Restoring a Relic From the Trenches of World War One
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- Опубліковано 7 чер 2024
- The Princess Mary Christmas gift box was a brass or silver tin containing a number of gifts intended to be distributed to all members of the armed forces of the British Empire on Christmas day 1914, during World War I. The success of the campaign led to almost 3 million of these little brass tins being sent to "every solider and sailor wearing the King's uniform on Christmas 1914".
We take a look at a particularly scruffy example of these tins and see if we can return some shine to this interesting piece of World War One history.
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Sources used:
Tommy at War: 1914-1918 The Soldiers' Own Stories
Memorializing the Anglo-Boer War of 1899-1902
Christmas 1914: The First World War at Home and Abroad
LOOK INSIDE THE PRINCESS MARY GIFT FUND 1914 BOX
www.iwm.org.uk/history/look-i...
Princess Mary Gift Fund Box - a royal gift for all
www.forces-war-records.co.uk/...
The final number of tins distributed by 1920 is as follows (source: Force War Record):
Navy: 255,271
Army:
France & Belgium 355,716
Wounded given in France and at home 89,165
Next of kin 5,000
French mission 4,600
Troops at home including Commonwealth 1,337,889
Empire:
India 294,000
Canada 70,000
Australia 53,3000
South Africa 42,647
New Zealand 19,915
Colonies 72,086
Nurses 1,500
I appreciate the dual lessons in war and restoration. Points on many levels. I do admire lovely boxes with rich history, they tell tales I'd like to hear. You have a light touch with the right amount of respect for the object, thank you for showing us your work.
Thank you very much for the Kind comments Trish! Much appreciated ☺️
I will second that opinion. I have now watched two videos, this and the Jerry Can and I really like your presentation. Now subscribed to your channel.
I also prefer a nice box to a sloppy one, preferably fully shaved.
In 1970 I was in the Army serving in Vietnam. It was Christmas and everyone in my unit received a large hand-sewn red cloth bag with shoelace drawstrings filled with candy and other items. They were donated Christmas gifts sent to soldiers in Vietnam. The tag inside my bag said it was made and filled by the Roanoke Valley Chapter of the American Red Cross. These sort of things were really appreciated and after all the goodies were gone, I repurposed the red bag for other uses.
After I got out of the Army I went to collage and earned a degree in mechanical engineering. It was during this period that the large Red Cross draw-string gift bag found a perfect new use of holding all my drafting tools. It continued in that role after I graduated and throughout my engineering career.
I'm retired now but every so often I still find myself doing "old school" hand drawings for something on my drafting board. That's when I pull my drafting tools out of a desk drawer, all still stored in that now half century old Red Cross Christmas red gift bag with the Roanoke Valley Chapter tag still attached.
Tell your children and grandchildren the story of the bag, they'll treasure it too long after you're gone. I have one of these boxes holding my grandfather's medals from WW1, but never knew the history of the tin until now. It is much more important to me now.
11:15 salt and vinegar/lemon is sometimes used to clean some very stained pieces of espresso machines, but it is considered malpractice as in 'you don't clean your machine properly and have to resort to that'.
Haha when I used to work at sea I got told off many a time for not keeping the espresso machine in the coffee shop clean and tidy. I argued a good good coffee machine needs a rustic patina 😂
I still have this gift box and all 3 medals and the thank you letter from the queen from my great grand father from South Africa.
Calum, thank you for the quality of your films, but also for the consideration and sensitivity your express in this video.
Incidentally I served in Northern Ireland in 1990, and we received much support from far and wide at Christmas. I can’t express how much a humble Christmas card such as “To A British Soldier, Happy Christmas, thank you, and be safe, from the Smith family, Bradford” meant. Those tins and tobacco must have meant the world to those poor souls in the trenches.
I have one of these (in much better condition!) - it was used for decades by my grandmother to keep my grandfather's WW1 medals in, and, on my parents' recent deaths, was passed down to me. At 108 years old, it now resides, in pride of place, on the main bedroom mantelpiece - in a house that was 24 years old when it was made. Approaching 70 myself, I have an old mans' understanding of time (there's an awful lot of it, and it passes very quickly!), but I am still constantly amazed by how old some things are and how they have survived. My house, for instance, probably breaks most modern building codes, but here it is, still standing over 130 years after it was built.
