Gaunt London Cap Badges (again - Sorry)

[max7474]

http://www.bidwyze.com/lotno.asp
I don't know if any one has seen this badge in Bosleys but he is selling this Wiltshire JR Gaunt. London marked badge as an original from the 1950s. Raises an interesting question about the marking.

Link is only partially working but it is the wiltshire badge in military badges section.

[leigh kitchen]

It's another one I need but I'm not paying anywhere near that kind of price.

The Gaunt London marking would have officially ended 1980 with the closure of their London showroom, as we've discussed, a Gaunt marking is legitimate for a lot of badges of the era, but with the amount of usage by fakers & production of restrikes by Gaunt themselves is not a reassurance to see gaunt markings on these things.
At least it's a London & not a B'ham. Wonder if it's large or small lettering, deeply or lightly impressed?
I'll wait until I can hands on one for the same sort of price that I've been paying for these sort of badges - 5 or 6 quid.

[max7474]

It's another one I need but I'm not paying anywhere near that kind of price.

The Gaunt London marking would have officially ended 1980 with the closure of their London showroom, as we've discussed, a Gaunt marking is legitimate for a lot of badges of the era, but with the amount of usage by fakers & production of restrikes by Gaunt themselves is not a reassurance to see gaunt markings on these things.
At least it's a London & not a B'ham. Wonder if it's large or small lettering, deeply or lightly impressed?
I'll wait until I can hands on one for the same sort of price that I've been paying for these sort of badges - 5 or 6 quid.

As the regt ceased to exist in 1958 the company should not have made any after then but they may have restruck some in the 1970s to meet collectors needs and I know of no way of identifying these later copies.

[max7474]

As the regt ceased to exist in 1958 the company should not have made any after then but they may have restruck some in the 1970s to meet collectors needs and I know of no way of identifying these later copies.

On the subject of Gaunt B'ham I have some anodised badges with that stamping for units that ceased to exist in the 1960s so is it possible Gaunt were running 2 factories, one in london and one in b'ham at the same time. The Gaunt b'ham has definately been used on bad restrikes but also on a lot of high quality Yeomanry badges - the question is are these contemporary with the nunits who still existed in the 1960s up to the 68 reforms or not?

[leigh kitchen]

As the regt ceased to exist in 1958 the company should not have made any after then but they may have restruck some in the 1970s to meet collectors needs and I know of no way of identifying these later copies.

Accepted that the badges should'nt have been produced after the regiment ceased to exist, but is there any indication that by bearing the Gaunt London logo they were produced post 1958?
As an aside, K&K give the date sealed as 5/6/56, the date that the gold anodised version was sealed as 26/8/64.

Dates sealed don't always have any relevance to dates worn, & it is not unheard of for badges to have been sealed after a regiments disbandment / amalgamation.

I have'nt dug into this, but was the badge continued in use by the TA, as happened with some other units?

Gaunts did'nt have a London factory, they produced in Birmingham & as they had a London showroom they stamped some of the badges that they produced in Birmingham as Gaunts London for sale in the London showroom, & other badges as Gaunt Birmingham.
I visited this shop as a kid, ended up with a bronze SAS badge, not that I knew who they were (no manufacturers mark on the slider).
The showroom closed in 1980, after that no badges were produced as Gaunt London.

Any restrikes produced by Gaunt after 1980 should not have Gaunt London on them, as explained to me by Gaunts when I once 'phoned them, but as you say - did they produce some restrikes prior to 1980?

I'm not sure that the demand was there for such modern & at the time uninteresting badges in the 70's?

Collecting lore seems to accept that a lot of the yeomanry badges were produced by Gaunts at the relevant times, but agreed, how do we know that the yeomanry badge we're holding isn't a later Gaunt restrike.
I've been picking & choosing from a batch of different yeomanry badges lately, I've left some unpurchased because I "don't like" the Gaunt B'ham markings.

I wish that Gaunts would open their books so that collectors could know exactly what restrikes they've been churning out over the decades.
Then again it'd probably be too depressing.

[max7474]

I have'nt dug into this, but was the badge continued in use by the TA, as happened with some other units?.

Any idea when the Wiltshire Territorials were formed? 1968 or earlier. I think it is a safe bet to think the anodised were TA badges only.

[Billy B]

Does anyone have list of which Gaunt made badges were re-struck ?

[leigh kitchen]

Gaunts have, presumably, but I'm unaware of any available to collectors.

[Billy B]

Could you tell me if on any of the “real” Brit badges the sign Gaunt et. Is “fuzzy” or should it be sharp on all of them.

.

[leigh kitchen]

Hard to say, no doubt amongst the hundreds of thousands of badges Gaunt have produced there will be some fuzzy, mis-struck examples.

The markings on some of the more modern, including restrikes, tends to be quite light, not deeply impressed, & the lettering quite large, Birmingham often reduced to B'ham.

I should be more specific really, all this "quite" large, etc isn't exactly specific.