Bridgend Antiques Roadshow

The Antiques Roadshow has responded to the promise

of a welcome in the hillside.

We've come to Wales, to Bridgend,

a thriving town in Mid Glamorgan halfway between Cardiff and Swansea.

The Welsh version of the town's name is Penybont-ar-Ogwr.

The Ogwr being the river that flows under this 15th-century bridge.

Above Bridgend is one of a trio of fortresses the Normans erected to protect their border from the Welsh.

They underestimated Prince Owain Glyndwr

who besieged all three river crossings and did particular damage to this one - Newcastle.

Famous sons of Bridgend have been a diverse band of achievers.

There was Dr Richard Price, known as the father of life assurance.

Then there was Dr William Morgan who stumbled across the marvel of X-rays

many years before the official discovery in Germany.

And there was John Thomas, harpist to Queen Victoria, and the star of many an eisteddfod,

who, probably more than anyone, made the world aware of Welsh culture.

In the late 1800s, there was yet another invasion...

by people fleeing from deprivation and poverty in Northern Italy.

The Italians came with nothing apart from a readiness to work,

a spirit of enterprise and their cooking skills.

Boys sold custard ice cream from handcarts and the newcomers set up cafes with a welcoming atmosphere.

By the 1930s, there were more than 300 Italian cafes in Wales.

Most of them are still here - an indispensable part of the community. Salute.

Coffee from the old country is still imported to the Ogmore valley

where it's roasted and delivered to the trattorias, bringing a taste of la dolce vita to the Land of Song.

And it's time to say croeso, ben venuto, and a warm welcome to Bridgend Recreational Centre

and today's Antiques Roadshow.

It was given to my wife by an elderly neighbour

she always said that she remembers playing with it as a child with her governess.

-That explains some of the subsidence and structural damage.

-Yes.

The whole house is slightly ropey. Let's turn it round.

A fraction of the roof is missing and we've got cracks all the way round.

What a shame.

And some repairs. Well, I'm going to put that to one side.

Now, do you know the family names of the lady who originally owned this?

Er, she was a Miss Jones, daughter of a Reverend Jones.

What I really wanted you to say that she was "Miss Teapot"

-or "Miss Kettle".

-No.

Because that presumably is what the original artist - when painting the model - was referring to.

I think she must've been Miss Kettle.

This was done in 1833.

This is a pastille burner.

Around this time, people smoked heavily and they would have

-special ways of making the atmosphere smell sweetly afterwards.

-Right.

And they'd have a pastille burner. Usually they are about this size.

This is the biggest cottage pastille burner I've ever seen.

There would have been something in the middle...?

They put pastilles - little tablets...

-They were burned?

-They were burned and they would infuse the air through the open windows

and usually through the chimneys.

It was almost certainly made in Staffordshire.

This is pearl ware, bluey glazed pearl ware.

Um...

I suppose a pastille burner collector would want to own this,

-simply to say, "Have you seen a bigger one?"

-Yes.

I'm going to put a valuation on it for somewhere in the region of...

-£2,000 to £3,000.

-Goodness gracious.

Well, it is such a rare object.

MUSICAL BOX TUNE PLAYS

That was the unmistakable sound of a slightly distressed disc musical box.

Now, tell me your family relationship with it.

It was given to me about five years ago by an elderly neighbour and it was his grandfather's before him.

-Oh, lovely! So it had been something much treasured in his family.

-Yes.

Well, let's have a look. It's a very simple box,

probably pine which has been finished with a transfer print or a decoration

to make it look like rosewood, it isn't actually rosewood.

So it would have been quite a cheap thing to produce and made by a company called Symphonium,

a German company that made a lot of these disc musical boxes and, in date, between about 1900 and 1910.

But what that makes it special is the bit that I'm hiding here...this.

When that goes on the top,

it changes it from being a standard small disc musical box

into something much more entertaining - an automaton.

Let's just get it going.

TUNE PLAYS

-Oh, it's great, isn't it?

-Yes.

If it just had its little disc, and didn't have this extra piece on the top,

it's a box that might be worth perhaps a couple of hundred, £300,

but this puts it into a completely different price category.

Terribly popular in America and all over Europe people collect them,

and it means that a box like this today is going to be worth

between about £1,000 and £1,500.

TUNE PLAYS

My husband bought it for me in 1960 as a wedding anniversary present.

-I was moaning I didn't have a desk and he did.

