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    paul wood

    Old Contemptible
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    Posts posted by paul wood

    1. His name was Hon. Surgeon General Charles Snodgrass Ryan

       Quite a character as well as his exploits in the Russo-Tutkish War he was the police surgeon who dealt with Ned Kelly's wounds (Ryan claimed he was a complete wimp and cry baby with a very low pain threshold). During the great war he visited military hospitals and would throw at ennis ball at the patients, any who caught it were liable to be sent back to the front as fit for duty)

      Paul

    2. Alan, Wasp,

      I see the problem.

      An auctioneer's, and I speak from personal experience, primary duty, or should be, is to act in the best interests  of his vendor. With medals I can think of several examples where the whole ensemble has had to be split up for the vendor's benefit.

      1) dress miniatures, normally these would be kept with the full-sized. However when they are worth a few hundred pounds or more then they should be separated but sold as the following lot as some medal  collectors are not interested in miniatures and any they acquire they will pass on and miniature collectors do not want the full-sized The classic example  is the DFC, Order of Lenin Group to W/C Ramsbottom Isherwood where the miniatures were sold for a few thousand to  different buyer to the full-sized. In that case I felt especially justified as all money received was towards care for vendor.

      2) Early portrait miniatures, some Waterloo, Peninsular or early Indian medals come with contemporary portrait miniatures the majority of which, to miniature collectors, are worth no more than a few hundred and therefore will get a better added value from the medal collector who tends to factor them in at 500-1000 pounds above the value of the medal(s). One one occasion however we had an officer's Waterloo with a portrait miniature by one of the best contemporary miniarturists and was valued at £3000-4000. It was sold at Sotheby's realising the mid estimate, bought by the buyer of the medal, as we had added a footnote that Portrait miniature was included in a separate sale, the underbidders were  all picture dealers as I bid on behalf of my client.

      3) Photographs and documents. Especially  in the case of Polar and exploration related medals there can be archives, diaries or photographs, in many cases worth many times more than the medals. These will perform better in specialist travel sales at places like Sotheby's. Obviously their sale details will be mentioned in the footnote of the medal catalogued and vice-versa in the travel catalogue. We have had polar archives with a medal which have sold for 5 figure sums.

      Were we to have sold these items together and the aggregate price were considerably lower we would rightfully have been liable to litigation for not acting in our vendor's best interest.

      I have no idea as to the value of the Khalafat standard. Had it been £200 or under I would have kept it with the medals on the principal that most medal collectors would value it at that as an interesting part of the group.

      While auction houses should try and help their buyers they also have (and several cases that have come to court confirm this) a duty of due diligence to their vendor.

      I hope that has cleared things up.

      All the best,

      Paul

       

    3. I know of this seller who goes under a collective name for birds of prey. He says unnamed as issued. I have several Indian KPMs from 1909 to circa 1940 NONE of mine are unnamed and £800 is obviously designed to lure an idiot who knows Rockall Shannon and Hebrides about medals. It is sellers like this who give Ebay its deservedly bad name as a haven for sharks and crooks

      The seller is also illiterate as he has frequently offered Tibets and early IGS 08s but is incapable of deciphering the running script which they are named in (if he reads this forum I will happily decipher them at £10 per medal (easy beer money) which I find most frustrating although it may be because they are crap ranks from crap units and is hoping someone might think they are sleepers. If any member of this forum  buys this KPM I would be happy to contribute financially towards their psychiatric treatment. 

      All the best

      Paul 

    4. Harold,

      My opinion for what it is worth. I suspect some one has found a cache of unissued  cased medals and has decided to sex them up. HK police are always in demand but I am afraid in my view the naming is about as genuine as Katie Price's cleavage. Certainly no comparison to the one Colonial police LSGC to a Sikh Inspector  in the Zanzibar Police I own

      Best wishes and welcome

      Paul

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