Chats on Old Copper and BrassBurgess, Fred. W. (Frederick William)
History
Chats on Old Copper and Brass
Burgess, Fred. W. (Frederick William)
Brasses; Brasswork; Copper; Copperwork; Metal-work -- Collectors and collecting
What wonderful antiquities are sometimes found among scraps! Years
of neglect cause indifference to the contents of a scrapheap, and we
read occasionally of the dispersal of relics among which, unknown to
either sellers or buyers, there may be antiquities of more than passing
interest if their original ownership could only be traced, for in the
personal relics of great warriors in our national museums there clings
a halo of hero-worship, and what to many would be considered fictitious
values are attached to such curios. A few years ago the relics from the
battlefield of Waterloo, which had for some time past been accumulated
in a modest looking building at the foot of the Lion Mound, were
dispersed. There were upwards of three thousand pieces, including
helmets of brass, plates of shining metal, innumerable buttons and
ornaments belonging to different French regiments, including officers'
regimentals, and some relics of the British and Prussian armies.
In old curio-shops many metal relics of battlefields are offered
for sale, but they have little or no interest to the buyer, simply
because their identity with their original owners has been lost. It is
of the greatest importance to future generations of collectors that
all records relating to known curios should be chronicled, and that
even private collectors should hand on to their successors adequate
descriptions which may have been verbally given them, so that private
as well as national relics may be identified and the monetary value in
such curios increased. Even a brass plate on an old gun, bearing the
name of a great man, makes it a relic worth securing, whereas had the
identity of ownership been missing the weapon would be of little or no
value.
A visit to the United Service Museum at Westminster is full of
interest. There is an abundance of personal relics there--not many
of brass, it is true--many of which are of special interest. Perhaps
the one of greatest historical fame is the much battered copper bugle
on which it is said the signal was given for the fatal charge of the
Light Brigade at Balaclava, resulting so disastrously to that famous
regiment. There are some curious trophies of brass, too, which have
been brought home by our troops; one known as "Jingling Johnny" is of
special interest.
Tiny Curios.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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