-Well, you have a desk!

He said it was a travelling companion so that when we went away,

I could do my thank-you letters,

-then, when it's turned over, I could darn his socks.

-Absolutely.

Well, if you open it, I have no doubt that we have a sewing compartment inside.

Absolutely beautiful.

These writing desks, are really little bit of English social history.

They were first made around the beginning of the 19th century

and they were really conceived for officers and their families when travelling abroad.

This piece probably dates to around 1900,

so it's at the further end of the history of this sort of campaign writing tables.

-Campaign?

-Yes.

-Ah, right.

-They were used when people were living under canvas.

-Yes.

They tried to have as many home comforts as they could.

You've got a lovely original green morocco interior,

pouches for envelopes, for letters, for stamps,

a blotter,

a little inkwell, something to probably hold quill pens.

On the reverse, you have compartments for your sewing equipment.

And there were firms like Shawbreads,

the Army and Navy Stores, Barker, who were in New Bond Street,

and they specialised in this sort of furniture and this is going to be made by one of those makers.

It's a very nice. Are we able to discuss prices if this was...?

-It was bought in 1960 from an antique shop in Cardiff.

-Yes.

It wouldn't have cost an awful lot, I would have thought probably about £10 to £15. But it was 1960.

Well, I think today it's a very desirable piece

that somebody with an interest in military history might well like to have in their collection,

-so I would put a valuation of nearer £1,000 on it.

-Really? That's fine.

It belonged to my great-great-great grandfather, who was a member of the Royal College of Surgeons.

He was with Wellington and he also fought at the Battle of New Orleans,

where General Packenham was killed.

Right.

I believe it's about 1825

and he was serving at the time in Corfu.

Right. Oh, well, that's lovely to have all that background.

The regiment itself is the 18th Regiment of Foot, which was the Royal Irish Regiment,

so a very good regiment of the time,

one of the lower numbers in the serial numbers of the British Army

and this type of tunic, it's known as a long-tailed coatee.

And here we... here we see the reason for it.

In the period that you mentioned, when he was in the Peninsula War, he wouldn't have worn this tunic.

-No.

-He would have worn a short-tailed coatee,

and then after the Napoleonic Wars, this type of tunic was adopted.

In fact, it went on to 1855.

The only thing that stopped this type of coatee being worn

was the severe winter in the Crimea in 1854-55.

They actually went to war in the Crimea, dressed like toy soldiers, all this splendour,

and they were decimated through disease and a severe winter,

so this coatee, as I say, had a life up until 1855.

But I would place this... I believe you said, didn't you? 1825.

Well, 1825-30, around that time. Has he got anything in his pocket?

-Did you know there was a pocket there?

-No, I didn't know.

No. You never know, I might have found a sovereign!

Anyway, these coatees do not survive, there are so few about.

Regimental museums have got their own examples usually,

but it's not often you see them

and to be in the same family, this is wonderful.

Now, if this was put into auction,

I feel that it would fetch something in the region of £1,500.

-Does that surprise you?

-I thought it was a couple of hundred pounds.

-Really?

-Yes.

-Oh, well, then, that's good news.

This is what we ought to see - Welsh Pottery, made by Dylan and Co.

-Are you a collector?

-Yes, yes.

And are all the pieces coming out - are these all going to be Welsh?

That's what I want to find out.

This is marked Nantgarw which is nice to see, should be incredibly white.

It is very white when you hold it up to the light.

-It's also very heavily potted.

-Very heavy, yes.

-Very heavy for Nantgarw.

-That's a nice one, I think.

-So, you've got a complete mixture.

You've got pottery from Swansea, porcelain from Swansea, Nantgarw.

-Which of these is your favourite?

-Um...

-This one.

-Yeah, I like this one, too.

Probably made sometime around the 1830s with a ship that is somewhat older.

It's probably 30 or 40 years out of date, but it's a lovely thing.

In Wales, I can see that in a shop window with a price of £150 on it,

-so at auction, you might be lucky to get as much as £100 for it.

-I see.

-We've had the magnifying glass on it.

-On the signature?

-Yes.

And everybody thought, "We know about antiques..." Nobody knows.

-It's David Woodlock.

-David Woodlock.

He's a Liverpool artist.

-That's right.

-And I didn't have to look at the signature.

-Well, I asked you to.

-Because I knew exactly who it was by.

-Right.

Basically, he's a painter around the turn of the century and later.

