Chartwell Antiques Roadshow

This week, we're the guests of the National Trust, who've invited the Roadshow to a country house

that was for over 40 years the home of an Englishman of many talents.

He was a prolific writer with 15 books to his name, some of them stretching to several volumes -

a body of work that earned him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953.

He was an artist, too, and this used to be his studio.

Picasso said he would have been a great painter if he hadn't concentrated on something else.

When he bought the house in 1922, it was in a bad state of repair,

so putting aside his fountain pen and paintbrush, our hero rolled up his sleeves and got stuck in,

helping to dredge the lake, mend the roof and build a garden wall.

Apparently, he could lay up to 90 bricks an hour and he was a member of the Building Workers' Union,

even though he was a prominent Conservative. Enough clues. You will have twigged.

The busy writer... the gifted artist...

and the part-time bricklayer were all facets of the great statesman Sir Winston Churchill.

Here at Chartwell, Mr Churchill and his wife Clementine

created a family home, which later became his sanctuary from Whitehall.

One of their favourite places to be was the elegant dining room with its breathtaking view of the Weald.

In the drawing room, where Winston and Clementine would break open the cards for a game of Bezique,

an ashtray holds the trademark cigar.

In the study, fortified by the occasional large brandy,

Churchill paced the floor until late at night, dictating books and speeches to devoted secretaries.

And so to today's Roadshow. To give things a Churchillian ring,

let's hope Chartwell's lawns will be spared a gathering storm

and that this will be at least one of our finest hours.

"Went to Dorchester in the morning, paid bills, etc.

"Talked to Mrs Huxtable, Major Butley and Mrs Cousins in the chemist.

"In the afternoon, T went to Talbothays to take Henry some cough mixture and I went to meet him."

-And so on and so forth. I am so excited by this! I mean, this is the second Mrs Hardy.

-Mrs Hardy.

-Thomas Hardy's second wife.

-Who was Florence Dugdale.

-Absolutely.

This is just so exciting! Does anybody know about this? Does the Hardy Society know about this?

No, no. It's just something I've had for about 20 years

and I've just had it in my drawer. I showed it to an English teacher at my daughter's school.

-And they patted you on the head and said, "Well done!"

-They said it was very interesting.

-I doubt anybody knows this exists.

-No.

-An incredibly exciting find.

-How did you get it?

-I inherited it about 20 years ago from my sister,

who was a book collector. And I have things in drawers, like a lot of us do,

and get it out from time to time.

-Well, I can't say this is great literature.

-No!

-But it does show a side of Thomas Hardy...

"Irritable and rather a scene with TH..." Thomas Hardy.

"Felt I could not bear any more of this writing about his lovemaking at St Juliet's with EH". Emma Hardy.

-Quite remarkable, isn't it, really?

-Mm, yes, it certainly is.

-1917.

-They were married in 1914.

-Yes.

-But I suspect she knew what sort of man he was before she married him.

-He was considerably older.

-Yes, and irritable.

-Yes.

-Absolutely.

It is just an amazing find and to find it here, you know, in cosmopolitan Chartwell

-is quite remarkable.

-Good.

-It's full of super little bits of information.

-From financial bits to others as well.

-Yes.

-Oh, how can we put a value on it?!

-I don't think you can, can you?

Well, as it's new to the world of literature and nobody has seen it,

certainly not for 50 years or so,

um...

-it's got to be worth in excess of £10,000.

-Oh, my goodness me!

Goodness me!

Now, this is the landscape that Churchill loved,

the landscape that the Battle of Britain was fought over and so many people fought for and died for.

And one of the great reminders of that battle, and of the war years, and of the importance of Biggin Hill

-is this fantastic name board. Now, why is it here? How is it here?

-Yes, well...

my parents had the White Hart at Brasted and the pilots used to come down from Biggin Hill

-during the war and they adopted it, really, as their second mess.

-What is this, incidentally?

It was a blackout screen. Group Captain Grice was leaving Biggin Hill - he'd been the CO -

-and they had a farewell party for him at the White Hart.

-Yes.

During the evening, he said to my mother that he would love to leave some memento.

And she suggested that perhaps he would like to sign his name on what was a blackout screen

-in front of the bar doors to stop the light going out.

-The light, yes.

So he wrote his name...

and the pilots that were there at the time, they all signed their signatures on the screen.

-And so this started a tradition.