I enjoyed reading your comment. It was very interesting and you seem to be a very wise man.
Interestingly, I found three of these in Afghanistan. I cleaned them up enough to get the dirt off, and all had a light patina that I left intact. I gave one to a British officer I worked with and another to my son (then serving in Iraq) for Christmas.
Wow that’s fantastic, I mentioned it in the video but I just love the idea of how far reaching and relatively mundane these now are, while also being a unique and valuable piece of history. Great gift!
Great work! Such an enjoyable story to watch and listen too. I really like how you included contextual history about the box along with the footage of you cleaning it up. The fact about the Lusitania carrying the metal used for the box really surprised me. Thanks!
Thank you! Yeah I knew most of the story but I hadn’t heard about the lusitania connection until I started working on the video.
Thanks for this video. I found it while watching your video about the origins of the Jerry Can. Intrigued when you mentioned it, I instantly recognized the tin as the one I've had for many years; inherited through family. I've always found it interesting but I knew nothing about it and have wondered about it's history and origins. Curious to note that it eventually made it's way to Canada, with the Christmas card in tact. A wonderful bit of history and a great video. Cheers!
What a wonderfully surprising result! Really great job on the restoration along with a compelling breakdown of its history. Love this channel.
Mate you are a marvelous story teller! to dive in and arrange that bouquet of emotional and historical valued details touched me deeply. To be able to do that based on a raggedy canister that was used for tidbits of forgettable throwaway stuff is amazing to me. Of course you felt the emotional value of the family heirloom when you got it from your grandparents, but still, to get this beautiful story and lets not forget a story as a narration underpinning a restoration, honoring its value for you and giving it its right place in your home, is overwhelmingly beautiful!
Jan these are the kinds of comments that really ake my day AND make me want to make videos! Thank you so much, really appreciate your ind words.
I agree with you mate this is a superb video. Reading your comment expressed perfectly what I was thinking. Well Said Bro.
Wonderful video and restoration
Thank you!
This is amazing! I had never heard of this. What a beautiful way for the people back home to send their love to those fighting. Im shocked at how amazing it came out! Its stunning and truly a lovely piece of history. Thank you for bringing history to life! And for the wonderful lesson on how to restore and protect as well.
This video reminds me of a rolling tin of my own, my father purchased it before I was born, it spent a lot of its life storing cable ties and other such bits in his office. I remember I took it camping with me in the scouts, more than a decade later I carry it every day with my rolling equipment, and tho its story wasn't that interesting prior to it coming into my possession, it have traveled the world with me and every dent has a story.
I think items like these are really interesting, and I'm glad to see your interest in them too. Class video as always keep up the good work
Thank you! Great wee story there as well, objects and possessions are at their best will imbued with the marks of our time with them.
I have a similar well-traveled oddments box, but its backstory is a lot less interesting--it's just an old Band-Aid box from the '60s. (Even though, in retrospect, it's kind of amazing that adhesive bandages used to come in actual metal boxes with hinged lids, and did so right up into the 1990s. :)
Wow. This channel just recommended. This guy needs more videos. He's good. Contrasting great history and this object and restoration. Impressive. Great narration, editing and all.
What an interesting piece of history. Thanks for the awesome video once again.
Thank you! Really wish I’d thought to make it a couple weeks ago when it was a lot more Christmas relevant 😂
Great video. I really enjoy your combination of restoration technique, contextual history, and personal connection with the objects and subject matter each of your videos address. Every time you drop a small detail about Raasay it if feels like another insight to a magical place and I get the urge to learn more about the region. Keep up the great work and Happy New Year!
Happy new year to you too! Would be happy to make a video about Raasay in the future :)
I have quite an obsession with trinket boxes. This is one of the most beautiful old boxes I’ve ever seen. Great video.
A lovely and very informative little video.
Many thanks! Had a lot of fun making it.
