Episode 16 Priceless Antiques Roadshow

We've heard some tall tales over the years on the Antiques Roadshow, but a man who rides pigs bareback?

That's an odd one, but it's true,

which is why it qualifies to be included in this collection of Priceless Antiques Roadshow.

Hello again. It's funny how our attitude

to an object can change in an instant.

Earlier this year, a man showed me an ordinary lemon squeezer.

Rather boring, I thought.

I was about to walk away when he told me it once belonged to Marilyn Monroe. That got me interested!

In this episode, standby to witness some remarkable objects with cracking claims to fame.

That's the most staggering story. I'm holding Buffalo Bill's gauntlet.

Every image... The classic image of Buffalo Bill

-is of him in his hat with these great gauntlets.

-That's right.

It's part of his trademark.

We revisit a moment in history that still casts a shadow, even today.

Gruesome, but at the same time, I have to say, rather fascinating.

These are all slaves that were actually sold and the names of the people who actually bought them.

And two Roadshow experts hit the road in search of magical jewels.

-But this doesn't smell of anything to me.

-So what is it?

-Gosh, it's gold.

-Yeah.

Oh! That is amazing.

I can hear you asking, where does the pig fit into all that?

Well, you're about to find out.

We love a good story on the Antiques Roadshow,

and no more so than one about an object which comes with the lure of a famous owner.

Here from our archives, a handful of legendary moments

when even the experts couldn't quite believe what they were hearing.

Our first unusual item turned up in the most surprising of places.

Hilary Kay certainly couldn't believe her eyes when she

unwrapped the gloves of famous Wild West showman Buffalo Bill

when the Antiques Roadshow visited Norfolk.

I love a parcel, and I love a parcel that has got a treasure in it.

Rather a dilapidated and dirty treasure, I'm afraid.

I don't know, these look pretty good to me.

The Buffalo Bill gloves that came into Holkham were spectacular.

To find a bit of what looks like North American Indian beadwork

here in the middle of Norfolk does slightly surprise me.

-Who went over to America to get these?

-Nobody.

My grandfather, who I don't think ever went to America in his life, was very into animals and what have you.

He went off to see the Wild West show run by Buffalo Bill

and he was presented with these by Buffalo Bill.

I don't know which Wild West show it was, it was a long time ago.

The story then unfolded with the lady owner talking about

her grandfather who had actually acquired these gloves from Buffalo Bill's Wild West show.

That's the most staggering story.

So, I am holding Buffalo Bill's gauntlet?

-Yes.

-Every image... The classic image of Bill Cody, Buffalo Bill,

is of him in his hat with these great gauntlets on.

-That's right.

-It's part of his trademark, isn't it?

-That's right.

Now, he came over, Buffalo Bill, he brought his show over in 1887,

and he set up a proper Wild West encampment.

-He did.

-I wonder how your grandfather actually met him.

Was he in the inner circle?

Not that I'm aware of, but he was very into animals and

he had this private zoo, and he probably, I'm assuming that he went

to the show to see what animals might be available.

Because, having brought them over from America it's much cheaper not to have to take them back again.

Because, probably, Buffalo Bill was only too keen to encourage

possible purchasers, he made this presentation as a sort of come on, so to speak.

That was one thing and then we delved into this extraordinary world of her grandfather.

This, to me, is the perfect Antiques Roadshow moment.

You have an object and it sets you off

down wonderful tangents into completely unenvisaged

eccentricities, which culminated in a photograph of her grandfather's keeper riding a pig.

So your grandfather was an eccentric collector of animals of all types?

Very eccentric, yes. But he also liked them to be ridden.

-To be ridden?

-To be ridden.

-What, everything?

He used to get...

his keepers to ride everything. I have just brought one.

That's fantastic!

I don't think I have ever seen a pig being ridden before!

That is just dynamite. Is that him?

-No, it's one of the keepers.

-Oh, it's one of the keepers.

Well, I suppose the pig wouldn't let just anybody ride him, would it?!

-No!

-Well, the first thing to say is that beadwork of any description is terribly valuable

back in America, where it originated. That's obvious.

But if you combine that with the iconic status of someone

like Buffalo Bill, you are actually talking quite a lot of money here.

-I think we should start at £10,000.

-Right.

And maybe go up from there.

Right, thank you very much indeed.

Spectacular object, wonderful owner and a story that you couldn't make up.