-It started from there.

-It's no longer in the bar, is it?

-No, it's not.

For the last ten years, it's been at our local museum in Shoreham in Kent.

So it's in the right place in the sense it's in the heart of the battle - Shoreham Aviation Museum.

-Some of the names are so famous.

-Yes.

You've got Al Deere, "Sailor" Malan,

-Bob Stanford Tuck, Kingcome again, who was one of the COs.

-Yes.

-Johnny Johnson...

-Yes.

-Every name of that period that was associated with Biggin Hill.

I think it's amazing. This is such a powerful, evocative thing.

-It's something like 52 signatures on the board.

-52.

-Of those, 33 are Battle of Britain pilots.

Well, it is an extraordinary document.

Against the rules of the Roadshow, I don't think I can value it!

-No.

-This is something that actually is priceless, in the true meaning of the word.

-Yes.

-It's beyond value.

-It is absolutely beyond value.

-Yes.

-Thank you very much.

Well, we live in Graham Sutherland's house. We've lived there for the past four years.

I've known the house for years, since I was a young girl,

and I used to see him painting in his studio. I loved the house.

And, um...people jokingly said, "Have you found anything of his under the floorboards?"

I said no. But yesterday, we actually had our cold-water tank renewed.

-Right!

-In the attic.

It was done while I was out and the rubbish was all put outside the back door.

There was a piece of paper... wrapped round this piece of card

and it actually had Graham Sutherland's name and address on the front.

What did you think when you took it out? What was your reaction to it?

-I was quite excited.

-And did you believe it was by Graham Sutherland?

-Well, yes! I mean, living in his house...

-It had to be.

-Yes.

And I don't think there would be any doubt that it is a work by Sutherland.

It's wild and rather unfinished and it's not resolved,

but this is the artist working, this is the artist's mind.

Why it was cast to one side... Perhaps he was unhappy with it,

or it was just one which was put on one side and not used in the final versions.

But the bonus on this, of course, is that we have something on the other side. Also, it does help

that it says here "Study, Head of Christ, 1945",

which we must take as a useful and correct pointer. But I wonder what the subject is.

-I know you've only had it 24 hours...

-Yes.

..and it's a bit unfair, but I just wondered if you had any particular ideas about it.

-Not really.

-Well, interestingly,

it's here on the front of the very book which you actually brought.

-Here it's called...

-Oh, yes!

-Palm Palissades,

a completed painting from 1947.

And I don't think there can be much doubt that these three stems here are associated with the design,

so if they aren't actually studies for these pictures, they are symbols and components of pictures,

which he's worked out in ideas which then were transformed and put into the finished paintings.

And let's turn back to the Head Of Christ, which we have here. I would have thought its value is...

somewhere in the region of between £3,000 and £5,000.

-Have you a licence for that, sir?

-I've got a bit of paper here says it's legal.

-You need that for the congregation?

-Yeah, they get unruly!

-I see!

-This is a delightful water carrier. How do you come to have it?

-Well, it was in my father's family.

It was always hanging in the hall in his home

and the house was bombed in the war and some years later,

my father asked his brother-in-law had he got the "fish".

-And it was in the shed - green, totally green!

-Gosh!

So my uncle had it cleaned and it was given back to my father.

-Well, we can see that it has a hole at the top where the water goes in.

-Yes.

-Where the stopper is.

The water travels through the dolphin

and at the bottom you have this brass tap in the shape of a fishtail.

-And when you lift it, the water comes out and goes down into the scallop bowl underneath.

-Yes.

Absolutely delightful!

It was probably made in France. These were very popular in France towards the end of the 19th century.

-It's in beautiful condition. Who polishes it?

-My father used to.

-You polish it, do you?

-Yes!

-..Your mother does! Well, it's lovely - brass and copper.

-As far as the value goes, I like it because it's a quirky item.

-Yes.

And unusual. I suspect, if this came up at auction,

-it would probably fetch between £400 and £600.

-Gosh! As much as that?!

What is fascinating about these is, in fact, that they're incredibly old.

-And they were actually made, believe it or not, in 1834.

-Really?!

Now, you look at these and they're very up-to-date, aren't they?

Almost like something you would buy in a designer sunglass shop.

But, in fact, they're made of silver

and that's how I can date them. They're hallmarked.

How do you come to have them?

Well, really, it was just at a jumble sale.

