict. The United Kingdom was at war with the French during the Revolutionary Wars and of course the Napoleonic Wars for pretty much his his boyhood and his his adult life. And so he's from Portsmouth, he joins the Royal Navy, he's assigned to victory, he's at Trafalgar, um what what more could you want actually from a from a classic naval general serviceman?

SPEAKER_03 15:14

A full circle, isn't it?

SPEAKER_00 15:16

Definitely, and I think you know, as you know, we all collect medals in our own little way, but if you know, this is kind of you know, we say iconic, this is one of the iconic things. If you've got a collection of medals, if you're thinking about diversifying your collection, m every man, woman, child on the street, you know, has probably been told the story of Nelson and Trafalgar and everything that meant for the country. So, you know, to find, you know, just just to have a Trafalgar Mel in your collection is a is a great thing, but to have, you know, the ship, you know, and also the the quirk of the rank that he's serving in and the Portsmouth Connection and Andan, it's a great thing. And what's the estimate, Robert?

SPEAKER_01 16:03

So we've put twelve to fifteen thousand on it, uh, which I think is is totally fair for for what it is. And and as you say, we haven't sold a victory to Falga uh before, or certainly for a long time. So yeah, it and it has every chance obviously of doing perfectly well.

SPEAKER_00 16:20

I think I think it has provenance back to does it have provenance back to us sort of twenty-odd years ago or something like that.

SPEAKER_01 16:26

It does, yes. I can't remember the specific date, actually. I'd have to check the catalogue again. But but there is it is it is certainly known, and it does have does have decent provenance, which is what's always helpful. Now I'm going to come on to another Naval General Service Medal with a foul de clasp.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

So poor thing, you're struggling today.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

It's a great problem to have. Um I'm not, however, going to talk too much about the recipient of this medal, because it's the addition to the medal that is the thing that that makes this quite special. But briefly, uh this particular medal uh was awarded to a chap called George Porter, who was uh an ordinary seaman aboard HMS Britannia. Um very briefly, HMS Britannia actually was another three-deck uh hundred gun ship of the line, so of a very similar type to Victory, and she was the flagship of Admiral the Earl of Northesque at the battle. Um Northesque is almost the sort of forgotten British sort of senior officer at Trafalgar, because of course, again, everyone knows of Nelson in command. Most people know of Collingwood as second in command, and very few people know of the Earl of Northesk, who was third in command. And so, of course, upon Nelson's death, he rose up, stepped up to become second in command of of the of the fleet. Um and um again I encourage you to read a little bit about his career because it was also pretty interesting. But what makes this medal rather special is that it comes with the original cardboard box of issue. Um, this is, as you can probably imagine, and again, as I'm sure many of our viewers can imagine, an incredibly rare survivor. Uh again, I don't think I have ever seen, or indeed handled, an original card box of issue for a Naval General Service Medal, certainly for the Napoleonic commemorating Napoleonic actions. And um it has his uh um written on the on the lid, uh it has his name, so George Porter, with the basically the list for for when the medal was was uh was struck at the mint and the sort of claim number uh and uh and so it it adds a delightful bit of provenance to to the medal. And it's just a again, a wonderful bit of history that you can imagine this literally being sent in in the post to him, this medal in in this very box.

SPEAKER_00 18:56

Yeah. And I mean obviously with the you know, the great thing with the you know, the Naval General Service, Military General Service, and the Army of India, we're not talking about six months after the battle like, you know, um, you know, chaps who've or ladies who've served in in Northern Ireland, in Iraq, Afghanistan in the recent era, we're talking decades after the action because this wouldn't have been received until you know 1849, 1850, probably. So, you know, that um in itself is is a really interesting thing because the the issuance of the NGS I don't think is something we've covered on this, you know, this the you know this platform before, but you know 30 seconds, give us give us the head the you know the hot news, Robert.