I have my great grandfathers on my desk at work, its a great piece on my desk at work, proudly with it is his Battle of Mons medal and clasp
I have one of these, passed down to me via my mother from her father. It contains my grandfather's original medals from the war and is in almost pristine condition, albeit lacking all the original contents. I don't know if she ever knew the origin of the tin, certainly she never told me. Her father emigrated from Glasgow, GB to Melbourne, Australia in 1924, 2 years before her birth. I was born 3 months after his death, so sad I never had the chance to get to know him.
This video (/story) was much more interesting than the title lead me to believe. I would humbly make the claim that this video would have a lot more views with a different title that hints towards the story of the box, and the fact that this video is really about telling that story, more than simply a person cleaning a box.
Maybe it would also be beneficial with a little sound design, maybe some subtle hints of artillery cannons at relevant times, or some low-key music here and there. But I also very much enjoyed the calm and quiet presentation in this video.
I do not mean to sound like I think that I know better than you, how to produce and publish your creations.
Thanks for the interesting video. Your channel is simply amazing.
Hey Calum , this is now the 4th video of yours I have viewed and was very impressed with as I was with the previous three . I also have many collectables from the Great War given to me from my great uncle but none so ornamental as yours . Thanks again
Neat little gift box.
It sure is!
Of course i made it to the end. Happy New Year, Calum! :)
*Happy New Year!* You lovely end watchers will be added to the cool kid list I keep next to my desk.
Beautiful job on a remarkable little artifact. I particularly love what it suggests about the official view of the war's prospects at the time--by which I mean, you can tell the British authorities still thought the war would be a short one when the first batches of these little boxes were made. If the people responsible had any idea that by the summer of 1915, the Army would be facing an ammunition shortage so severe the scandal would bring down the government, I doubt they would have authorized the use of so much brass in the production of anything other than shells, even for a royal goodwill project.
Thanks, well researched and presented as always 👍
Thank you very much Alan!
Amazing work. Glad I spent the time watching this.
I had the pleasure of photographing one of these a couple of years ago for an exhibition on the centenary. It's nice to learn some history on them as the owner didn't really know much and I wasn't involved in the subsequent research for the exhibition. I remember being mildly irritated that the 'CHRISTMAS 1914' wasn't centred vertically.
I’ve cleaned and restored many of these tins over the years - to clean it quickly and efficiently I use very fine wire wool and a paste polish
originality appreciated. I've barely heard about any of the things in your videos before.
Thank you! Always fun to shine a light on more unknown stuff!
Thank you for the lovely video and calming my little brain late at night! Beautiful as always xx
;)
Superb research and footage made this video for me. Thanks and you did a perfect and none destructive restoration so every credit mate 👍👍👍
So interesting. Thanks for sharing your work and research.
Thank you for watching!
I have one of these from my Great Uncle who was a medic in the Canadian Army.
You’ve given me the thought of trying to clean up mine which was dug out of our garden 10 years ago and is black all over
Just for curiosity's sake, I went on E-Bay to see what these were selling for.
To my surprise, the prices ranged from about 50 U.S. dollars to almost 1,500 USD.
HOLY COW!
Thank you for a very interesting video!
Well done, you've done a great job with that, keep up the good work. Also, thanks for pointing us in the direction of naddpod, my partner and I have been enjoying it so much!
A naddpod convert! Amazing. New campaign they're doing atm is AMAZING.
I have the same princess Mary Christmas gift box orignal i have polished it and now its shining like gold
3:56 "private allowance" lol
Very interesting video.thank you
Ive seen these before and know the history but this was really well presented :) the restoration looked great! I’m actually about to try to restore this old pill box my mom has had for decades that got wet and rusted. She was going to just throw it away but I managed to get it first and am going to suppose her with it. I’ll use this video for some advice thank you!
I have one of these tins . I inherited it from a friend when he passed away.
Nice video again Calum!
Thanks for your support Timon!
I have one of them it belonged to my wonderful grandfather may he rest peacefully 🙏🌹❤️he used to keep his spare change in it have great memories of him giving me money out of it
I enjoyed that thanks 👍
Glad you enjoyed it!
I remember one of these featured in an episode of Peaky Blinders! Such a cool little bit of history.
Oh really? That’s cool I’ll need to watch that
Great video. It would be amazing to open one of these that was stored since 1914, and have a 107 year old smoke.