-And my son had asked me to look at the jumble sale...

-Yes.

-..for a cut-throat razor,

because he was going to be doing medicine and wanted it to dissect.

-And, of course, I went and he described that the cut-throat razor would be in a cardboard box.

-Right.

And that's where we come to this.

And I just put my hand forward and thought that might be the cut-throat razor box.

-And there was this fantastic pair of glasses.

-Quite!

This is a card case, which really is very period. You can tell this is of the period of the glasses.

They're stylish, made of a good material

-and, I think, worth every penny of £200 to £300 at auction.

-Really? That's wonderful!

-A very good jumble-sale buy.

-Yes, very good! Thank you very much.

Well, the sun's blazing away. What's in this box?

My goodness! Look at that. Wowee!

-I can't imagine diamonds looking more scintillating.

-They're lovely.

-Does it get worn?

-No, I'm afraid not.

-I think the last time it really saw light of day was at my daughter's wedding.

-Oh, lovely.

-Light of day it's certainly getting, isn't it?

-Yes, it is beautiful.

Well, it's a very beautiful Victorian cross. I'm using a lens

to see the purity of the diamonds and to look at the way they're cut.

Several have been in earlier pieces of jewellery.

-Oh, I see, yes.

-Which is perfectly normal. They're fantastically pure white diamonds.

-They're a joy to see, actually.

-Yes.

And when I ran the glass over the front,

-one of them here has got a blueish tinge.

-I can see that now, yes.

-Have you ever thought about the origins of the diamonds at all?

-No. All we know

is that it was given to my wife's great-grandmother by her husband on their wedding day

and we calculate that at about the mid-1850s.

Well, I'd say that's absolutely bang on for the setting. It's backed in gold, fronted with silver.

It would've been worn in candlelight where the oxidisation of the silver -

well, it's the action of SULPHUR in the air that turns it black -

is less important as ONLY the scintillation of the stones will be seen at an evening reception.

-Who turned it into a brooch?

-My mother-in-law, unfortunately.

We were thinking of removing this and making the top swivel

-as it should.

-It would be very nice, because then it would swing freely.

That's the right thing to do. This is like ugly replacement windows in old houses.

Sweep them all away, get back to what it was and it'll free it up enormously.

It's a lovely, lovely thing and hugely desirable, I think.

-Probably - what shall we say? - £5,000 for insurance today.

-Golly!

It's in a class of what was called metamorphic furniture.

Very popular in the beginning of the 19th century. And this design was patented

in about 1810-1811 by the firm of Morgan and Sanders

in England and it's exactly this design.

-We've got drawings.

-Yes.

-And it was illustrated in 1811 in Ackerman's Repository.

-How very interesting!

-And this one is even more interesting than that,

because on the treads, the risers,

you have the candle and the little book, which is absolutely delightful and relates to library usage.

I think I might just close it up. We've seen that aspect of it.

And you can see how it works at the side as well...

how it fits very neatly into the overall shape of the chair.

And just turn it round so you can see the lines of it again.

Queen Charlotte had one of these chairs in her model villa.

-You can see it in an illustration, a little watercolour of the time, about 1816.

-Oh, how marvellous!

But when you look at this chair, I get very confused,

because there's the things relating to the Morgan and Sanders design,

-but what you've got here is inlay.

-Yes.

-Floral inlay,

which ISN'T characteristic of Regency. So you must think again.

Is this, in fact, an English chair?

There are a number of things that suggest that maybe it isn't English.

-The little moulding along the top.

-Yes.

-And these very tight scrolls

in the arms there, which all point towards Holland.

-I always thought it was possibly Dutch.

-It's very interesting

that you've possibly got here a patented English design

maybe being made in Holland, where this kind of inlay was still extremely popular in the early 19C.

There's a problem in terms of value,

because there are a lot of these metamorphic library steps around

and they vary in quality and they vary in value. I would say you're looking at perhaps...

-£4,000 to £5,000.

-Really? Yes, yes.

-That sort of area.

-It came from my mother's effects.

-Yeah.

She did various house sales and auctions during the '50s and '60s.

So it appeared in the home and you don't really take any notice of things that turn up!

-You don't know anything about this?

-Nothing at all.

-It's fascinating.

This opens up a whole channel of interest for me,

because it purports to be Italian maiolica.

It probably IS Italian maiolica. But what is so interesting about it...