Woodlock has...

this wonderfully decorative style,

a woven tapestry of colour in a way.

That's right, which amazed me, it being so old, that it still has that richness of colour in.

All the richness of the reds and the blues is there.

And it's a wonderful thing.

-I think it's worth £2,500 to £3,500, maybe a bit more.

-Lovely, lovely!

-It's very, very pretty.

-I think it could make more. It could make...

-£2,500?!

-..on a good day, up to £5,000.

-But I would say £2,500 to £3,500 seems like a reasonable valuation.

-Excellent! Thank you very much.

It was my grandmother's and it came down to me when she died.

She used it every day in the days when the milk was delivered on a wagon

and you went out with your jug and the milk poured in from a measure.

-Oh, yes, so this was the jug?

-That was the jug.

-So it was in daily use.

There's a mark on the bottom which is a GB. Does that mean anything to you?

No. Not a thing.

This was painted by a lady called Grace Barnsley

who was a member of the Barnsley furniture family in Chipping Camden in the Cotswolds, in that area...

-You're looking worried.

-No, it's just that I moved here from Cirencester

-and Barnsley is just down the road.

-Yes.

Well, in that case it must have been bought in that area.

In the 1920s, Wedgwood was an avant-garde firm.

They reintroduced hand decorating for their table wares,

and Grace, who knew Tom Wedgwood, was encouraged to do some decorating,

so she got Wedgwood blanks and developed her own patterns,

working under the guidance of artists like Millicent Taplin who were in charge of the hand-decorating girls.

She made a range of things, which all have this lovely decorative quality, lovely colours,

lovely soft brush work, and her things became quite collectable,

-because of the Barnsley connection. Now, do you think it has any value?

-No, I wouldn't think so.

-Just a pretty thing?

-Yeah, I would say an everyday...

-Well, how about £150?

Very nice!

I've often seen silk merchants' sample books with prices in, but this one is extremely strange.

Not only is it entirely hand-written in French, "principes de fabrique" there,

but it also has - which I think is unusual - all the instructions about how to make this stuff,

so this is in fact the trade secrets which is quite incredible, and it is a most wonderful volume

because it has not only - as I say - all the samples in,

but actually notices here of all the things that you do to make it.

-Where did it come from?

-I think my great-great grandfather was a silk merchant in Spital Square, London.

I think it was probably about the 1840s or something like that. He probably started the business.

I acquired it from my father when he died and it's been in the family as far as I know ever since.

I love this. This is so bright. It's been in this book, this book dates from about 1850, I would have said.

But it's so bright and so wonderful, and to see the big watercolour plan here of the silk,

and then to see it actually made up into these tiny little samples.

-It really is just wonderful, and they're so bright, I mean just...

-They are.

-..lovely, very exciting.

And, as I was saying, the unusual thing is he tells you how to make it.

"Systeme de la mechanique a la Jacquard," and here it all is.

-It's the famous loom, isn't it?

-Yes. It's unusual to see how to do this.

Yes, late 19th century, everybody would have known how to make it,

but I can't see that in the mid-19th century that everybody would have known how to make this sort of silk.

I'm delighted that you brought it in. I'm going to put a value on it

-of £2,000.

-£2,000, you reckon.

-And I think probably any museum

would be fascinated to have it and to see what's going on in here.

-I've had it about 45 years.

-Yes.

-And I acquired it then.

-I used to use it in my younger days.

-Yes.

But haven't used it for years. I've just kept it in the drawer.

-But you never considered that it was unusual?

-No, I didn't.

Leica made a camera called the Leica One in 1931 and they produced very, very few

and they were called the Luxus range.

Luxus meant that they were a very luxurious camera.

They were finished with snakeskin.

They were gilded and they had very ornate crocodile cases. Now, hold your breath,

because one of those some years ago sold for £30,000 at auction.

Now, what is very interesting about this is that it's got a pretty early serial number, 88840.

Now, that to me, is a Leica Two. That is 1932 for this particular model.

-Right.

-A standard Leica Two has a black body

-and I have to be quite frank with you, I've never seen one with a gilded body like this.

-Oh.

That makes this a particularly interesting camera. These cameras are faked a great deal.

I've seen some very good fakes in Eastern Europe.

Now, this one is not in very good condition

and if someone was faking a camera, they wouldn't go to the trouble of producing all this wear on it.

-Yes.