Sometimes a document provides the evidence you need to pronounce a strange item authentic.

This was the case at an Antiques Roadshow in London a few years ago.

It was at Mansion House that Nelson's hair came in

and Wellington's hair came in.

"The Duke of Wellington begs Mr Diamond will come promptly

"and cut the Duke's hair on Wednesday at 11 o'clock."

The point about that was everyone will turn around and say,

"Well, there's enough hair from Wellington to stuff a sofa",

but what you need is the provenance to go with it. Now, who is Mr Diamond?

Mr Diamond was the husband of my great-great-grandfather's sister.

It's very complicated, but here is this wonderful card.

I assume he cut everybody's hair...

royalty and all sorts of people's hair like that?

Yes, I believe so. The Duke of Wellington, Princess Charlotte...

Yes, tremendous.

The actual document itself, the little calling card I suppose, the little advertisement,

was vital in one sense, but you could put the two together, the hair and the card,

and that is what we are looking for, those sort of provenances.

Here is what the Duke of Wellington's hair looks like. How can one describe it?

It is almost blonde, really, isn't it?

So often you see these little pieces of hair and they come in very tiny

little snippets, but that was, I would say, in quantity.

Mind you, he must have had an enormous amount of chance to

take famous hair, certainly if he clipped them every two months or so.

This, of course, is the great Nelson.

This is salt and pepper, which is precisely as Nelson's hair was supposed to be.

Have you any idea how much these pieces are worth?

I did have it valued some time ago for insurance purposes,

household insurance, and they said about £200 pounds.

-What, for them both?

-Yes.

Well, the Duke of Wellington, here, I reckon somewhere in the region of £500.

Nelson, well we are coming up to Nelson's bicentenary,

and any Nelson material is getting quite a lot of money.

I reckon that this piece would be worth £5,000.

Well, the reason people want to collect hair, the reason

people want to collect autographs, is that they want to feel

not exactly closer to somebody, but they want a relic.

People have always wanted relics, right the way from pilgrims and earlier,

have always wanted a little bit of something because it brings

them closer to the bravery, the gallantry, and in some ways

the excitement of the battlefield, if you can call it excitement.

# Robin Hood, Robin Hood Riding through the glen... #

It is always a challenge to be sure that an item with a claim to fame

is genuine, but at Renishaw Hall, our host for the day,

Sir Reresby Sitwell, was so convinced of his item's famous origins,

all Michael Aspel could do was agree.

Sir Reresby, this is claimed to be an original bow of Robin Hood.

How did it come into your possession?

My uncle bought it.

He remembered seeing the bow hanging in a neighbouring country house

about three miles from here, and he was rather intrigued to see it there.

50 years or more later it came up for sale.

The house had been broken up and among the contents was sold this bow,

which was bought by the principle of a local technical college.

He put it up for sale in the late '40s, early '50s, and my uncle attended the auction and it was

knocked down to him for the princely sum of £29.

But what makes you think that it actually is the genuine article?

I didn't think I would be holding Robin Hood's bow

in the Antiques Roadshow,

and I wasn't even sure I was holding it when I was holding it.

It's one of those times where people bring along these objects and give you this background and

you can't say, "Rubbish", or, "You just made that yourself", or "Somebody nicked it".

But, I mean, was this his bow?

I remember saying to him,

"Sir Reresby, where did you get this from?", and all that, but it did have a kind of provenance.

There were bits of ancient writing that proved that it was.

This document here, which goes with it, describes it as being given to Mr Bartlett by the owners

of Kirklees Priory, and legend has it that Robin Hood was taken ill there

and fled to Kirklees to his distant cousin for medication.

But she was a very naughty lady and she had a lover, sometimes known as Red Roger,

and they conspired to murder poor Robin.

Why they should want to murder Robin, I don't know,

so a hole was cut in him and he bled to death.

-That's a very sad end. How far could he actually fire an arrow?

-I don't know.

According to legend, he's supposed to have said,

"Where my last arrow lands, that's where I'd like to buried be."

Sir Reresby was so convinced that it was Robin Hood's bow that

if I had actually argued with him or said, "I simply do not believe

"this and I'm sure our experts will prove it nonsense", he would have cracked me over the head with it.

I didn't want to risk that so we have to play it straight.

And always the excuse is, "I'm not an expert, what do I know?".

Robin Hood's bow? I'm not sure Michael was convinced!