The shape of the dish, before we move on, is called a crespina.

-Right.

-It's based on a piece of Italian 16th-century metalwork.

That's why it's scalloped. But the design on it is a biblical design

and it's reminiscent, to me anyway, of the Bible of Jean de Tourne,

which was published in Lyon in France

-from around 1554, and there were several versions of it done, with engravings by Bernard Saloman.

-Right.

And this is a well-known group.

The figures are all very elongated, typically mannerist in style,

and the subject taken from a biblical story of Joseph.

I think this IS Joseph with his coat here.

And when you turn it over, you've got "guisep" on the back.

At first I thought this is the artist, Giuseppe,

but I think this is probably Joseph, ie, what's going on on the front.

The Bible was the source of this and there is a similar dish attributed to Lyon

in the British Museum, dated 1582.

Very similar types of figures, similar kind of flaws, and so on.

And the date of the dish, I would put into 1570-1580.

This makes this a very, very interesting dish indeed.

With a little bit of cleaning up - putting the foot back on, having it restored - you're looking at...

-certainly between £7,000 and £10,000 for it.

-Are you? Really? That's very interesting, yes.

-It's a very exciting dish.

-Good!

It's a Soviet-made sub-machine gun, PPSH41.

They started making them during the Siege of Leningrad. It's rather a nice thing to have.

Usually they're seen with the drum magazine in situ, but it's easier to carry it around with it.

This is another drum mag in here and I think - or I'm told -

-that that is a genuine pouch from some Soviet soldier or other.

-Right.

It was used by the Russians and Germans in their thousands.

-And in the film Cross Of Iron, you see James Coburn running around with one.

-Oh, right!

-It's got the old Soviet button on here.

-Yes.

-The hammer and sickle.

-A jolly nice thing. And - I must ask you - deactivated?

-Oh, yes.

So it's officially deactivated, so you cannot...

-All you can do with it is hit someone on the head with it.

-Fair enough!

-Should you feel so inclined.

Now, the 64 question, what is a vicar doing with a semi-automatic weapon?!

I've always had an interest in things military. I found this and said, "I'll have a bit of history!"

Something like that today is worth a few hundred pounds, so they're not very expensive, are they?

-No.

-So a lot of deactivated weapons you can still pick up £100 plus.

But you can go up to about £300 or £400.

-It's Albert Winney Finney.

-Albert Winney Finney.

I mean, Winston Churchill depicted in a number of pottery guises

and this one is gorgeous, a really juicy little figure. Gorgeous.

-And I think there he is as the First Sea Lord?

-Why not? Of course.

-Very nice object.

-Where's it made?

-Doulton.

Worth anything, do you reckon?

-Well, I've never seen this particular model before.

-Mm.

-So it's difficult to say, but I'd guess it's going to be £100-£200, something in that region.

-Mm.

I seldom see nice quality French clocks on the Roadshow. Is this one of a kind?

-I've another one.

-Smaller?

-No, bigger.

-Which you didn't want to bring.

-No, it's too heavy.

-This is the better one.

It's a lovely clock. Has it been in the family for long?

Yes, it was my great grandfather's. It's rather strange, he was a deserter from the French army,

and he left France in a hurry, came to this country. How he got these over we don't know!

-What sort of date?

-Around 1870.

The clock's date is 50 or 60 years earlier, about 1815.

It is lovely quality.

It's particularly nice because it shows the various arts.

You've got this selection of brushes here, and other bits and pieces

that demonstrate the typical arts of the piece.

These two musical instruments on either side,

and here this lovely cart and plough being pulled by oxen.

I particularly like this plaque here,

standing in the middle, this lovely artist's model.

Then, little cherubs painting and drawing him.

Here you're got a chap playing a pipe and he's got a lyre down here,

then there's a sculptor at work there. It's a very pacifying clock.

Looking at the dial, have you spotted the deliberate mistake?

-Yes...

-The number six?

-My brother put that in there.

-Did he break the original?

-When we moved it was lost.

-Right.

It's a shame because it's got the old Roman V, which is a five.

He probably found it in an antique shop and thought it better than nothing.

Probably, and at least it's not an eyesore being blank.

The proportions are lovely, as you'd expect for late French Empire.

Quick look round at the movements, you've obviously removed a pendulum.

Silk suspension, just what you'd expect.