-Now the other thing is

if we detach the lens from the front of this camera, which unscrews,

the copies have a sprocket inside

which is generally square, but the real ones have a circular sprocket.

And if I look inside it, it has a circular sprocket, we can see that.

So there is no doubt in my mind that this camera is absolutely correct in every respect.

It's difficult for me to put a price on this because Leica collectors, they're a law unto themselves.

They look for things that are interesting and different.

A black-body version of this camera is just worth a few hundred pounds,

-but I think I can tentatively put an auction price of £3,000 to £5,000 on this camera.

-Really? Gosh.

-I would hope that it would do that and better.

-That is a surprise.

I didn't realise it was worth that.

Well, if only these artefacts could talk. Is this something that's been in your family?

Yes, it's been passed down several generations.

-It is a box of tricks when you open it up, isn't it?

-And it's heavy.

-Yes.

-It must have been all over the world, I suppose.

-I think it has.

This is something that every grand gentleman or lady would perhaps take around with them.

-Look. I love that.

-There's monogrammed envelopes in there...

Isn't that terrific?

-..from my gran's mum's brother.

-Yeah.

-Yes.

-And even little silver mounts on the leather writing slide.

-Yes.

-Really quite magnificent, the way it's put together.

-I mean, it is a myriad of objects in here, isn't it?

-Mm-mm.

And they've got absolutely something for every occasion, but mostly for personal hygiene I suppose, isn't it?

-Yes.

-Um, wonderful glass and silver bottles, silver mounted.

This one, in particular, is great

because it has scent at one end and cologne at the other.

You can unscrew the cap.

And beautifully ridged swirled glass and it's very, very carefully made

-so that everything is airtight.

-Yes.

-Wonderful.

It's hallmarked. It's 1886 so getting on for 115 years old, aren't we?

-Yes.

-The little inkwell.

-The travelling inkwell with some kind of...

-Absolutely.

-..cork above it.

-It needs obviously to be liquid tight.

-Yes.

Really terrific. They're quite difficult things to value

-because there's so much amongst the objects.

-Yes.

And there are people who collect scent bottles in particular

who might cry out just for that.

-One would be expecting, I suppose, probably £300 somebody might pay for that.

-Just for the one bottle?

-They are particularly sought after.

-Gracious me.

I think that we would, in an auction today,

probably estimate something in the region of £1,500 - £2,000.

-Gracious. Really?

-Quite a... quite a grouping of things.

Well, these are by Allen Jones and you knew him?

Absolutely, yes, I met him in London in 1959. I was a neighbour of Allen's and then we became friends.

Good, and this was done, I assume, when he was at Hornsea.

-Yes.

-Studying with Alan Braund. Do you like this print?

Not really, no, I don't, actually, because when Allen completed this,

I just couldn't see what he was painting and then he explained to me

the window was open in his bedroom and there was white net curtains just fluttering in the breeze

and that's how he could see his garden through his window.

-Interesting, because I wouldn't look at it that way.

-Yes.

-I just feel this great vortex of wind.

-Yes.

-The face is part of the garden in a way.

-Yes.

So, he goes from Hornsea School of Art, where this was painted, to the Royal College.

-This is a Royal College picture?

-Yes.

And there's a reason why I assume that, because he then entered the revolution that was going on,

which had been Peter Blake to start with, with Pop Art and when he was there it was David Hockney and Kitaj

and there was a feeling of Hockney here in this face, and Kitaj,

and he's grasping at new languages and trying to express himself,

so I look at these both as seed pictures

because his revolution was different,

his revolution was the communication...

the two-dimensional communication -

the strongest and most popular form of communication, which in a way is the poster. What do you think of it?

Um...I just...

I think it just jumps out at you, as you said. It's a poster, isn't it?

It's so different, and I just think it's wonderful. I just love that.

How do you translate this? Or you don't?

-I've always assumed that was Allen's face.

-Right. Could be anything, couldn't it?

-I think it's Allen's face.

-Do you? I think it's a rhythm of bodies.

-No, I think it's Allen's face.

-Right.

I've always thought that.

So there you go. Anyway, it's wonderful.

Now, the interesting thing about this - not from your point of view

because these are personal possessions - but from the general public's point of view,

here is a very important figure in the history of art since the war,

and people say there's nothing to collect,

but a poster like this is only worth £300 or £400.

You can buy an Allen Jones, so I think it's a wonderful area to buy.

