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    Some Imperial smoking items...


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    • 9 months later...

    Finally, here is my favorite Imperial smoking item. In 1991, while wandering about on the crest of the Dead Man at Verdun, I spotted the edge of this sticking up out of the dirt. After carefully wiggling this straight up and out of the earth, I realized it was a cigarette tin. A friend got excited, grabbed it from me and opened it (thankfully doing no further damage to it) thinking there might be an Iron Cross inside. Sadly there was nothing inside but dirt and it was only when I got back to the hotel that I cleaned it and realized that much of the lithography was intact. Having been in the ground for 70+ years the condition is remarkable. It is a tin for "Gold Saba" cigarettes made by Garbaty of Berlin. I often wonder if the Prussian owner survived the battle.

    Dan

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    Edited by Daniel Murphy
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    Finally, here is my favorite Imperial smoking item. In 1991, while wandering about on the crest of the Dead Man at Verdun, I spotted the edge of this sticking up out of the dirt. After carefully wiggling this straight up and out of the earth, I realized it was a cigarette tin. A friend got excited, grabbed it from me and opened it (thankfully doing no further damage to it) thinking there might be an Iron Cross inside. Sadly there was nothing inside but dirt and it was only when I got back to the hotel that I cleaned it and realized that much of the lithography was intact. Having been in the ground for 70+ years the condition is remarkable. It is a tin for "Gold Saba" cigarettes made by Garbaty of Berlin. I often wonder if the Prussian owner survived the battle.

    Dan

    IPB Image

    Looks like a bullet went through it . . . . I've shot enough metal things to know. That was in my younger days of course.

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    Especially in Verdun many items were hit again and again by shell fragments. It must not mean, the owner carried it as it was hit. Or lets hope, he didn't...

    Here is a Batschari cigarette tin from neighbouring Cote 304.

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    Here is a nice trench art lighter made from shell case brass. This is so precisely made without even a seam visible, it has got to be German. A very classy and stylish piece that I purchase from a German man who collected old lighters. It is engraved only "Verdun". No need to elaborate on that!

    Dan

    Jens,

    I would love to know how they did the old lithography on those cigarette tins that made the label so resistant to oxidation. Simply amazing they have survived.

    DSCN1707.jpg

    Edited by Daniel Murphy
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