It's very delicate. The hook is half the thickness of a needle.

They're very thin, those pendulums.

-So something was whizzed across...

-Somehow!

-..under strange circumstances.

Yes. His father was the mayor of Paris so I expect he helped.

Cos he brought furniture as well.

-Any thoughts on price?

-Well, in 1916, my grandfather was offered £100 for it,

-by a jeweller.

-1916?

-Yes, I remember that!

Well, that was a lot of money then! A tremendous amount of money then.

-You could buy two houses for that!

-Almost! You couldn't now, sadly.

In top retail condition at a good antiques fair,

somebody would ask £4,000-£4,500.

Little bit short of two houses, but nevertheless a nice thing.

She's absolutely wonderful. She's got all her original clothes.

Someone has looked after her so well.

Either your mother or grandmother must have really cherished her.

It's strange that a gentleman should own a doll.

Well, I take it you don't play with her.

Well, um, she's French.

She's made of bisque which is, as you know, unglazed porcelain.

But the interesting thing is we call them swivel head dolls,

or fashionable dolls, because they were made to wear the costume of the day

and this would have been around 1860, so...

-definitely your grandmother's.

-Oh, I see, yeah.

It could well have been imported into England after the Great Exhibition of 1851

and...imported, actually, without any clothes on...

and then the clothes might have been made in England.

She's got all her lovely underwear

and the boots - which are wonderful, heeled leather boots - have a mark underneath which is a T.

I think it's a T for Terrene, which also was a doll maker and made clothes in Paris.

-She is very French.

-She's all wonderfully original.

-My mother must have been careful with her.

-She MUST have been. And you've had her tucked away in a box?

-Oh, yes, in a cabinet, yeah.

-For insurance,

-you should be insuring her for £3,000.

-Amazing!

-I know.

-It's actually my mother's. She was given it 50 years next year as a wedding present.

-Does she use it?

-No, I don't think so.

-Why not?

-It just sits on the side.

-It's been very well looked after.

-So you've no idea about it?

-When she was given it,

there was a note inside saying something to do with George III, that's all. That's all she knows.

Well, it is indeed George III and it's a really nice quality,

a really nice silver coffee pot. It's very typical Adam design,

because he designed everything, not just the furniture he's famous for,

usually everything in the house including the doorknobs and silver.

It's got these very typical swags and tassels and festoons

and beautifully bright, engraved

little cartouche here with the monogram of the original owner.

And a nice cast spout

with this beading and leaf finial here and the same motif on the corner.

It's got the date letter D, which is the London mark for 1779.

-Gosh.

-Then it's got the leopard's head for London,

the lion for sterling

and it's got a triple maker's mark

which is the London silversmiths Carter, Smith and Sharp.

They always made particularly nice silver

and this is really a lovely coffee pot. Nice, solid and elegant.

Beautifully looked after, if I may say so, for the last 50 years.

-Do you think you'll inherit this?

-I hope so.

The value for insurance of a coffee pot like this today,

-I would say, is somewhere between £3,500 and £4,000.

-Right.

-Thank you for bringing it.

-That's all right.

-Would you be upset if I told you this was a souvenir?

-It might well be.

-I don't know where it came from. It was just sitting in the bank, really.

-Amazing.

Well, originally, it came from Rome

and is the sort of object that would have been brought back

by a first-class grand tourist visiting Rome.

It's perfectly obvious that it's a Roman ruin, at least an Italian ruin,

but what tells us that this is a very grand souvenir

is that it's laid out in micro mosaic. Do you know this technique?

-No, I know nothing about it.

-Well, it's made up of tiny pieces of glass,

and some, perhaps, hard stones too, that are laid into a background minutely and very accurately.

-It's a sort of miracle of human craftsmanship.

-Tiny, little bits.

It refers back to the mosaics of ancient Rome, the Byzantine mosaics,

the Roman mosaics that such a man would go to visit.

He might have brought this back to a member of his family who had not had the pleasure of visiting Rome.

There's quite a lot of plate powder in the surface of it

which prevents us from understanding immediately that this is a rather ravishing gold box. Solid gold.

-I didn't know it was gold.

-Yes.

It's actually a very matt gold. Gold is very malleable material. You can push it around and engrave it

and texture it, and this is exactly what's happened here.

There are two marvellous neoclassical griffons.

It's lined with a band of enamel, echoing the enamel on the front.