SPEAKER_01 19:41

So uh so yes, again, yeah, briefly expanding on that, you're quite right. And that so 1847 and 48 was really when the medal, both the military and the naval general service medals were finally decided upon, that all these veterans of again, not just the Napoleonic Wars, but the French Revolutionary Wars of the 1790s were finally going to receive some medallic recognition for what they had done. So if you think about George Porter fighting at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, and then he goes through the rest of his life, he's a he's a veteran, he's a Royal Navy veteran of Trafalgar, but he has nothing to show for it. And it's discussed from time to time in Parliament, uh it never goes anywhere really. Uh then Waterloo happens, of course, in 1815, and within in under a year, there's a Waterloo Medal that goes to everyone who's there. And quite rightly, the the veterans of battles and campaigns, both uh afloat and ashore, um earlier than that get quite upset that that they think, well, someone might have joined the army in eighteen fourteen, fights at Waterloo in 1815, leaves the army in eighteen sixteen, and he gets a medal.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

It's a nice silver medal to show it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:03

Um whereas you know I might have been in you know in the Royal Navy from 1795 to 1815 and participated in you know great fleet battles or little you know hard fought actions, and I have nothing to show for it. And eventually they finally get a medal. Um but again, by imagine I how old George Porter and indeed William Pope were by 1847, 48, 49, 50 when the medal is coming out. You know, they are late middle aged to getting pretty elderly. Um and that of course is why these medals are comparatively rare, because of course they were also only authorised to those who were surviving at the time. So they weren't authorized for families for next of kin to claim on their behalf, um, which is a pretty sobering thought when you think about it. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

SPEAKER_00 21:58

It's it's a really amazing thing. you know, you think about these, you know, these great, you know, historic battles happening. And you know, then you've got a medal with Queen Victoria's head on it, which is quite sort of strange when you first explain, well, you know, you want to buy a Trafalgar medal, well, it's got Queen Victoria's head in the date, 1848 on it. And you know, people say, oh, you know, what's you you've got the wrong date on this one, you know, do you really know what you're doing? But actually that is a really interesting social, it's a bit of social history as well. The fact that you know the Waterloo medal was for everyone, you know, no matter if you were you know the Duke of Wellington or you know private budgeon of the of the Royal Artillery drivers getting your medal, you were equal you know because you were equal on the field you're equal upon you know at death as well. So that's the really interesting thing with with these and why the survival rate like so there's only 1500 Trafalgar clasps claimed give or take. Somebody in the in the comments can give us the exact figure if they'd like for a for a free catalogue for the next the next one. Let's see if anybody's watching. But you know it's these intricacies that you know without going a bit deeper and studying them, you know, this is why we get so passionate and excited and you know about these things because they are rare. They are unusual and this is what sets this hobby apart from other things I anyway.

SPEAKER_01 23:29

Definitely. And the final thing I will say about this particular medal um as well as it has an estimate of seven to nine thousand pounds. Again I I would hope it'll do eight, nine, ten or something along those lines, is that remarkably this was saved very recently from landfill. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 23:48

Really?

SPEAKER_01 23:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 23:49

What's the story?

SPEAKER_01 23:50

This was spotted by um someone who works in that industry.

SPEAKER_02 23:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:57

And literally it was going to go probably into into a big hole in the ground amongst a load of junk. And they realised what it was, saved it and uh inquired with fortunately with me and that is how it has now come to be here where instead of going yeah and being lost forever literally lost forever, it is now going to go into someone's collection. Yeah. And it's going to be treasured as it deserves to be.

SPEAKER_00 24:29

So yeah again a great story and we do have that again once or twice a year. We have some crazy story of you know it's you know if you read it in a book you'd say it was made up but you know that that you know again it is it has been saved forever and you know his story will go out there forever and now it's recorded you know that medal will always be you know in the corpus for the for the collectors and you know probably in 200 years time somebody will you know will be clinging on to that fact and and and and happy about it that it was saved hopefully so um yeah no two great uh two great Trafalgas is a really good run of um you know we've got a couple of quite rare we love saying rare uh naval general service uh medals in this um in this auction and I've had great fun yeah doing cataloguing.

SPEAKER_01 25:20

Um but I think enough about me and and I think it's time for you to cover one of one of your selection I won't take very long though don't worry.

