In 1914 Princess Mary, daughter of King George V and Queen Mary, decided that she wanted to send a Christmas gift to all British troops on active service on the Western Front. When it was shown to her that she couldn’t afford it, the idea was to have a publicly funded appeal to raise the money to do so which was so successful that, eventually, the gift was given to everyone in the British and Empire armed forces, including nurses. The gifts were presented in a very fetching brass tin and these tins eventually became known as Mary tins.
Now, through a combination of things I have developed an
interest in the First World War. For Christmas 2025 my younger brother bought
me a Mary tin. I absolutely love it. Even without the history behind it I think
it is a lovely object.
It does have an antecedent, in the shape of the chocolate
tins sent by Queen Victoria to British soldiers during the Boer War. Originally
Cadbury’s were commissioned, but being a quaker firm they were reluctant to be
involved with the war, and in the end the commission was shared by Cadburys, Frys
and Rowntree. Apparently you can work out which company made which by slight
differences on the box lid. There’s still a sizeable number of these tins in
existence but even a battered one that has lost most of its paint/enamel will
set you back a pretty penny.
You can see a basic similarity between the Boer War
chocolate tin and the 1914 Mary Tin. Both of them feature a cameo profile of
the titular donor.
I don’t know if the 17 year old Princess Mary was inspired
by her great grandmother’s gift some decade and a half earlier, but I can well
believe the girl’s sincerity in wanting to give the gift. She was gently
informed “Sorry, your Royal Highness, but you ain’t got enough lolly for that,
but never mind, we’ll get Joe and Josephine public to pay instead” or words to
the effect. A public appeal was launched that proved wildly successful, so much
so that the scheme was extended to include everyone in the Armed Forces. Mind
you, not everyone got these by Christmas 1914. The last were distributed as
late as 1920. The majority of them contained tobacco and cigarettes, but there
were a variety of different contents for non-smokers, nurses and Sikhs amongst
others. The tins were made of brass and this is one of the reasons why it took
so long for everyone to be given one. Brass was in short supply at times, for
example, the Lusitania was carrying tons of the stuff when it was sunk by a U
boat in 1915.
I think that the tin itself is a very desirable object and
I think a lot of the recipients did too considering how many of them are still
around. On the lid is an embossed design, which seems to owe something to art
nouveau. In the centre is the profile of the Princess, white there are 6
roundels in the border containing the names of allies Belgium, France, Russia,
Serbia, Montenegro and Japan.You can probably see from the photograph that my
tin seems to have been extensively polished over the years and this has rubbed
away and flattened out quite a bit of detail. But I like it tremendously.
Being the kind of person that I am, over the next few days
after Christmas I set out to find out as much as I could about the tins. One of
the things I discovered was that in 2014 the Daily Mail made a promotional
offer to their readers to provide a replica Mary tin – and a replica King’s
Shilling. I think they had to collect tokens or vouchers from the paper. I
immediately wondered just how good a replica they were. To cut a long story
short I found one for a reasonable price on ebay and bought it. Here it is
The first thing you notice about the replica is not something you can see in the photos. It’s the weight. The original is much heavier, and feels far more substantial. If anything the replica feels even lighter than the Old Holborn tobacco tins my father used to use. The detailing on the lid, the embossed design is cruder than the original. The Christmas 1914 lettering is smaller, and further down the lid too. As regards the insides:-
The lids are very different. The original opens flat while the replica only
opens through 90 degrees. The original‘s lid closes over the edges of the body
of the tin, while the replica lid has a deep edge that closes inside the edges
of the main body of the tin. In short, then, I don’t see any way you could
mistake the replica for original if you know anything about what the original
is like.
With my first reproduction tin I was messed around something rotten by Evri, the delivery company, so when it got to a fortnight after the original delivery date they gave me I was looking at alternatives in case it never did get delivered before my nerve snapped and I claimed a refund. Well, one of the reasonably priced alternatives I looked at obviously alerted the owner and he offered it to me at a reduction. The price was so good that I felt, hmm, I certainly didn’t mind having three boxes rather than 2, so I bought it. Then, the first one I ordered arrived. Here’s a photo of the three together.
So, the genuine Mary tin is in the middle. The one on top
is the last one to arrive, while the bottom one is the one that I wrote about
and photographed originally. So let’s take my original away for a moment:-
The embossing on the lids seems pretty much identical, but
of course there is one glaring difference. The top one seems much closer in
colour to my original while the bottom one seems more of a coppery or bronze
colour almost. There is one other even more obvious difference between the two
tins which you can’t see from the photo. Compare the bottoms of the three tins
:-
Yes, my first replica tin on the bottom does not have any
writing on it, while the top is stamped with the Daily Mail. I don’t know why.
There doesn’t appear to be any sign that the plain one has had anything done to
it to remove the writing so that someone could try to pass it off as an
original. Which I’m sure would be a forlorn attempt anyway because it doesn’t
require any expertise whatsoever to tell the difference between original and
replica. I guess its because they were made in different batches, and being
promotional items, nobody was that bothered about each replica being identical
to all of the others.
Well, there we are, original and 2 replicas. I thought that
was it. Only it wasn’t. You see, in the course of my research I found out about
a variation. This was clearly a reproduction, but instead of having the head of
Princess Mary embossed upon it, there is the date, 1914. I felt that this was
strange, but eventually I found a post on a forum that explained it. It said
that tins with 1914 were made as souvenirs of the Great War in the 1920s. The
change in the design was because the Crown forbade the use of the image of a
member of the Royal Family for commercial purposes. These were sold under the
name commemorative tins.
The 1914 tin I had seen was not from the 1920s, but
essentially a reproduction of one. So a reproduction of a reproduction. I
wouldn’t say that it was difficult to get hold of, but I could only find one
supplier. None to be found on ebay. Yes, of course I bought one.
It’s an interesting piece. I mean it’s clearly based on the design of the
original Mary tin. However some of the embossed writing is not there. Only the
lid seems to be brassed, and it has a darker, less shiny surface colour than the originals or the
Daily Mail reproductions. The lid is not attached by a hinge and its dimensions
are slightly larger than the others I have. The body of the tin has some kind
of matt black coating. It’s quite tactile actually, and it’s pretty heavy. If
anything I’d say it’s heavier than the original.
So there we are. Or are we?
Well not quite. In the course of finding out about the
reproduction Mary tins I came upon a post on an old internet forum that mentioned replicas made by the
Daily Mail and posh grocers, Fortnum and Mason's. I dived down this particular rabbit hole and
found out that in 2014 Fortnum and Mason’s in London had produced what I
believe is called a Tommy’s tin to commemorate the centenary of the original
Mary tins. Tins were gifted to all members of the Armed Forces serving in
Afghanistan. Based on photographs I found, the tin was very clearly based on
the Mary tin. It seems to have a helmeted head where Princess Mary’s was, and
instead of being flanked by two Ms, the head is flanked by F and M. I did find
one on ebay. This had the original contents, a mini pack of playing cards and
as a result the price was rather more than I was prepared to pay.
Eventually patience brought its reward and I was able to
buy an empty tin for about the same price as I paid for the first Daily Mail
replica.
It’s fair to say that the Fortnum and Mason’s Tommy's Tin is
a homage to the Mary tin rather than a reproduction like the Daily Mail tin.
The design is obviously inspired by the original – with the border work, and
the circular motif surrounded by laurels. Instead of the profile of Princess
Mary, or the date, the circular motif shows a helmeted head, possibly
Britannia. I’m not sure if this is specifically Fortnum’s logo or
not. This motif is flanked not by two capital M’s, but rather an F and an M, as
in Fortnum and Mason’s. There is no other writing on the tin where the original
said Imperium Britannica and the names of the UK’s allies. However, where the
original tin says ‘Christmas 1914’ the Fortnum and Mason’s tin says, in very
small writing ‘Tommy’s Tin 1914 – 2014’.Unlike the original or the Daily Mail
reproductions, the lid removes and isn't hinged, and you can see the embossing
from the back.
The size of the tin is similar in length to the original,
but it’s noticeably thinner. It is also much, much lighter, possibly even a bit
lighter than the Daily Mail replica. That’s not the only similarity between
them. The quality of the modelling and embossing on the Fortnum tin is
comparable to the Daily Mail tin and not as fine as the original. Well, Fortnum
and Mason’s were giving them to the Armed Forces so let’s not moan too much
about that.
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Top - F and M 2014
Tommy's Tin - bottom - original Mary Tin |
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Top F and M 2014
Tommy's Tin - bottom - Original Mary Tin |
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top - reproduction
commemorative tin - Middle - F and M 2014 Tommy's tin - |
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