A great Allen Jones, for instance, is only £4,000.

-Mmm.

-And I'm sure it's not going to last, but here is a wonderful area.

I don't think one would necessarily find such early ones as this,

but they would be just a few hundred pounds if you did. It's exciting.

-What does it say on the top here?

-I'm not very good at reading Welsh.

"Tarian Goffa Iorwerth Glyndwr John."

A shield in memory of Iorwerth Glyndwr John.

-And who was that?

-We don't know.

-Where does it come from originally?

This is the first copy of the original shield that was found in the Thames a long, long time ago.

And they used it for the Eisteddfod prizegiving.

The reason we have it is that my mother-in-law's father was a choirmaster back in the '20s,

and the choir that he was with won the National Eisteddfod four times in six years.

-Ah! And this is the arts we're talking about?

-Oh, yes.

About 20 years ago, my daughter knocked it and broke it,

so I took it to Bristol and they repaired it

and said that it was an interesting piece,

-so it's back hanging up again.

-Good,

because it deserves to be hanging.

The maker is Berge of London,

and it says "late Ramsden". Now, that is Matthew Berge,

who took over Jesse Ramsden's business in 1800.

Ramsden was one of the finest instrument makers in London,

and the premises was in Piccadilly and this man died in 1819.

From the style of the barometer,

I would say it was from the first few years of the 19th century,

-just after 1800.

-Hmm!

Now, it is a silvered scale,

it is the bow-fronted type of barometer with flame mahogany -

you can see it here, you've got that lovely long thermometer tube

in Fahrenheit and Reaumur,

and then down here, the cistern cover is an ebony urn,

and, on these canted corners here, little ebony inlays.

It is as good as you will find.

So for a barometer just after 1800, what sort of figure do you reckon?

-I don't know.

-Right.

This man is one of the finest makers

and these bow-fronted stick barometers have zoomed over the last five years on the market.

At auction now this would make at least...

£7,000, at least,

and would retail with a barometer specialist probably around £12,000.

-So...

-Oh!

Yes. Mmm. Right.

When I was a little girl, if I was very good, I was allowed to wear this on St David's Day.

-Very suitable.

-It's been in my grandmother's family, I don't know how long for.

-This is quite an early one, isn't it? Your grandmother's family?

-Yes.

-This is sealskin...

-Sealskin, is it?

-Yeah.

It's a very traditional style and certainly like a Victorian one.

-Any idea about their value?

-No, no.

Victorian ones are very collectable and very desirable,

even in this condition. It could be as much as £600 or £800.

-You're joking.

-No, no. They're very rare things to find.

I believe it's made of oak.

It's come to me via my mother and aunt and uncle,

-originally from the west of England.

-The first thing I should tell you -

-it's not oak.

-Oh.

-It is, in fact, true ebony.

It's a very dense wood and that accounts for its weight.

Have you any idea where it was made?

-None at all.

-Well, for many years,

particularly in the 19th century,

they were believed to date from the period of Charles I

and to be English.

They were much admired by collectors in the 18th and 19th century,

and, in particular, Eliza Ashmole, whose collection formed the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford,

owned these chairs which were published in the early 19th century

as being from the time of Charles II. In fact, we now know differently.

They're, in fact, made in Ceylon

and date probably to the... 18th century

and some of them date to the 19th century. This one, I am sure, is an 18th-century example.

If you look at the carving on the back,

it's actually very, very beautifully carved, low relief,

but very much in an Oriental taste,

it's got a very Eastern flavour -

the way the flowers are done, the way the leaves are carved.

And these heads - although they're trying to depict Western figures, they've got an Oriental feel to them.

And so these are carved by people in the East trying to imitate the look of Western figures.

And if we turn it round,

it's also very, very beautifully carved on the back,

these turned spindles, which again relate to early English furniture,

so it's quite understandable why people believed them to be that.

-Is it something you've had valued or given any thought to?

-I've never had it valued. I've often thought...

-I really should find out more about it.

-Mmm.

One's probably looking at a figure of something like £5,000 for one chair.

It's a very, very good example.

This is Welsh porcelain as good as it comes. Are you a collector?

I am. My wife and I have been collecting for 20 years.

And these are choice pieces indeed.

Two different Welsh factories - two pieces of Nantgarw,

and this one here - Swansea. And this one...

one feels the factory is struggling because it's got no gold edge.