SPEAKER_00 25:29

So I've got uh two just two groups to talk about um and you know all of you who are who've sat through my talking on about uh polar exploration um this is a group which featured in that uh exhibition um in 2019 this is the uh military cross and um Sir Douglas Mawson um Aurora expedition uh 1912 to 14 um group to Dr. uh Archibald McLean um who was uh Sir Douglas Mawson's um doctor effectively um he he wrote uh a fantastic diary which we've we've reproduced and has been um published recently by Bo Rifenberg a historian and was one of the key characters in um Sir Douglas Mawson's Australian expedition this is bang in the middle of the golden age uh of of polar exploration and um famously um McLean effectively saved the life of Sir Douglas Mawson when he'd returned from his um tragic far eastern um sledging journey uh with Xavier Mertz and um Lieutenant Ninis of the Royal Fusiliers um uh Ninis went down um a crevasse Xavier Mertz uh died on the expedition on on on that uh sledging expedition and um it was McLean who who nursed um Sir Douglas Mawson you know one of Australia's heroes um back to health and like so many of those those guys you know he obviously took uh a polar medal um with the Antarctic 12 to 14 clasp which is again a scarce award in its own right uh like so many of the Aussies he went off to the Western Front um in the Great War and took a very you know very good military cross just before the end of the war uh at the Battle of uh Villas Bretonau again one of the famous Australian actions which is you know massively covered um the Australian War Memorial in Canberra and you know again this is a you know we like things coming back uh through our hands here this was purchased through the numismatic circular in the 1990s um by a uh longstanding and um you know grizzled polar collector um you know who who has been a great supporter of of of that field uh who very generously uh lent this group to us for public display um in 2019 and uh he's now decided it's it's the time to bring it to market um he's got a 10 to 15,000 pound estimate and again it should fly away at that price so you know we're really hopeful that that will that will do well um so yeah that's that's the army we've covered the navy um yeah Annabelle's got a couple of really you know quite striking and unusual um sparkly things yeah um so um I had the real privilege in order to catalogue the Eric Smidi collection which is in the middle of our sale um so this is an individual that you both have been working with for the last few months.

SPEAKER_01 28:51

Indeed yes I've I've corresponded with both Eric and his wife um quite a bit um both via sort of email and and through the medium of Instagram um which is also quite fun um and uh they are both they both have a wonderful eye for quality and interesting pieces which is which is wonderfully reflected here I think it was really tricky to choose which items to talk about today because it was amazing to be able to work on our collection where just en masse everything is quality and exciting and has a good story.

SPEAKER_03 29:24

But I thought I'd choose the slightly more quirky pieces in the in the collection to talk about I'll start um on this um mantle star um so this um is an embroidered mantle star um it's made from bullion thread so gold and silver thread um that we can see here um and um also some lovely sequin decorations um here but um the most exciting part of this star I think is actually on the back so I'm going to turn it over um which order is this Annabelle just for those from the um order of the bath so this would have been worn on the mantle um of um a night grand cross which is why it's that little bit bigger than say a breast star um let me turn it over and we can have a look at the writing on the back um so um this was topic of conversation um in our department for a little bit trying to figure out what exactly this inscription says um but as we can see it has the name of the embroiderer at the top and at the bottom it's being sent to a J Ede who after some research we found out um this is the tail's that goes on to become Eden Ramescroft so J. Ede was Joseph Ede who was in fact working um exactly where it says he was at 193 Fleet Street that's where the tailors used to be. They've moved round the corner to Chancery Lane now. But it was just amazing to see the twists and turns in the historical story of the star. So that's one exciting avenue of this mantle star. The other one was this book that I've got in front of me. This is a fairly well known book in the trade and those are interested in collecting orders. It's called Court Jewellers of the world and if you look up um the embroiderer here which is Dalmain and Co, we actually have an entry here that references a mantle star and it quotes um what we see on the inscription on the back. So it's our thinking that it could well be given the provenance of the star and given the writer of this book that it was in fact this very mantle star that was in front of the individual that wrote the book. I think it probably that totally makes sense doesn't it because I think the author is an American author as well so it makes sense with this star you know obviously having like so many single bridge shoulders gone over to the US um and circulated amongst the fraternity over there you know it's a you know you know we're talking this is I think we date 18 32 1832 around about and actually that's a really exciting time with Joseph Ede because it was just two years later that he was appointed King William the Fourth's official robe maker.