-What about date - any thoughts, any ideas?

-I don't know.

I know really nothing about it. What would be put in it?

-It's a snuff box, notionally.

-Ah, right.

-Yeah.

-Because it's tiny, isn't it?

Snuff it is, and this is a very eloquent and beautiful example from about 1820.

-Now, having said that it was almost certainly bought in Rome, it's not made in Rome, it's Swiss.

-Really?

All they've done is incorporate a mosaic which does come from Rome.

It's hugely enviable. I think everybody behind us would love to run away with it.

Because of that, it's really quite a valuable object.

So...goodness, what shall we say?

-£15,000.

-Gracious.

I think it had better go back in the bank.

Perhaps I'll go with it.

Brilliant. Absolutely marvellous.

Here's an opportunity for me to make a fool of myself. I would have thought this was to do with cameras,

but, of course, I'm wrong. What is it?

It's a sort of semi-automatic mouth organ, harmonica, that works on the same principle as a pianola

with a roll of music. It's called a Rolmonica.

It's a harmonica, so there are reeds in there...

See if you can spot the tune.

Well, if only we could dance at the same time. Rosemarie, no doubt.

It's a car horn, isn't it?

It's the secret weapon in an oompah band. What do you call this?

That's what I came here to find out.

I have never seen these illustrated anywhere in any of the textbooks.

-It looks very experimental. That looks like a piece of...

-..Plumbing.

-Absolutely.

I can say with a fair degree of confidence that this is the oldest thing we shall see today.

How did you get it?

Well, my husband is a pavier and he was working on a building in Thames Street near London Bridge.

And they were shoring up the building, but they had to dig deep down. He found that and a jug,

-but unfortunately, he broke the jug.

-Oh, no!

-I think he hit it with the shovel.

He broke the jug and discarded it, and he brought that home, and he's had it 25 years.

-And do you know how old it is?

-No, no idea.

I think it's what might be termed Romano-British.

It probably dates from the second century AD, so it's about 1,800 years old.

-Oh, my goodness.

-And it's in a remarkable state of preservation.

And it's got a little spout at the front, and we can see where the potter pinched it to make that spout.

One of the most remarkable things about this is the price.

We read about statues of this period fetching hundreds of thousands, and sometimes millions of pounds.

This stoneware jar, 1,800 years old, near perfect condition,

-has a value of around £10.

-Oh.

Here's a fine fellow. Who is he?

-He was my grandfather. He was Lieutenant Colonel in the Oxfordshire Hussars.

-Really?

-Yes.

-There's his rank on his epaulets. You've got a crown and pip. That's his lieutenant-colonel's rank.

-Yes.

You've got to bear in mind that the Yeomanry regiments often used to vie regular cavalry regiments.

-Now, the very famous regiment was the 11th Hussars.

-Yes.

And they had cherry trousers, so the Oxford Hussars have adopted red trousers.

-It's a copy, you see?

-Yes.

Another sign of rank is the depth and the size on the cuffs.

So when this chap was on his horse, he was very impressive, and there was no mistaking who he was.

Let me have the pouch and belt there.

This fits across his breast,

and the pouch at the back.

And here you have the prickers.

Now, again, these are symbolic, because at the time your grandfather wore this,

they wouldn't have percussion or even flintlock pistols

to prick out the fouling at the touch holes.

I see that he's got the cipher here of Edward VII.

Let's talk about that plume. This is an egret-feather plume.

And these are vulture's feathers.

They're dyed, of course, but they're vulture feathers.

The fur is possibly from a bear...

Canadian.

But this is very nice because it's unspoilt.

No moth.

And it's just nice condition. So a collector of Oxfordshire Yeomanry,

-he would have to pay something like £3,000 today.

-Goodness.

But if you get two enthusiastic people, it could be more.

Unusual to find a nice Liverpool clock down here. Is it a recent acquisition?

No, it's been in the family going back through father,

grandfather, great-grandfather, and obviously originated in Liverpool where my predecessors were living.

-What sort of date do you associate with it?

-I think it's about 1790 - something like that.

-As far as I can determine.

-I think you're within five years.

-Am I?

Yes, I would have said sort of 1780-1785.

This chap, Harrison of Liverpool, is going to be Thomas Harrison.

And he was working from about 1770 to just after 1800.

-You don't have to be a clock enthusiast to think this is lovely quality.

