Arms, Armour & Militaria

Cased pairs of pistols remain a particular favourite with collectors, being relatively compact and often in excellent condition after centuries cocooned in their brass-bound mahogany boxes.

Sporting guns are a little different from other areas of the arms and armour market in that many that are well over 100 years old are still in use today.

Russ Withem has joined Morphy Auctions as a firearms expert in the company’s firearms and militaria division.

Thomas Del Mar (24% buyer’s premium) sold the first instalment of de-accessioned arms and armour from the John Woodman Higgins Museum in Massachusetts back in 2013 and a second in 2014.

The pick of a good selection of military muskets and rifles in Anthony Cribb’s (20% buyer’s premium) sale in Abingdon on June 27 was a relatively rare example of the Baker rifle issued to British rifle regiments from the beginning of the 19th century until the 1830s.

For many years auctioneers have been itching to move the finest arms and armour from the province of the specialist collector and establish them with a wider audience as works of art in their own right.

It has been 50 years since Sotheby’s first held its annual August sporting guns sales at the prestigious Gleneagles Hotel in Perthshire.

This bronze Lantaka ship’s swivel gun/signal cannon is one of the antique firearms to be offered by Cordier Auction in a July 30 auction of more than 350 lots of militaria and firearms.

A superb set of decorated armour sold at Sotheby’s (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) is believed to have set a record. The £880,000 hammer price for the three-quarter-length cuirassier protection is believed to be the highest auction result for 17th century armour.

ATG’s weekly selection of items on sale at auctions and dealerships.

While it is well known that Queen Victoria sent her troops tins of chocolate boxes for Christmas in the second Boer War (1899-1902), the eight scarves she personally crocheted to send to individual soldiers are not so familiar.

Original D-Day invasion flags may be fragile and rare but a spate of them has appeared on the market recently in the US.