Skip to main content
Read page text
page 10
LETTERS Have your say Your Letters The sale of a collection of Punk badges causes mirth, and Mouseman pews in Hertfordshire pose questions Our star letter receives a copy of British Designer Silver by John Andrew and Derek Styles worth £75. Write to us at Antique Collecting magazine, Riverside House, Dock Lane, Melton, Woodbridge, Suffolk, IP12 1PE or email magazine@ accartbooks.com I have been a subscriber to your magazine for 50 years and, while I admit my gross ignorance of the reigns of the British kings, I still find it necessary to correct errors on your part. On page 12 of the November issue of Antique Collecting, in Around the Houses, you state that Lincoln was assassinated on April 4, 1865. I assume that this was merely a typo but no American editor would allow it to pass. You merely left out the “1” before the “4”. He was shot on the evening of April 14 and died the next morning on April 15. Fear not, we’re not mad at you as it wasn’t your fault. After all, John Wilkes Booth was an American. Ricky Cooper, Chicago, by email. Left The wanted poster for the assassins of President Lincoln who was shot on April 14, it sold at RR Auctions Above right Th e collection of Punk badges sold for £400 Below One of 11 ‘Mouseman’ mice which can be found in a Hertfordshire church, image Dr MacFarlane I am replying to the letter from Dr Kathryn MacFarlane in the last magazine (Your Letters, December/ January issue) on how thrilled she was to come across a number of ‘Mouseman’ pews at St Margaret’s church in the small Hertfordshire village of Ridge, near St Albans. Her discovery sent me to my muchthumbed copy of The Tale of the Mouse by Patricia Lennon, which is not only a wonderful introduction to the work of Robert ‘Mouseman’ Thompson, but provides a comprehensive list of the places, including churches, where his work can be found. While it lists a font at the United Reform Church in St Albans, and a lectern in Potters Bar, alas, I found no reference to Ridge. Maybe more research is required? Jean Ruthen, by email 10 ANTIQUE COLLECTING Star letter My wife and I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when we read about a collection of assorted Punk and New Wave badges which recently sold at Vectis Auctions for £400 (Around the Houses, December/ January issue). We met at a Sex Pistols concert in Middlesborough Town Hall in 1976, so does that make us antiques? While you ponder the answe r, I am heading to the attic to see if I’ve kept any of the badges I once proudly pinned to my donkey jacket (making sure, of course I don’t sustain any injuries to my ageing hips). Anon, by email The answers to the quiz on page 42. Q1 (d) ‘Rupert’ was the name given to human-like para-dummies dropped over Normandy on June 5, 1944, to confuse the Germans and designed to explode on landing. They are very rare and occasionally appear at auction so (d) and possibly (a). Q2 (b) It used wire to ‘stitch’ magazine pages together. Briggs also founded the Boston Wire Stitcher Company. Q3 (c) They were pictures made of coloured sand, probably based on the Japanese craft of bonseki (or tray-painting), and popular souvenirs from the Isle-of-Wight. Q4. (c) They are also known as a meander. Q5 (a) Small wafers (often coloured) impregnated with flour. They were wetted and attached to letter-flaps, when they dried, they stuck. In the late 1800s ready-gummed envelopes were available. Q6 (b) It is a generic term for glassware decorated with enamelled figures of children. Q7 (d). Q8 (b) It is the name of a short sword worn, or sometimes carried, by Roman o cers. Q9 (a). Q10 While the end of a sword is called a crampet; a crampon is the metal border keeping a stone in a ring; a crannog is an Irish lake fortress and a cradling refers to buildings made with a timber frame. Finally eel petition can be rearranged to form the two-word phrase toile peinte; the words true coach are an anagram of cartouche; our elk bowl can be rearranged to form the words boulle work and Cheerio nisi is an anagram of Chinoiserie.
page 11
EXPERT COMMENT Eric Knowles In the KNOWLES It was one of the most notorious events in maritime history, and this month a piece of HMS Bounty goes under the hammer in Derbyshire. Eric Knowles reports After Titanic, it is possibly the most famous ship in history. So when a relic from the wreckage of HMS Bounty came to light in Rugby, it’s safe to say we were all rather at sea. Rugby is located some 9,077 miles from the Pitcairn Islands (I checked). So how did a piece of the iconic vessel, which was burnt by mutineers off the island in 1790, make it to the UK? Enter John Coleman, an RAF chief technician from Coningsby in Lincolnshire who, in 1973, was sent to the remote British outpost. His job was to provide a radio station on the UK’s most isolated dependency in the middle of the South Pacific, 3,728 miles from any continent. His detailed diary describes idyllic days on the island he dubbed paradise, telling of long sunny days swimming and fishing and making friends with the locals. Above right A poster for 1935 film Mutiny on the Bounty, image public domain Left A fragment from HMS Bounty, it has an estimate of £1,000£1,500 at Hansons’ sale on February 26 Below left Mutineers turning Lt Bligh, Officers and Crew adrift from HMS Bounty, 29th April 1789, credit National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London, image public domain But on May 20, 1973, swimming off Bounty Bay, Coleman came across something very special. He wrote, ‘You can still see a cannon embedded in the coral, it will probably stay there forever. Nearby there were also sheets of copper from the ship’s bottom, well encrusted with the invading coral’. His July entry that year describes how he helped raise one of ship’s cannons from the seabed. The excavation led to the discovery of a large piece of copper sheathing, patinated with verdigris, and a patch of barnacles which was part of the hull of the famous ship. Coleman, a skilled carpenter, mounted it using one of the ship’s nails to secure it to a plinth and, when home gave it pride of place near the fireplace of his Rugby home. Mutiny Mr Christian If any reader is unaware of the famous tale, or has not seen it immortalised in numerous films, let me remind you. The Bounty, commanded by the strict and often tyrannical Captain William Bligh, set sail in 1787 on a mission to collect breadfruit plants from Tahiti to feed enslaved people in the British colonies. But the paradise of the South Pacific island and allure of the local women proved hard to give up. And on the return leg, after Bligh accused the crew of stealing the ship’s store of coconuts, Fletcher Christian and others mutinied. The renegades seized control of the vessel and cast the captain and 18 of his followers adrift in the ship’s launch without charts, very limited instrumentation and only meagre rations. While Bligh navigated thousands of miles to find relative safety in Timor, the mutineers settled on a number of islands before setting up a new community on the uninhabited Pitcairn Islands. After deciding to settle there, in 1790, they burned Bounty to avoid detection. Fast forward some 235 years and a small part of that legendary ship, released from the seabed of the South Pacific, is looking for the next phase of its amazing history. The HMS Bounty fragment will appear in Hansons’ saleroom in Etwall on February 26 with a guide price of £1,000-£1,500, for more details go to www.hansonsauctioneers.co.uk ‘Mr Coleman’s diar y entr y mentions how he helped raise one of Bounty’s cannons from the seabed. The excavation led to the discover y of a large piece of copper sheathing, patinated with verdigris and barnacles, which was part of the hull of the famous ship. ANTIQUE COLLECTING 11

