SIR HARRY SMITH 1851 MEDAL

[Rusty Greaves]

Thanks for your opinion Graf. That makes sense given it is not clearly affecting the letters. Cheers! 

 

As I have not seen this flaw on the reverse of any other medals, it seems to suggest identification of another reverse die. Numis or other folks more knowledgable than I may have a useful opinion about this. 

Edited July 19 by Rusty Greaves

[Rusty Greaves]

 

Two catalogs from City Coins featuring two Sir Harry Smith Medals for Gallantry 1951 are now available online. Below is the text and low-resolution images of these medals. The illustration of the Thomas Duncan medal from the their 9 December, 2005 Auction 55 (Lot 1) sale of the named Sir Harry Smith 1851 medal is distorted but provides slightly more detail than the even lower resolution image that City Coins sent to me and I illustrated here on this thread in my post of 20 April, 2023. 

 

Below is the description of an unnamed Sir Harry Smith Medal for Gallantry 1851 (Lot 7) from the City Coins March 2003 catalog: Catalogue of Campaign Medals Part I: Orders , Decorations & Medals Selected from Several Important Collections Including: Dave Baxter, Alan Beumont, Peter Beighton, Ricky De Menaud, Brian Johnson-Baker, David Lonsdale, Henk Loots. Postal Sale 51, Friday 21st March, 2003 (https://www.citycoins.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/City-Coins-Auction-No-51.pdf). The description of the Sir Harry Smith Medal is on page 3, and the illustration of the obverse (only) of the medal is in color Plate V. 

 

 

Above is the text listing for Lot 7, the Sir Harry smith Medal for Gallantry 1951. This is cropped from page 3 of the City Coins March 2003 catalogue for Auction 51. 

 

 

Above is a cropped version color Plate V, showing only the 3 medals on the lower portion of  Plate V, Missing at the top. of the plate is Lot 333 a trio of: a Companion of the Order of St,.Michael and St. George breast badge (LG 16 August, 1901, pg. 5409), the Queen's South African Medal (with Defense of Ladysmith clasp), and the Union of South Africa Commemoration Medal 1910, all to Lieut. J. Farquhar. Lots 5 and 6 are South African General Service Medals 1834-1853 (Lot 6 has a longer description on page 3 of this catalogue). 

 

Below is the description of a named Sir Harry Smith Medal for Gallantry 1851 to Thos. Duncan from the City Coins December 2005 catalog (Lot 1): Catalogue of Campaign Medals Part I: Orders , Decorations & Medals Selected from Several Important Collections Including: Dr Felix Mechanic, Andy Birmingham (Bermuda), Colonel Ivor Moore, Dr Ryno Greenwall, Willem Joubert and others. Postal Sale 55, Friday 9th December, 2005 (https://www.citycoins.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/City-Coins-Auction-No-55.pdff). The first mention of this Sir Harry Smith Medal is on page 5. The full description of  Lot 1, the Thos. Duncan medal, is on pp. 11-12, and the obverse and reverse of the of the medal are illustrated in an unnumbered color Plate. 

 

 

Above are the introcductory remarks about the Sir Hasty Smith Medal for Gallantry from page 5 of the Auction 55 City Coins catalogue. 

 

 

 

Above are pp. 11-12 describing Lot 1, the Sir Harry Smith Medal for Gallantry 1851 named to Thos. Duncan from the Auction 55 City Coins catalogue. The description on page 11 states that some flaws due to crack(s) have been removed by post-striking tooling.  The medal also is identified on page 12 as coming from the collection of General Whittaker, and seems to suggest that City Coins purchased this medal from Spink & Son in 1958. 

 

 

Above is a cropped version of the distorted and low-resolution image of the Thos. Duncan Sir Harry Smith Medal for Gallantry 1851 from an unnumbered color Plate in the Auction 55 City Coins catalogue. This provides just slightly more detail than the previous version of this illustration I was sent by City Coins that appears in my post on this thread of 20 April, 2023. The reverse of this medal shows the larger lettering of "...IN THE..." (as noted for die #!?, and as discussed by Mitchell 1955 pg. 239, also shown in the Girt Roots medal in the 1st photo of my post here of 1 May, 2022, or in the Hendrick Ferara medal shown as the 1st image in my post of 5 July, 2023). The Ferara medal and the Duncan medal's engraving of the recipients' names are distinctly different, but are the most elaborate among named examples. There may be an indication that the reverse die flaw I illustrated here in my post of 15 July, 2024 is visible on the reverse of the Thos. Duncan medal. Note the visible flaw going through the "F" in "FIELD" in the inferior right margin of the illustration, possibly as seen on the unnamed medal from an 11 December, 2014 auction by Dix Noonan Webb (Lot: 618). 

 

 

 

 

Edited August 13 by Rusty Greaves

[Rusty Greaves]

Below is the brief description of the John McVarrie Sir Harry Smith Medal for Gallantry 1851 from the City Coins December 1997 catalogue: City Coins, Catalogue of Campaign Medals Selected from theCollections of: M. G. Hubbard, F. K. Mitchell and B. Cairncross. Postal Sale No, 45, Friday 19th December, 1997, pg. 6. 

 

 

No photographs of the medal are included with the catalogue. 

Edited August 13 by Rusty Greaves

[gavinmedals]

Hi Rusty, I was aware of the first two medals mentioned above and had suggested that Numis reach out to them as they may possibly have had some better photos. I had not seen the one from the Dec 1997 catalogue as yet, so appreciate the time you took to compile the information.

 

I have read through some of the old catalogues again (many of which I had digital copies of when they started issuing them in that format). In retrospect, suffice to say, there are many groups that I would love to see surface again! Just not all at once🤩

[Rusty Greaves]

Howdy Gavinmedals, 

 

Thank you for your comments. Of course, I only became aware of City Coins because of your suggestion to Numis on 5 March, 2021 about contacting them. As noted in my post of23 April, 2023, I wrote City Coins and received the low-resolution image of the Thos. Duncan medal in that post and their apology for not having the higher-resolution image of that SHSMG 1851. I'm not a collector, I just got roped into some research on a couple medals from Egypt for my wife's family, and occasionally poke around GMIC on a few other topics. Cheers!