SPEAKER_00 32:19

So sort of all ties together quite nicely. So it's pieces like this that got him that commission that started off you know the sort of you know the business that still exists today obviously doing kind of university robes but also still looking after the mantles for these orders that you know this is the you know I think is a it's an interesting sort of side angle because this is like the living and breathing, the working order you know when you see this, you know, we're very lucky to go to the ceremonial services to see these actually in the wild that they're not just some antiquated um throwback or or a reflection of something from the past these are actually still in use today aren't they?

SPEAKER_03 33:01

Absolutely and so this is lot 184 with an estimate of 33 to 500 and it's not the only embroidered styles we have we have some breast styles again from the Smiley collection. So there's a lot to play around with.

SPEAKER_01 33:16

Yeah they're they're beautiful things aren't they and I think they you know they would have taken much longer to make actually than the the the official sort of metal and enamel pieces. And you can imagine these sort of little almost cottage industries at this time of um people sewing and and creating these things and just the attention to detail is astonishing. And I do, as you correctly mentioned, I love the fact that you know Ian Romanscroft still going today about ten minute walk from here and in their basement they still have all the they they store all the mantles of the Orders of chivalry, including the bath that are that are in use today. So again it's a wonderful thing that brings it brings it in a full circle.

SPEAKER_03 34:02

That's really nice so this was uh the lot 184. I'll move on to now um lot 205. Now this you are sniggering because this has certainly been topic of conversation for the last two months. I first saw this in about January um when me, you and John were looking at it on my desk for about 10 minutes, trying to understand how you can have a sash badge with the Order of the Garter on one side and the Russian Order St. Catherine on the other it was a mystery. We know it's a a nice value item it's heavy it's hallmarked to Kebel who were the Imperial Russian court jewellers but how this came into be we weren't entirely sure.

SPEAKER_01 34:54

So what was what was your sort of diagnosis in the end?

SPEAKER_03 34:57

My diag well having been cross-examined by you about later we came up with around three different ideas we thought perhaps some kind of fantasy sash sash badge perhaps some kind of gift from the Russian family to the British royal family perhaps some kind of trial piece. We can't say anything to be certain um we went with perhaps it was a gift from the Russian members of the family to the English. It narrows it down because there aren't actually many women who are members of both orders. And when we were studying the hallmarks um the specific stamp of the anchor um tells us that it was made in St. Petersburg but actually it dates to around 1880 to 1900. So it gives us around 20 years to play around with and when we did a little bit more research we thought it was likely if it was a gift to one of three women either Queen Victoria Alexandra or Mary of Tech but it's a really exciting lot because whoever decides to buy it can go on a journey of discovery and see what's going on.

SPEAKER_01 36:19

Yeah well on earth it is yeah what a great curiosity.

SPEAKER_00 36:21

Yeah it's definitely a curiosity isn't it and I think you know the you know we we did sell a a a a genuine um you know Russian Order St. Catherine six or eight years ago you know a real you know a proper rarity a real beautiful thing. So what what's the who who gets the Order St Catherine? What's the story? Because you know we all know about the Garter and we've sold those and talked about those on previous episodes where does the Order of St. Catherine fit into the Russian Imperial Russian order system?

SPEAKER_03 36:53

So this is an order that is often actually extremely decorative. We see lots of orders with diamonds on for example um so they are an order just for noble women um in in Russia. Yeah um and they are really really rather beautiful yeah um but it it is just so curious to see it with the order of the garter.

SPEAKER_00 37:13

And it's a bit of a sort of throwback to the some of the um the German princely orders that you see with with garters on them and things like that. Obviously sort of Prince Albert's relatives and things like that who ended up getting um being terribly proud of their you know their mixed herit you know mixed heritage um and having orders from all over the shop sort of thing and and and showing off about it. That's kind of possibly what this might allude to. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:43

So this is lot 205 and it's got an estimate of 1400 to 1800.

