Rare World War One token turns up at Birmingham antiques fair

From Birmingham Mail: Rare World War One token turns up at Birmingham antiques fair
IT was a token gift from royalty designed to bring some festive cheer to soldiers serving at the front.

Now, nearly a century on, a rare cigarette tin which travelled to the trenches of the First World War has been snapped up by a collector at a Birmingham antiques fair. The metal tin, which was one of thousands sent to serving soldiers and sailors by Princess Mary to mark Christmas 1914, has been discovered with its contents intact.

It contains two perfectly preserved packets of cigarettes bearing the inscription “Her Royal Highness the Princess Mary’s Christmas Fund 1914”, along with a Christmas card.

The rare find was among an estimated 100,000 items at the Antiques for Everyone fair at the NEC, which started on Thursday and runs until tomorrow.

It was bought for the princessly sum of £100 by antiques enthusiast Duncan Phillips on the first day of the fair.

Duncan said: “When I saw it on the stand I thought it was too good to miss and I couldn’t resist.

“It is very, very rare to find one of these tins with all the contents inside, as the cigarettes would have usually been smoked.

“It has a Christmas feel to it to mark the festive season, but the fact it has cigarettes inside shows how attitudes to smoking have changed over the years.”

The only daughter of King George V and Queen Mary, Princess Mary was just 17 when war broke out in July 1914.

The teenage royal pledged to send a Christmas gift to “every soldier afloat and every sailor at the front” out of her own money, but when it became clear further cash was needed, she lent her name to a public fund.

Donations came flooding in to the fund, and tins were dispatched to the armed forces, which included a Christmas card. The card reads “With best wishes for a happy Christmas and a victorious new year.

“From the Princess Mary and friends at home.”