Page Text

View plaintext

LETTERS Have your say

Your Letters

The sale of a collection of Punk badges causes mirth,

and Mouseman pews in Hertfordshire pose questions

Our star letter receives a copy of British Designer Silver by John Andrew and Derek Styles worth £75. Write to us at Antique Collecting magazine, Riverside House, Dock Lane, Melton, Woodbridge, Suffolk, IP12 1PE or email magazine@ accartbooks.com

I have been a subscriber to your magazine for 50 years and, while I admit my gross ignorance of the reigns of the British kings, I still find it necessary to correct errors on your part.

On page 12 of the November issue of Antique Collecting, in Around the Houses, you state that Lincoln was assassinated on April 4, 1865. I assume that this was merely a typo but no American editor would allow it to pass. You merely left out the “1” before the “4”. He was shot on the evening of April 14 and died the next morning on April 15. Fear not, we’re not mad at you as it wasn’t your fault. After all, John Wilkes Booth was an American. Ricky Cooper, Chicago, by email.

Left The wanted poster for the assassins of President Lincoln who was shot on April 14, it sold at RR Auctions

Above right Th e collection of Punk badges sold for £400

Below One of 11 ‘Mouseman’ mice which can be found in a Hertfordshire church, image Dr MacFarlane

I am replying to the letter from Dr Kathryn MacFarlane in the last magazine (Your Letters, December/ January issue) on how thrilled she was to come across a number of ‘Mouseman’ pews at St Margaret’s church in the small Hertfordshire village of Ridge, near St Albans.

Her discovery sent me to my muchthumbed copy of The Tale of the Mouse by Patricia Lennon, which is not only a wonderful introduction to the work of Robert ‘Mouseman’ Thompson, but provides a comprehensive list of the places, including churches, where his work can be found.

While it lists a font at the United Reform Church in St Albans, and a lectern in Potters Bar, alas, I found no reference to Ridge. Maybe more research is required? Jean Ruthen, by email

10 ANTIQUE COLLECTING

Star letter

My wife and I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when we read about a collection of assorted Punk and New Wave badges which recently sold at Vectis Auctions for £400 (Around the Houses, December/ January issue).

We met at a Sex Pistols concert in Middlesborough Town Hall in 1976, so does that make us antiques? While you ponder the answe r, I am heading to the attic to see if I’ve kept any of the badges I once proudly pinned to my donkey jacket (making sure, of course I don’t sustain any injuries to my ageing hips). Anon, by email

The answers to the quiz on page 42. Q1 (d) ‘Rupert’ was the name given to human-like para-dummies dropped over Normandy on June 5, 1944, to confuse the Germans and designed to explode on landing. They are very rare and occasionally appear at auction so (d) and possibly (a). Q2 (b) It used wire to ‘stitch’ magazine pages together. Briggs also founded the Boston Wire Stitcher Company. Q3 (c) They were pictures made of coloured sand, probably based on the Japanese craft of bonseki (or tray-painting), and popular souvenirs from the Isle-of-Wight. Q4. (c) They are also known as a meander. Q5 (a) Small wafers (often coloured) impregnated with flour. They were wetted and attached to letter-flaps, when they dried, they stuck. In the late 1800s ready-gummed envelopes were available. Q6 (b) It is a generic term for glassware decorated with enamelled figures of children. Q7 (d). Q8 (b) It is the name of a short sword worn, or sometimes carried, by Roman o cers. Q9 (a). Q10 While the end of a sword is called a crampet; a crampon is the metal border keeping a stone in a ring; a crannog is an Irish lake fortress and a cradling refers to buildings made with a timber frame.

Finally eel petition can be rearranged to form the two-word phrase toile peinte; the words true coach are an anagram of cartouche; our elk bowl can be rearranged to form the words boulle work and Cheerio nisi is an anagram of Chinoiserie.

read next page

My Bookmarks

Buy this Book
Skip to main content