SPEAKER_01 37:48

And yeah happy bidding toever could be a great discovery for someone. Really exciting.

SPEAKER_03 37:56

So it's a it is a really exciting piece and yes good luck to whoever ends up winning it because it will be so exciting to know more about it. But moving on I think we're going to turn turn to my left and we're going to go back to Robert.

SPEAKER_01 38:11

And return back to the era of the Napoleonic Wars before finishing off with Marcus I think. No thank you very much indeed. So you've heard from me all about the Navy so I'm now going to talk very briefly about the army during the Napoleonic Wars and I have this military general service medal in front of me which has three clasps for Vittoria, Pyrenees and Ortez, which was awarded to a Captain Mark Anthony Stanley of the 20th Foot. Very good name well exactly I do wonder if his parents were sort of classicists or something like that. And he doesn't have a have an especially exciting military career in the peninsula the the three clasps are not for any of the necessarily more exciting actions of the early part of the war. So Vittoria Pyrenees and Ortez, the the 20th were there but they weren't heavily involved in any particular actions or suffered significant casualties. But what I particularly like about this medal and it was something that immediately sort of sort of piqued my interest the moment that this this inquiry came through to me was that the Twentieth Foot in eighteen nineteen were sent to the island of St. Helena in the middle of the Atlantic now of course St. Helena is where Napoleon Bonaparte spent his final years after defeat at the Battle of Waterloo. And so the Twentieth Foot were indeed the principal British regiment stationed on St. Helena guarding Napoleon up until his death in May 1821. And happily for us and for researchers there is a a book that exists that I believe was written at the turn of the twentieth century, which is literally called Who Was Who on St Helena? Now it's a wonderful list literally everyone from the former Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte to the the footman at Longwood House, they are all listed by name as being present on St. Helena from the time Napoleon was there up until his death said on the 5th of may 1821. And I was very very pleased to be able to look at a copy of this book and under officers of the Twentieth Foot there is captain or indeed as he was at the time Lieutenant, Mark Anthony Stanley as present on St. Helena. So we know that this medal was awarded to someone who definitely would have seen Napoleon during the course of his time on the island and who knows, might have even exchanged a word or two because Napoleon quite famously was very happy to talk to the British officers on the island and to keep company with not just the sort of the French people of his own household but people around the entire island.

SPEAKER_00 41:19

Yeah I think there's lots of letters and things like that talking about his treatment and things and trying to get you know treated a bit better and get a bit more sort of you know he wasn't just sitting there biding his time he was sort of really a social figure on the island. He's obviously the only reason you know that that you know it's a real person of prominence on you know a rock in the middle of nowhere effectively sorry to all of the our watchers on the island who might live on St.

SPEAKER_01 41:45

Helena No you're quite right. And you know the the surgeon of the 20th foot Archibald Arnett famously was asked to administer to Napoleon during his sort of final months and his eventual death and indeed two of Stanley's brother officers were both successfully sort of orderly officer at Longwood House of course Napoleon's residence during his time there. And so I you know one can, as I think I've written the catalogue, one can immediately kind of just imagine in your mind's eye that when these officers were all off duty together in the mess, they would probably talk about Napoleon and saying, oh you know, did you see him today? What sort of what did you talk about? And just yeah again the idea that you know this man would have been that close to Napoleon, to the man responsible for the Napoleonic Wars for everything that we know about today, for these medals being in existence essentially is pretty astonishing. And what is also slightly intriguing is that with the the medal came this little these three little French buttons that have been made into a brooch at some point and the pin has has long since snapped off. But they do bear an imperial eagle and a crown. Now I'm certainly aware that this symbol has been used by France outside of the time of Napoleon I as emperor but one does wonder if these are a little memento of this man's time on Saint Helena and the maybe these were given to him by a French soldier or a French officer on the island and he had them made into a brooch for maybe a his wife or a sweetheart and have just memento why why why would he have it otherwise?

SPEAKER_00 43:39

Yeah that's that's the thing and I think the link there's a good photograph in the catalogue of the procession of his funeral going and obviously the the twentieth um gave a firing party?