-I was attracted to that one purely for the decoration - very elegant.

-Yes, it is elegant.

I'm looking at these flowers here and see the hand of William Billingsley.

-Had you thought about the artist?

-I hadn't.

-Not Billingsley, anyway.

-But attributing the artists is tricky.

What matters is the style which is so classic.

This has the Swansea mark on the back,

so decorated at the factory, but never finished off.

It looks naked without the gold edge,

-but that gives a lightness which is really wonderful.

-Yes.

And two pieces, though with very different decoration, from Nantgarw.

Really superb porcelain made there - such difficult material to make -

a lot of it so beautiful, they sent it to London for painting.

And here we've got London decoration at its best. What is that?

A Virginia quail, I believe.

Oh, it tells us there, "Virginian Quail",

and one can just see the mark tucked in there - Nantgarw CW - China Works.

And the decoration here - London work rather than decorated at Nantgarw,

but stunning, isn't it?

And this one - that looks good painting...

-Incredible detail.

-Fantastic.

-Every inch of it smothered.

-Yes.

-All those flowers - they're so real.

-Yes. Many hours gone into that.

-I think it's superb.

-This is really magnificent London painting

and that reminds me of the finest Derby or George Complan,

a Derby painter of fruit. The detail is incredible

and that gold is all done by hand.

It looks so perfect. How on earth can anyone do that quality?

Splendid pieces.

So we know that they're good, quite expensive pieces too.

Yes, they were, yes.

-Do you know much about their values? You bought them recently?

-No.

They were bought between 8 and 10 years ago from a dealer in Swansea.

The market's been rising steadily

because people do realise how good they are.

-This is nice being Swansea decorated, although the lack of gold will reduce the value a little.

-Right.

A cracking plate...

-£2,000 today.

-Really? Oh, thank you.

Nantgarw plates are generally more expensive,

and a London-decorated plate like this, with a named bird...

-ooh, £3,200 - £3,500.

-Wow! Yeah.

-Hopefully, they're going up.

-More than I expected.

-Going up.

And how do you value a plate that's so nice? Um, let's guess...

-£5,000?

-..Really?

-Where do you get a better one than that?

-You won't.

This red chalk drawing of what appears to be a military gentleman

is inscribed - not signed, in my opinion, but inscribed - Lancret.

Now, tell me what you feel about the drawing and a little bit about it.

Well, the...drawing has been in my possession for 40 years or so.

It was given to me by my father, who took it from a portfolio given to him by his brother, an art dealer.

-Right.

-So that's the background.

I believe that you're right that the signature doesn't match the drawing,

-but what I'd like to know is who actually did it.

-Yes, well,

I'm not absolutely convinced I'm going to be able to tell you.

But it's interesting this question of whether it actually could be English

or whether it could be French and I think that is one of the things that we must consider.

Now, Lancret was a pupil of Gillot and a fellow pupil with Watteau,

who was probably the greatest figure draughtsman in 18th-century France,

but really...the style of Lancret is much more sophisticated.

Um...sometimes there was a kind of ease and facility about his work

which doesn't appear in this drawing.

The hands, the foreshortening here, is a bit inadequate,

so perhaps it's not, after all, by an absolutely top-flight artist.

One of the people who I consider it might be by - and I'm saying MIGHT,

because it's as far as I can get just now -

is William Hoare who, funnily enough, went to Bath like Gainsborough,

but he was a few years earlier, and he did numerous portrait drawings.

Now, before we talk about the price, in an oblique light,

there is a suspicion of a watermark - a shield.

It would have been good if we'd got the whole watermark and seen whether it was a French or an English paper,

but I suspect that it's a Dutch paper which both the French and the English would have used, anyway!

So the only thing one could have been sure of is that it's a certain date,

but probably wouldn't have indicated who did the drawing.

If it's by somebody like Hoare of Bath - I'm not saying it is -

the value, I'm afraid, will be much less than if it was by Lancret.

If it was by Lancret, we'd be talking about tens of thousands of pounds,

even though he was an imitator of Watteau. As Hoare of Bath,

-around £1,500 to £2,000 would be a fair figure for it.

-Thank you.

-That's most helpful.

-Good.

This belongs to a club I'm a member of.

-It's called Ye Pirates Club...

-Ah.

-..in Porthcawl.

I think it would have been given to the club - it was formed in 1928 -

-I would think within ten years of its founding.

-Oh, this is great.