Fun fact: gifts to the troops on Christmas 1914 wasnt just exclusive to Britain, german soldiers would recieve a multitude of gifts including tobacco and a pipe with a picture of the crown prince for Christmas 1914
Interesting note is that the British military still gives out princess Mary parcels to active overseas service members to this day
hmm next time you could try reverse electroplating the tarnish off. if you look up an old nurd rage video of silver tarnish. you can do something similar with copper alloys if you get the electrochemistry potentials just right or force it with a battery. i think aluminum foil or zinc metal would work here, in the us, we can just take post 1983ish pennies, put them in a solution of 0.02% hydrogen peroxide ("food grade"), and add vinegar, stir every 5 minutes and an hour later you have almost pure zinc pennies. then you could use these in a solution of baking soda and water to remove the tarnish very slowly without any acid degradation of the unoxidized metal. then you can polish just the remaining tarnish to remove less. you might be able to put the tarnished piece in boiling water and convert it to a different oxide state. i know this works with iron/steel rust and converts some back to the base metal i think. backyard balistics recent restoration videos almost always rely on this method
Great job Zip... I am really enjoying these historic videos you have been doing. Maybe someday soon we can catch up a bit :) Lo'
Happy new year Lo! Maybe one day I can finally make out there and we can catch up in person!
“I don’t think mine will end up in a museum” everyone says that, then 500-600 years later, it is either in a museum, or no longer in existence.
I too am a collector of old things. People will now buy things at sales for me and I even will take old things in payment
👍👌👏 Simply fantastic! Extremely well done again (video, work and research). I've never heard of the possibility to clean brass with warm vinegar and salt until now. Do you know if the polish you used afterwards maybe roughly the same as the famous Nevr Dull?
Thanks a lot for making teaching explaining recording editing uploading and sharing.
Best regards luck and health to all of you.
I’d love to find one that still had the original contents.
Same!
Just salt and vinegar. Wow. Wonderful.
That is a miracle!! I cannot believe how great it looks now. I just found a WWI US military cigarette case and match safe with raised ancient Roman coin designs on top of the lid on ebay and bought the pair just now. They are filthy, blackened and also have some pitting. I will try to clean them with your method.
When you say heated up vinegar, how hot should it be and should I heat it up in a pot or can I do that in a microvave? Can I use sea salt?
Should the vinegar be boiling or just warm? Also, would this work on nickel or chrome plated, or silver plated metal? I am unsure which one of the three metals it is made of. I have Brasso cream in a squirt bottle I got on Amazon and was going to try to clean them with that, but saw your video just now. Sorry to bother you with dumb questions.
P.S. are you Scottish by any chance? My grandmother was from Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire (Rosehearty), Scotland and your accent reminds me of hers.
Those war weary souls might have ended that folly that Christmastide in 1914... That aside, it's neat to see the restoration take place. I did a "restoration" of a lovely Pacific NW Native American style plaque on a box that had smoked salmon at some point. Thanks for the diversion from the events of yesterday.
What events took place the day before you wrote your comment mate?
If you find one in relatively good condition, be careful not to overdo the polishing, as they originally had a gilded finish & you will easily strip his off by being overly keen to restore
True, though what’s nice about these is that while (I think) very interesting they also aren’t super valuable or rare. That’s why with mine I wasn’t really too worried
Would a wax polish like that used on cars help keep further oxidisation at bay? I'm just concerned that that the corrosion will return. If a wax polish isn't up to the job, a lacquer coating perhaps?
Yeah wax, or actually linseed oil is good too. Anything that keeps the oxygen away from the surface.
I have same box
Even my uncle have same kind of box
GROOVY
I only watch the movies that attract me to the end. :)
Late arrival only just found your channel . Is that white vinegar and table salt you were using
I’ve been looking for one of those for myself. Last one I saw casted $126. I’m still looking for a better one. I do however have just gotten my hands on the American “Bacon” tin and “Condiments” tin. I want to use them as part of my backpacking equipment. I was wondering if you knew a good way to clean them so I can reuse them for food storage again?
I gave that with good quality if you want dm mee
Glè bhrèagha!
7:03 So non smokers could drop acid instead?
Where are you mate, we need a new vid
Busy busy!