SPEAKER_01 43:52

Yes well in fact it was uh twelve men of the grenadier company of the regiment that actually bore Napoleon's coffin. To to to the grave. To the grave.

SPEAKER_00 44:02

And so there's a link between this unit and and Boney. But obviously they there was also the award of the Medal of the Legion of Honour to some of those soldiers, which we sold a few years ago. So there was a special medal struck for the Bearer Party, all officially named. So it's a really sort of yeah, again, interesting link between Napoleon himself and obviously the respects that were shown by the French to the way that they behaved in the final act of his life, or his life was over at that point, but his his final act upon this earth before he went into this earth, sort of thing. So again, it's a it's a great story. I think those those tell those tell that story a bit more, don't they? So, you know.

SPEAKER_01 44:48

Exactly. You know, as we say, we can't can't prove it, or I can't prove it, but I think it's it's just as likely as not. Um and also this metal has never been on the market before. It's it's come from a very, admittedly, very distant uh sort of descendant of Captain Stanley. Uh and it is again, it's been a delight to write it up. Uh and and again, it was lying forgotten about, and now it is here for all to remember him and his story, and Napoleon and St. Helena, and again, with an estimate of uh only£1,1400. There's a lot of history for that sort of money, so I'm sure it'll do better than that.

SPEAKER_00 45:29

So yeah, fabulous. So we've had tales of navy and the army, we've had a kilo of solid gold, we've had fine British orders, fine Russian pieces, tales of the Antarctic and the Western Front. Um, as always, uh, of course, we have a good offering of uh the Royal Air Force. We have um uh one of our cover lots is an outstanding uh Battle of Britain uh pilots, uh Hurricane Pilots DFC, AFC group, again sole bold of the family, um, who gained A status in the Battle of France, shot down three in one sortie, which is no mean feat. Um again, there's some some really interesting foreign orders uh on offer a really good array of um imperial Chinese orders, which again you just don't see in this grade. Um, and then the front cover lot is one which again, you know, we often are blessed with a Victoria Cross on the front cover, but this could be, you know, this is as good, and this is the Victoria Cross that never was. Yeah. Um again, soul boulder of the family, and uh this is the group of ammunition smith, um, the Padre Um for the legendary defence of Raw's Drift, uh, the mission station. Um, you know, a truly legendary action. I'm not gonna um go on about it because you've all seen the film, you know, you've all you know, everybody knows about Rawksrift. Um, you know, it's a truly iconic thing. And um George Smith was the chaplain there. Um, I've spent many long weeks growing uh an appalling ginger beard in homage to his very fine, long, bushy ginger.

SPEAKER_01 47:16

I was gonna say, will it be as long as his ginger beard in two weeks' time?

SPEAKER_00 47:20

But famously with a huge, fiery ginger beard, uh Padre Smith, um, and a fire brand um minister, uh, he was not one, uh he was not a shrinking violet and um was a was a missionary out in South Africa um before the outbreak of the Zulu War. And when when the uh you know he found himself attached as the Padre to the um to the mission station and then to the 24th Foot. Um Padre Smith actually was the first person to sight uh the Zulu uh hordes, the Zulu Impy and their their regiments charging towards uh Rawke's Drift after their massive victory um at the Battle of Isan Luana. Um and again, we do have a killed in action thought for that battle in the sale as well. And you know, he looked through his telescope and then he saw the thousands of Zulus coming in their direction with their war cries and you know, you know, that famous expression, you know, it they they were as dark as night and as thick as grass. So that is what he saw, and you know, it's a really you know stirring thing that I think everyone can get on board with, whether you're again, like we said, about you know, the victory man, everybody would love a Raw's drift defender in their collection. And without a doubt, this is the most um important group to come to the market probably in the last 30 or 40 years. Um, besides the Victoria Crosses, which are all accounted for, yeah, this is the most important man there. Um during the battle, obviously, as a non-combatant, he got his moniker because he had a haversack around his neck um filled with ammunition, and he was charging around the perimeter, um, you know, giving out ammunition to the men who needed it. Um it was also giving them you know great encouragement. Um and I think I think you found it, did you find an interesting quote of it?

