I’ve got the set also and there is no 9th edition. Never noticed that before.

Putting on my archaeological hat for one more time.

Carbon dated ?

BWAAHAAHAA. :p

Presumably it confirmed that the paper was made in the last 100 years or so.

That touches on the difference between a cash-value driven collection and collector, or one actually genuinely interested in history and with a sense of the importance of maintaining the integrity of history.

Regards,

Good point James and from my experience there are collectors from both sides of that equation and many in the middle. Personally I collect both for the historic interest but also with an eye to the fact that desirable items always retain their value and therefore make a more interesting investment than boring old shares. However one must apply the same care to a purchase whether it be antiques or shares – lots of shearers out there 😀

That said, although investment is a consideration and if you are paying several or more thousands for artefacts then that must be a reasonable consideration, most collectors like myself got started for the historical sake and it was only when we realised the monetary cost that we got a financial wake up call.

My considerations when buying are roughly speaking –

1. Rarity,

2. Condition of the object, i.e. the better the condition the better the value, and

3. Historical interest.

But that is not a hierarchical list – because something which is of particularly important historical value may be in pretty rough condition, or it may be rare and desirable but also pretty rough condition wise. Often a pistol in top notch condition may be for that very same reason not of any great historical importance because it never saw use – you get my drift. The factors tend to vary with the artefact.

But coming back to the combat reports which are the subject, what I think we are seeing is “reports” with famous names atracting large figures because of the name. If it was a report signed by a pilot who did one op then got posted for LMF would it attract interest and therefore faking and the attendant high price – I think not. So the only defence for the validity and trustworthiness of the data base is to destroy the fakes before they corrupt the whole collection.

The much earlier discussions about Sky Type “S” paint and what colour it really was, suddenly seems far more interesting, although I suppose we could next discuss the weight of the paper and its watermarks?

And did you have that paint chip radiocarbon dated? 😀

But seriously, this discussion is rather important because we are dealing with the exposure of fakes.

The problem seems to come down to people buying things of which they have little understanding as physical artefacts which have physical features that a proper understanding of is necessary to determine their validity. That is crucial because if you have a series, which we appear to have here, of paper documents all of which have a similar foxing and age staining appearance then that is way beyond coincidence. The experienced collector would be looking at things like that, as well as typeface and signatures – in other words there are many physical features the presence or absence of which should ring alarm bells.

However a lot of these documents appear to be bought by enthusiasts who for some inexplicable reason trust the vendor. Now the vendor may not be a crook and in fact may just be an unwitting victim themselves but that’s why the term caveat emptor is so applicable – in the end it is the responsibility of the purchaser to check properly before handing over the money.

As an example – my main collecting interest is in antique firearms. During the late 1950s and later some enterprising American entrepreneurs realised there was a huge market for US Civil War pistols among shooters. So they sought to meet that demand with modern made replicas that worked like the real things but cost a fraction of the real thing. There was nothing wrong in that because from the beginning certain physical features were given subtle changes which an experienced collector would pick immediately, while “Made in Italy” and current Italian blackpowder proofs were stamped quite prominently on them. These shooting replicas are still produced and are very popular.

But many of the early ones are now nearly 50 years old and wear and tear from use has produced in them an appearance very similar to the Civil War originals. Some enterprising people are grinding off or weld filling the stamping and then giving these already worn pistols a little more aging and they are now turning up and being sold as originals. Now I can look at one and see the subtle frame shape changes that are there and irrespective of the rest of the faking done I can pick them for what they are. But inexperienced collectors or newcomers to the field are plonking down lots of money only to discover too late that they have bought a fake. They have a couple of choices, demand their money back if they can, put it down to experience, or find another newcomer and palm it off on them – and unfortunately it is the latter which seems to be the preferred choice.

Keeping fakes in circulation is the worst alternative because it lowers the attractiveness of the good, or as they say bad money drives out good money. We arrive at a situation where normal caveat emptor is replaced by more aggressive behaviour. That is not a desirable situation and apart for a few fakes for demonstration purposes my view is destroy them whenever they are found.

Very nice piece, Malcolm.

Is it just marked 43 Squadron….or named to a specific individual?

Will quite understand if you do not wish to divulge details or identity.

Andy Saunders

Here you are Andy –

Somewhere in the dim darks of my memory I think I have seen that on some French aircraft and it is their symbol for an ejection seat warning – Canadian aircraft have that bilingual requirement.

………and in the meantime here’s an image of the ultimate pou!

Very nice but it will never replace the death trap 😀

To me as I have stated before this is just tired old Cold War rhetoric – Poland may have come out of WW2 a loser however prior to the war she was not exactly lily-white herself. The process akin to ethnic cleansing directed at Germans after WW1 in some of the western parts of Poland and Poland’s quick grab of some Czechoslovakian territory after the occupation by Germany in early 1939 spring to mind.

We tend to see eastern European affairs through a slightly rosy western democratic haze, when in fact all of the eastern European countries were blithely absorbing, exterminating or just generally making life unpleasant for ethnic minorities for most of the period leading up to WW2. Germany and Russia just took it to a new level of brutality.

However to suggest that the West should have nuked Moscow because of Poland is just plain idiotic – we tend to forget that it was the Russian infantry who beat Germany and won WW2 in Europe for which we owe the millions and millions of Russians who died an eternal debt of gratitude. In comparison we just provided some, albeit, bloody sideshows and in reality we had at best only one bomb available which would have inflicted minimal damage on Moscow while the Russians had in place in Europe sufficient forces which they would have used to chase the Allies back to Canada in retaliation. To have risked that outcome over Poland is not only plain idiotic but would have been suicidal.

The Cold War has been over for 20 years – let the thing rest.