It all comes down to that word we hear a lot of on the Roadshow -

provenance. Irrefutable evidence that a piece can be tied directly to an owner or a maker.

There's one smart way of making that connection - by using your eyes.

Penny Brittain tells us now about an object that came her way almost by accident,

that proved on closer inspection to have much more to it.

I brought a very sweet, tactile little spoon

that I absolutely love, and I acquired it not for very much

money, simply because I love the way that the seed pod at the head just sort of drops out its seeds.

I just like using it at my breakfast table, into the jam.

Not that everybody obeys my rules, but it is the jam spoon.

I didn't think much of it, other than I liked it,

until I saw its big brother or sister in the Fitzwilliam Museum,

saw on the label that the big brother was made

by George Jensen and was dated about 1944, and I thought, "Good heavens, that looks just like mine!"

I rushed home, opened the drawer, got the spoon out, went to look for the marks with my

little loop, and saw it had JG and Sterling and Denmark

and realised it was by George Jensen.

Because I'm not a silver person and I don't normally look at silver,

I was really interested to know a bit more about George Jensen.

Anyway, he was Danish and a brilliant designer,

and I decided that if I was going to collect something, it had to have an intrinsic value to it.

I think in this day and age, when the market is so volatile, it is comforting to know that,

no matter what prices are doing, whether they are in or out of fashion,

you have actually got something

by a named designer that is universally collectable.

The Americans love George Jensen,

and it is made of silver so it has its latent value in there.

For my money, a piece of named silver that you can enjoy and use,

well frankly, you can't do better.

When our team of experts aren't on duty at Roadshows,

they love nothing more than ferreting about for new treasures.

Last year jewellery expert John Benjamin stumbled across

a collection of gems that made his pulse race.

Keen to share his find, he invited fellow Roadshow jewellery hound Jo Hardy to join him.

"Great", she said, "you take us there. I'll drive".

Interesting woman, Jo is.

She's something of a free spirit. One of life's more unusual people.

-Hi, John!

-I'm not getting on the back of that.

-Of this?

I'm not getting on the back of a motorbike.

You'll be fine, it's like sitting in an armchair.

Are you ready?

Don't worry, Jo Hardy is a highly experienced biker and,

with John safely on board, they set off to Smallhythe Place in Kent in search of some rather special gems.

Rather wonderful rustic and atmospheric house. Do you know who lived here?

-I've got no idea.

-Come round here and look at this painting.

-Do you recognise her?

-The face looks familiar. Who is she?

This is the house, for the last 30 years of her life, of Ellen Terry,

THE woman of the 19th century stage.

-Beautiful lady.

-Beautiful woman, wasn't she?

She was the ultimate Shakespearean actress.

She was the Judi Dench of her day, and she inhabited her role in a way that nobody else could.

This place is a veritable shrine to the woman's memory.

There is something particular that I want you to have a look at, so follow me and I'll take you there. Come on.

Fabulous.

Ellen Terry first trod the boards as a child in the 1850s,

and her career spanned many decades and myriad leading roles.

She established her name as a Shakespearean actress,

but also acted in plays by the likes of Shaw and Ibsen, and even ventured into film in her later years.

Today John and Jo are hunting through the precious collection at the house

for some gems befitting a leading lady.

Have a look through here. Would you like that in your bedroom?

Oh, my goodness! I like the outfit. I would like to see you in it, John.

I don't think it would have suited me! The primary reason we are here is just behind you.

Have a look at this.

These prize pieces from Ellen Terry's collection,

gathered over many years, have a strong theatrical story behind them.

Oh, fantastic.

Oh, that's amazing.

Let's have a little look inside.

-Yes, let's open it.

-Take that lid back carefully.

Fabulous. Am I allowed to pick them up?

Well...

I've got to dance, have I?

Well, let's put these on.

So, take your pick.

Can I pick one out?

Let's have a look.

-It's Mr. Shakespeare.

-Correct.

-Very appropriate, isn't it?

Shakespeare was fundamental to her whole life.

You know, she was the ultimate Shakespearean actress.

-Yes, absolutely.

-And the base of it?

The base of it... Purple.

We like purple.

Well, these have absolutely perfect inclusions inside the stone,

which are called tiger stripes, and that is very indicative of amethyst.

-Next?

-Next, OK. I think I'll pick out these earrings in their fitted box.

