WW1 medals

[museumtom]

I was just wondering that if say, 6,000,000 ww1 trios were awarded, we can assume that some were returned, others were dumped, others were split up and lost, others stolen, more melted down etc. What percentage would you reckon there are left out there as sets?

I dont have the answer but I would like to know what others feel.

regards.

Tom

[Guest Ian Bowbrick]

30 - 50% as complete sets

50 - 65% if you include singles.

Ian

[HarryBettsMCDCM]

As complete Trios or Groups I would hazard a guess @ around 50%,they had little monetary value before about 1977{when the Silver Price shot up}so werent worth selling & many Veterans were still alive & wearing them @ Various "dos",They were then passed onto Relatives made acutely aware of the"value" of their Grandads Medals by Various Antiques TV Programmes,etc & consequently many more were kept together than had happened with Victorian Medals,which generally have a survival rate of around 20~30%,which were often dispersed amongst family members as were the Pairs of Staffordshire Figures & Vases,Also many budding Collectors had grown up with Grandads War Memoirs & having a better knowledge had kept them together

[Terry]

Tom,

I would tend to agree with Ian and HarryBettsMCDCM; probably somewhere up to half of trios are probably still with us. Obviously a huge number of war medals went into the melting pot, leaving those star/victory combinations one so often sees for sale, but you also see many single war medals for sale, often to casualties or decorated men, leaving you to hope that somewhere, sometime, the groups may be re-united.