-Yes.

You've got the moon, the moon dial here,

and then against this little nib here indicating the age of the moon.

-And this little motto's rather sweet.

-I think it's self-explanatory -

"Our time's uncertain date eternal hours depend".

Which means we have no control over how long we're on this Earth for.

You're absolutely right. Typical Liverpool dial.

-This very nice crossing in the centre, and a concentric date.

-Yes.

Which is very typical for a north country clock.

It's a handsome dial. It's a very handsome clock.

The hood is just exactly what you'd expect -

nice free-standing pilasters and all this blind fretwork here.

A lovely flame-mahogany trunk door,

and then - I have to say from there on down it goes very wrong.

-Have you had that restored at all?

-No.

-Well, it's not quite right. I have to be honest.

-Oh.

And looking down in there, you can see a lot of new wood,

The backboard doesn't go the whole way down to the floor.

Assuming there was a little bit of work done on the base, you would be paying...

-£9,000, £10,000, perhaps £11,000.

-Really?

It is a lovely piece.

It was given to my husband to throw away about seven years ago.

He brought it home and it's been living in our shed ever since.

It would have been in, probably, in an imperial household in China.

This has actually got...

the imperial marks of the Emperor Wan-Li.

He reigned from 1573 to 1619,

so this is 16th century, this particular...within that period.

And there are very similar pieces in China in major collections there.

And it's not, as you can see, terribly well made.

It's got a lot of what we call glaze crawl here.

There's little holes in the glaze, which is typical of the end of the Ming dynasty.

And if you look, you can see at the side of the pot, there's a seam round here.

Because Chinese porcelain was made, at this time, in sections.

In fact, I'll rip off the neck.

If you look at it, you can see it is made in sections.

And this comes apart and sits in there quite nicely.

So that tells us all about this piece.

I love it, because it's a very satisfying shape.

It's a melon-type shape and it's got all the symbols you associate with Chinese culture.

You've got dragons on the side, symbolising the emperor.

You've got the phoenix, this strange bird here,

that symbolises the empress, Feng-Huang.

But what we look for is the colour of the glaze. It's very bluish.

This colour is not white. This is typical of late-Ming porcelain.

And the very fact it's made in sections is again characteristic.

So this is a genuine Ming piece with the imperial marks on it.

Because it's come adrift here, that's probably devalued it.

I imagine, in perfect condition, this would be £6,000 to £8,000.

With this coming adrift here, maybe £3,000 to £4,000.

-Wow.

-So there you go.

-So I need to get it mended?

-Oh, yes.

-Lovely. Thank you very much.

-Thank you.

-Thank you.

I don't think we've ever had a Gainsborough portrait. I may be wrong as we go back some 25 years.

But I'm sure this is what this portrait is.

What's the story behind the picture and your family? Is the painting connected with your family?

It belonged to my grandmother, Catherine Calveley, and she married into my family.

Right, so it's come down to you by descent?

Yes, my grandmother left it to my brother and he gave it to me.

How nice. It's a charming portrait.

Condition is a problem and I think we'll have a look at that in detail.

But I think these wonderfully sensitive eyes and slightly pursed lips are beautifully expressed.

But you can see these shadows where the actual ground is coming through,

because it wouldn't have been painted directly onto the canvas.

There would have been a ground colour put in.

On the forehead, you can see this larger area of paint, where it's more robust, remaining,

but these are thinnesses. Then we come on to the dress.

This is painted with great vitality.

This is all Gainsborough's rapid painting.

This is painted with really quite heavy paint.

It's been cleaned a number of times.

It would have taken probably the glazes and the more delicate paints away,

while this more robust paint has been preserved in greater relief.

But we have to consider also the date of the painting.

I imagine that it was probably painted in the early-Bath period.

He went there - left Suffolk in 1759.

But I would imagine that it was painted in 1760 or 1762.

Well, value-wise, if it had been in wonderful condition,

we could talk of a value of £100,000 or even £200,000.

I don't know what you think, but I think that quite a modest figure on this would be £15,000,

possibly £20,000, and I think for insurance it should be £25,000.

If anywhere should be haunted, it's Chartwell.

Several people have said to me that they felt a presence as if the great man was still in charge.

And as far as the show is concerned, it's cigars and victory signs.

But for now, from Sir Winston Churchill's garden in Kent, the Garden of England, goodbye.