Good, I'm glad you selected those.

-Prime Victoriana, would you not agree?

-Absolutely.

I thought you would like the turquoise, the way they're set almost like Liquorice Allsorts.

Yes, it does! They do look like that.

-Little clusters like that.

-Well, turquoise was one of the oldest and first gemstones ever to be mined.

How far back does it go?

Gosh, thousands and thousands of years.

I'm going to move you on to what you must have seen winking in the corner there.

No, no, I've been waiting for you, John, to get your hands on this.

-There we are.

-Oh, look at that.

So... Take it out, go on.

And the fact that the clasp here has got its own special area.

A kind of cavity for it.

Look at this!

That's amazing.

-Come on down.

-That is amazing, amazing.

What is it made of?

What's it made of?

I have to give it a sniff test.

Why are you doing that?

Old habits die hard.

No, because gold doesn't smell.

But if it's silver gilt or silver, you will smell the tarnish smell.

Exactly. So?

But this doesn't smell of anything to me.

-So what is it?

-Gosh, so it's gold!

Oh! That is amazing.

It looks very heavy, doesn't it?

It does, yes. It is very deceiving because it is, in fact, quite light.

It is, isn't it? These long gold chains reached a peak of popularity in about 1830, 1835,

so this is George IV to William IV, but the key component

of the chain is quite clearly the clasp, which is fashioned as a hand.

If you don't mind me saying, the primary reason

why I wanted to get you down here to look at all this collection was to look at this one piece.

This is absolutely fabulous.

Look, it's got the different coloured metals.

It defies the imagination.

Can I just ask you to look at the clasp and look at the little tiny stone in the finger.

The green stone in the finger.

And, do you know, I think this might be an emerald.

You get symbols such as hands, hoops, hearts...

they're all examples of Georgian, William IV, Victorian, sentimentality.

So it is a sentimental motif. She was on the stage at the Lyceum Theatre...

thousands of people would queue up to go and see her in her various roles, whatever it may have been,

as Lady Macbeth,

Cordelia in King Lear, Ophelia...

If you imagine the potency of these people, now this is what is left.

It condenses down to all of this.

For me, and goodness me, Jo, I have seen a lot of chains, but for me,

I have never seen one quite of this distinction.

When you and I handle this piece of jewellery,

we are touching a piece of jewellery

that was originally owned by my heroine here, Ellen Terry.

They are lightning rods between then and now, and that means

they have a kind of potency about them

that somehow can sadly be lacking in more ostentatious modern jewellery.

There you are, there is Smallhythe, what did you think?

Brilliant, thank you so much for bringing me here.

Fantastic, I've really got a sense of this lady who was an amazing woman. A real gem of a place.

Well, it's been my pleasure. I'm so pleased to show this off to you.

-Oh, thank you.

-It is my gem too.

-I've got to go now. Are you going to come on the back of the beast?

-Your motorbike?

-My motorbike.

-No.

-No?

Those pieces tell us so much about another life and another time.

Sometimes objects arrive at Roadshows that remind us of darker periods in our history.

They can make uncomfortable viewing but, equally,

they serve as important reminders of years that shouldn't be forgotten.

The slave trade took place between the 16th and 19th centuries.

Fuelled by an insatiable demand for goods and labour, this period witnessed the trafficking

of African peoples to the Americas via European ports.

It is thought that between nine and twelve million people arrived in the New World in this way.

The facts and figures serve to remind us

of the brutality of this history.

For our experts,

objects like this also bear witness to an uncomfortable era.

It's not often you're going to see me doing miniatures on the Roadshow,

but there was this little group

of miniatures that had something special about it,

and they brought it to me.

My family had plantations

in Jamaica, Barbados, British Guiana and Suranam.

My husband, not to be outdone, searched around his family,

cousins and all,

and he outdid me with this beautiful, beautiful shield

of all his family, with relatives going back through the generations.

So, what we're looking at here is an assembly of miniatures

-that was assembled right at the end of the 18th century.

-That's right.

Just at a time when Jamaica and all the other West Indies were teetering towards abolition of the slave trade.

-That's right.

-It represents a very interesting period.

-Yes.

'Slavery does surface in a lot of what we do.'

I am interested in the slave trade because, of course,

it is an immensely important part of our history.

Many of the houses we go to simply wouldn't be there

if it hadn't been for the whole trading triangle between Africa, Britain and the West Indies.