SPEAKER_01 49:30

Yes, there was a there was a wonderful sort of account by some of the soldiers there, how Smith would tell them off if they were swearing.

SPEAKER_00 49:39

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 49:39

And so you can imagine in the middle of a battle, you you know, you've if you let out the odd curse, that's I think you're perfectly entitled to do so. But Smith was apparently, as he handed them sort of fistfuls of of of sort of martini-henry rounds or pointed out targets, he would apparently be saying, um, don't swear, men, don't swear, but shoot them boys, shoot them. So uh he was trying to uh ensure their their spiritual wellness and focus their minds whilst they were uh at the same time fighting off thousands of Zelus.

SPEAKER_00 50:14

So no, I think it's uh you know it's uh it's a group which has everything going for it. It's from the family. And um yeah, just to close off why there isn't a Victoria Cross there, well well, he was a volunteer, so he had no right of employment after the after the the conflict, after the battle that he'd shared in. And effectively, when the British Army heard what he had done, the offer came down. Well, either you can have a permanent commission, i.e., and future employment, um, and your you know, you will progress through the army chaplain's department, um, or you can have a Victoria Cross, and then that'll be that effectively, that will be the end of your employee. Uh obviously he would have taken the the pension that would have come with the VC, but no future opportunity. So obviously there were 11 Victoria Crosses for Aux Drift, the most for any single action. Um, and Padre Smith, you know, is definitely recorded as somebody who was worthy of earning one and would have been the 12th had he made that decision. But you know, we're lucky that he didn't because otherwise it may have been just a single Victoria Cross uh on the table rather than you know his lovely campaign group because he then uh went on to serve in the Egypt and Sudan campaign, as you can see, and you know, had a long, full career, ended up as a full um chaplain colonel um before his passing. So, you know, this is um fresh to market find um his family actually ended up in in New Zealand, and so the medals have been in New Zealand for over a hundred years, and you know, they are truly lovely people who it's been a pleasure to get to know in the course of bringing these to market. And obviously, you say Rawke's drift, there's the two very famous paintings, you've got Lady Butler's painting and um Alphonse de Nerville's painting, and of course, he's in the front and centre of them both. You know, you've got Chard, and then you've got Padre Smith, you know, so he is very much there, and it's well recorded in the the Sydney newspapers because the um the Nerville painting was purchased um by the government of New South Wales for the people of New South Wales and still proudly hangs in the main galleries in Sydney, um, and it is a monstrous picture. And Padre Smith in around 1910-1912 did a journey to see his family in New Zealand and on the way stopped off in Sydney to see the painting and was very happy with the way he'd been portrayed. Um, so it's just you know, it's an utterly iconic thing, it's got such great connections. Um, you know, it's front cover material, you know, the estimates 40 to 60,000. Um, so let's see what happens on the day. We've obviously got his we're very lucky we've got his miniature medals and his ribbon bars um because we love supporting the ribboned and miniature communities as well. So, you know, there'll be something there for everybody. And um yeah, you know, it's a 375 lot sale, um, small but perfectly formed, I think. And um, you know, we're all looking forward to it, and um yeah, it should be a good day, and and Robert will be laying on uh the exhibition in the gallery in the coming days, so everybody will looking forward to that. So um unless anybody's got anything to add, I think we're sort of um yeah, I hope some people have maybe stayed to the end of this video and that you've enjoyed it, and um we look forward to all of your bids, and if there's anything we can help you with um with your collections in finding you spares or gaps, um, you know, just just let us know. If you're watching this after the auction, uh we do hope you've enjoyed it because obviously, you know, these stories are here forever, and you know, we're really passionate about that. So if there's anything that we can answer for you, um please do um pop some questions in the comments or reach out to us because we're always very, very happy to um meet new collectors, um, whether they're near or far, um, whether that be you know through the socials, um, walking through the door here at 69 Southampton Road next time you're in London or via email. You know, we're always here, so please do get in touch. Thank you. Bye bye.