I've just seen some 'new' ones on eBay for 8.34 pounds, repro I think although I have no idea why they would reproduce this box.
Her highness would be proud 🥲.
They were known as Christmas gift tins one was sent to the Royal family and has not been opened it was Xrayed Ref: daily mail
I have 2 of these in good condition
Hodl onto them!
@@CalumRaasayyeah, My dad picked them up in Afghanistan as a gift... so I'm holding onto them for sure. Interesting because I saw another comment with someone that found one in Afghanistan.
I am sure that back then the money raised actually went to the soldiers, contrary to today when charity money is most often stuck in a Swiss bank and used to raise more money to remain in the bank like the 2004 tsunami money that is still in a Swiss bank, how sad that we cannot trust a charity, any charity. Best to give directly to people and not to a 'bank'. I have often looked out for one of these tins but never found one, they are really well made and soldiers must have kept their treasures in them. As a kid I had a similar tobacco tin that I used to keep my found treasures in, bits of broken chain, metal buttons, safety pins, 'jewels' etc. My father who was very talented would strip down tobacco tins then after priming would paint disney characters in relief with enamels that he gave to his drinking buddies in exchange for whiskey. We kids never got one, we were not 'useful' to him, he was such a nasty piece of work with so much amazing talent.
I got the warm and fuzzies when I heard the international troops weren included and accommodated ☺️
Wonder what Mary thought of her uncle willy?
Hey I'm from India..i have this tin box
Would cleaning my tin decrease value in the future if it was ever to be sold ?
Probably. These aren't worth very much though!
Not really.
Originally the tins were gilded in order to retain a shiny appearance without polishing. However, soldiers being soldiers (and using Brasso almost daily on their buttons and equipment) they more often than not brassoed them, taking off the gilding and exposing the naked brass. Besides which, although the gilding is quite shiny, it's more of a "frosted shine" (if that makes sense) and the troops were more used to the smooth and brilliant shine of a highly polished cap badge or webbing buckle.
Over time, the gilded tins that escaped being brassoed by the troops often reacted badly to sweat etc, and developed the dark staining you see here. If you notice, the worst staining is along the edge of the lid and the bottom right corner. This is exactly where the thumb and fingers will be when the box is opened by someone laying it in the palm of their right hand. The pad of their right thumb will be exactly on the right corner, the heel of the left hand on the bottom left corner with the length of their left thumb running along the edge, with the thumb of the left hand prising open the badly corroded corner.
The tins that had had the gilding polished off, simply dulled as brass is wont to do (and at the most turned a little green with verdigris in the odd spot).
The one here probably wasn't originally polished, but the gilding has reacted very badly to the sweat from many years of handling.
Hence, Calum did the right thing in that a Brassoed tin that's in good nick will probably fetch more than a gilded-but-corroded one that looks awful.
Would you consider cross-posting to either Odysee or Rumble? I really enjoy your content but I can no longer support UA-cam and I don't want to miss your next project! Thank you for considering!
Salt realy??
salt really!!
A bit of Brasso she'll look like new
Sooooo, Princess Mary was kind of a smoke show in her day, yeah?
A true historian
Didn't think it would be possible to make an interesting video about a bronze, tobacco box.
Millions dead but at least we got a tin each before we died. I like the charming and romantic side of this but the cynic in me cant but help think it was a manipulation of a public who were told their men would be home by Christmas. Instead of a focus on ending the war everyone was always directed towards something that supported it. Absolutist objectors had awful experiences. I see how the public lost their minds during covid and instead of the NHS being held to some scrutiny we clapped like seals on our doorsteps and soviet style murals went up everywhere. The whole thing freaked me out. It Feels like a dry run for the coming war.
I mean yeah, it was part of a campaign to romanticise the war effort and drive up public support. It’s all propaganda at the end of the day!
@@CalumRaasay Thanks for the reply. Ive been binge watching you today and you are so undersubscribed. I loved the WWII Rescue Buoys video and would have listening to a 2 hour Gerry can video. I may be a minority there though. Thanks for the quality content. Those real engine models of the buoys were so immersive and just show how lucky we are that we can now do this stuff. I grew up on time team recreations and drawings.