So, it's something we have to face.

Now, we can't put a name to all of these miniature painters,

that would take some time, but we are able to identify three of them.

Gervase Spencer at the top,

this is Charles Jagger, and this is by Daniels of Bath and Plymouth.

Those are the three best.

Well, on the outside, of course, you have got this lovely family collection of lovely portraits,

of lovely people, who've stepped out of the lovely pages of Jane Austen.

But, behind it of course, once you start digging, you realise

that these people, this family, was actually based on,

or derived their wealth from, the slave trade.

Letters, diaries and historic documents regularly illuminate the past on the show,

but as Clive recalls, few can be as shocking as those

which set out in minute detail the terrible trade in human beings.

I have seen many ships' accounts and copy letter books,

for the most part they are terribly boring, but here,

what a gruesome tale unfolds when you actually read through these.

Gruesome, and at the same time, I have to say, rather fascinating.

These are all slaves that were actually sold,

and the names of the people who actually bought them down on this side here.

This is the most incredible account.

When I saw the ledger it certainly didn't give me any feelings

of the Pirates Of The Caribbean.

There was no joy in it at all, really.

It was just trafficking human flesh.

'It's a shock, I have to say.'

"The sale of 234 slaves imported in the ship Dalrimple.

"Pat Fairweather, Master, out of Africa."

He bought two men there at £40 each, £80, and so it goes on.

On to the following page, and this is 1778, don't forget, and the price here,

the sum total is £6906.

-That's a hell on lot of money.

-It is in those days.

Quite remarkable.

It was quite detailed and it had lists of slaves and how expensive they were.

'Strong men were fetching £100.' Tell me the history.

I understand that they were going to be destroyed

-and my father, approximately 50 years ago, rescued them, really.

-Where were they?

They were in an old farm building, as far as I understand it.

-I think he was clearing it out and someone was told just to burn them all.

-Yes.

Father managed to rescue just a few of them.

Just a few. The feeling in my water is that it is probably a very valuable collection.

I happen to feel shocked when I see a slavery inventory like that.

It brings it home to you in real terms what the slave trade was like.

That human beings could be trafficked in this way.

It just showed how unfair life was for these people.

A significant campaigner in the movement to end slavery came from a familiar name on the Roadshow,

porcelain manufacture Josiah Wedgwood.

Lars Tharp found evidence of his important influence in Wells.

"Am I not a man and a brother?"

And there is the figure of a kneeling slave.

"British and Foreign Anti-Slavery society".

-What an interesting object that is.

-Very interesting.

-How did it come to you?

In 1960 my mother bought a table from a friend of a friend who was moving into an old people's home.

She paid £5 for the table, which was a Victorian card table.

A beautiful table, she has still got it. That was in the drawer.

The little cameo that was discovered in the back of a piece of furniture was

an amazing discovery.

To me, if I found something like that I'll would have said,

"This is the valuable object, forget the piece of furniture."

Maybe rosewood with a steel cuff and then this lovely cameo.

Let's see whether it works.

Actually, it shows you just how finely carved that is.

This is an image I recognise from my ceramics background.

In 1787, Josiah Wedgwood, who was a prominent member of the Anti-Slavery Society,

commissioned one of his artists -

we think it was William Hackwood, a very, very talented carver of cameos -

to create a special medallion which shows a kneeling slave.

Well, the abolitionist cause,

the anti-slavery cause, began to get going in the 1780s.

Josiah Wedgwood was a prominent figure.

He was responsible for creating or commissioning one of his modellers to make the celebrated little cameo

which was then mass produced, which was then sold or given to people who

were like-minded, along with Wedgwood.

This was the way in which these prominent members of society,

one of the ways, in which they spread the word.

Wedgwood's own cameos, the seals on the back of envelopes.

This was the great and the good trying to convince the other

great and the good that slavery was a bad thing.

It took them almost two generations to achieve that.

This is an incredibly poignant piece of social history,

and for that reason it is going to be worth a lot more than your average cameo.

-I'm going to say it is worth somewhere in the region of £1,500 to £2,000.

-Really?

Well, the value is meaningless, really, because it'll go back in the drawer.

Lars Tharp unpicking a story that haunts us even today.

We are just about there for today's selection from the archives.

Join us tomorrow when we will bring you more memorable moments on Priceless Antiques Roadshow.

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