"On Chile's coast my death I found,

"Killed by the Harriet's jovial crew.

"My body is in the barrels bound, My teeth exposed to view.

"My race 'tis true have often died And cherished many a sinner.

"My flesh was partly boiled and fried And made a Christmas dinner."

The last two lines are...appropriate to what's caught on Christmas Eve!

-First of all, it's a sperm whale tooth, but you knew that.

-Yes.

It's got a lovely colour, and the thing about whalers

and whaling ships is that it was a real entrepreneur's,

a real sort of adventurer's type of ship.

Incredible risks were taken and incredible fortunes could be made,

because the actual, you know, whale oil, one has to remember,

was the equivalent of petrol. It powered everything. It was heating, it was lighting,

it was the prime energy source for the home.

Now, the ship Harriet - and this is very interesting - the ship Harriet

was built in 1810 and was registered in New York.

However, in the 19th century, round about this time,

there was a nice little bit of trade embargo going on, with the Brits,

and the Brits started putting, um... not exactly an embargo,

but they put restrictions on whale oil coming from American whalers.

So what did the American whalers do?

Some of them came across the Atlantic

and re-housed themselves in the British whaling ports,

so you can see that these sort of circuitous routes to get past laws

have been going on for ages. We've got here,

"South Seaman" and the captain, James Jones.

It's registered that the captain was a Mr Jones and the owner was a Mr Riley, so we know all about the boat,

which is great.

The other interesting thing here is the date - 1821.

It's very, very early for a tooth to be dated 1821.

There's a whole series of teeth produced by an American whaling ship called the ship Susan,

dating from around 1827,

-and it's very unusual to have anything dated from before that.

-Is that so?

So, all in all, I think you've got a very interesting -

and, I have to say, historically important - piece of scrimshaw here.

What's it going to be worth?

Well, there's no documentary evidence to support the fact

that this was off the coast of Chile in 1821, but why disbelieve it?

Everything about the tooth feels right -

the patina, the type of writing here,

everything about it feels good, so I am not doubting it at all,

and I think you should insure it, or Ye Pirates should insure it

for about £10,000.

-Goodness gracious! I know they all say that, but we thought £2,000.

-No.

-It's a lot more.

-It's fantastic.

-You looked it up?

-Yeah.

-Now, how did you look it up?

-It's got a sign underneath that I thought was important.

-Right.

-So what did you find out?

-That it was the Dutch India Company

that used that insignia on their porcelain and that it was...

-You've done your homework.

-A bit.

-I can't tell you anything about this.

-OK, I'm going to ask you to pronounce what that stands for.

-No idea.

-It says VOC...

-Right.

..which you quite rightly say is the insignia of the Dutch East Company,

which, if you'll forgive my Dutch, is Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie.

-Oh, right.

-The United East India Company.

And it is an insignia which a lot of people collect,

whether it's on porcelain or on metalware,

guns even carried the same insignia, it was a very important monogram.

-How did it get to you?

-I bought a box of china in an auction 10 years ago

because I wanted a particular teapot - I collect Denby ware -

and this was in the bottom, and I washed it and looked at it

and I offered it to my niece, who refused it because it was chipped,

and I said, "Fine, I'll keep it." It's sat on my bookcase ever since.

-What's the maximum you've ever paid for a piece of Denby ware?

-Oh, £10.

-£10?

-Yes.

-So this is an also-ran.

-Yes, yes.

-This is a bonus?

-It was £4 for the box, yeah.

-£4.

-So anything I tell you that this is worth will be...a plus?

-Got to be.

Well, let me tell you about the shape - a wine-bottle shape,

and then this decoration along the edge is called octopus scroll or caracusa scroll.

-It is, sadly, damaged.

-Yeah.

-You've got all this chipping round the edge

-and you've got chipping around the sides.

-Yes.

-You've dated it?

-No.

I couldn't - I'd no idea.

-OK, well this dates to about 1680 or 1690.

-Never!

-Really?

-Yeah.

Wow!

And badly chipped, it's sadly only going to be worth somewhere around...

-£1,500.

-You're joking.

-£1,500?

-Yeah.

-Wow! My grandsons will have their new surfboards!

SHE CHUCKLES

Pretty well the whole of Bridgend came to the Roadshow. It's been an astonishing turnout.

Thanks to everyone for showing us their treasures and for letting us share their memories.

From Wales, goodbye.

Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd