Disposal of Medals

[old sparky]

I have the MIC of 1126 Cpl H A Gunner RFA which has an entry on the reverse apparently from Oi/c Records asking for authority to dispose of the medals. This entry is dated 1922 and Cpl Gunner was killed at Transloy in 1916. Can anyone help me on two questions please?

1. Would the request for disposal arise from a failure to find a next of kin?

2. What does disposal mean, Scrap?

As medals are often all that is left of the fallen it seems very sad that in some cases they were never issued.

Peter B

[Timbob1001]

Hi Peter

1. Yes - no one was found or existed to formally claim the medals

2. Disposal would either mean scrapping the medals ie melting for reuse or renaming them for another recipient. Effectively grinding down the rim of the medal to remove the naming and the re-impressing them with the name of another.

Tim

[auchonvillerssomme]

^{Did the government 'grind' down the edges of medals and rename them?}

[Sepoy]

^{Did the government 'grind' down the edges of medals and rename them?}

In some cases yes.

Officially renamed medals are encountered and it is something which has gone on for years. For example the Indian General Service Medal 1854 with Chin Hills bar awarded to the Norfolk Regiment are normally "Officially renamed".

The normal giveaway is the thickness of the rim, but they would be named in the official manner.

Sepoy

NB An easy way to check if a medal has been skimmed - look at the rim under a light and get a straight line of light across the rim: as you rotate the medal the line of light should remain straight but if the medal has been skimmed you will see the line distort. It is an easy way to check if you dont have a pair of calipers to check the diameter.

Also look out for ghost full stops etc left where the medal has not been skimmed sufficiently.

[old sparky]

Thanks for your help folks. It confirms my suspicions but leaves me a bit bothered as his parents are recorded as resident in the village at the time of his death. I know that there will be any number of explanations for the non-issue. It still doesn't sit right with me.

Regards

Peter B

[auchonvillerssomme]

If the government skimmed WW1 Stars, BWM's and Vics then that throws all the advice on checking for fake WW1 medals on its head then, isn't the advice that any skimmed medals are fakes?

[Timbob1001]

Confusing it is...... Officially re-named does not mean a fake - you just need to be v. v. careful.

Tim

[Sepoy]

If the government skimmed WW1 Stars, BWM's and Vics then that throws all the advice on checking for fake WW1 medals on its head then, isn't the advice that any skimmed medals are fakes?

I recently came across a very thin 1914 Star to a member of the Royal Field Artillery which had been issued in the early 1940s. It was an officially named skimmed medal. What caught my eye was just how thin the star actually was. Either way it was an official issue but it did effect the actual value and I walked away from it. To add to the confusing situation - you also come across officially corrected naming ie rank spelling of names etc.

British Indian Army Medals can also have very interesting "correct" naming. I have even seen a medal which was issued to a member of a Bullock Corps officially mis-spelt (use your imagination)

The best way of being to pick these out from from the unscrupulous is to handle and inspect medals at medal fairs and arm yourself with decent reference books. The best available for WW1 Medals is Howard Williamson's "The Great War Medal Collectors Companion" (Howard is a member of this forum). For British Campaign Medals you cannot better "British Battles and Medals" 7th Edition published by Spink. Neither of these are cheap but will pay for themselves very quickly if it saves you from "unofficially renamed medals".

Sepoy

[HarryBettsMCDCM]

That said it was not common for unissued medals to be so Skimmed only when unissued Stocks ran out... Most common would be partial renames where errors occoured and this would normally be recorded on the MiC as "Returnd for Adjt" returned for adjustment.. Medals were sent Registered Post to the address given by the Serving Soldier, and had to be signed for, If no one at that address would or could sign the packet would be returned ..Kept if i recall from previous post they were kept on Stock for a few years before being scrapped in case a claim was made for them & they could have been issued at any time up to the 1980s from newly struck awards.

[auchonvillerssomme]

What official references are there to medals being returned and renamed to other recipients? With the numbers involved surely it would have been easier just to name up a new medal rather than spend time working on it to take a new name. I collected medals for some years and never saw anything that looked like an officially skimmed and renamed WW1 medal, in fact up to the late 70's and early 80's you rarely saw a professionally skimmed WW1 medal, most were fairly obvious. I disposed of a large collection of MM's in 1988 because I discovered one of them, not skimmed was very professionally named, some of you may well remember the cases at that time. I know of dealers who sold on BWM's as scrap because of renaming (I would have done the same myself).

[CarylW]

Thanks for your help folks. It confirms my suspicions but leaves me a bit bothered as his parents are recorded as resident in the village at the time of his death. I know that there will be any number of explanations for the non-issue. It still doesn't sit right with me.

Regards

Peter B

I had a similar case with one of the men I'm researching. On the reverse of his MIC was stated 'O1/C Records York requested authority to dispose of his medals 22.3.22'. In his service record, the next of kin, his mother was named as the recipient of the memorial plaque in 1921, but her address by that time was a Union Infirmary workhouse in Chester-Le-Street. She may have died in the interim year - common surname and a few deaths in that area with that name in the death indexes but it left me wondering too. If in fact his mother were still alive by that date in 1922 and still in the workhouse, were medals sent to next of kin if they were inmates of a workhouse? Has anyone come across this before?

Caryl