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It was very interesting to watch the DNW auction yesterday and in particular the sale of the medals to the CIV. Despite their number, the prices were consistent throughout the sale with single QSAs selling for hammer prices around the £190 mark. Medals to the reinforcement draft or those invalided home early commanded similar prices to those men who saw out the whole campaign. Groups containing Great War medals tended to go for just a little more with out of the ordinary groups commanding higher prices.

Jack Webb put together a collection of CIV medals and militaria the like of which we are unlikely ever to see again.

As a medal collector, to be quite honest, it is a regiment that I have never bothered with, although, very significant as far as the Anglo Boer War goes, I can certainly see the attraction for so many.

Of all the clerks, accountants, labourers, storekeepers, prospectors and grooms who volunteered for service in the Boer War, from the UK, Canada, India, Sri Lanka, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, the CIV are by far the most celebrated and disproportionately so.

Yes, they do seem to have had much of the limelight, at the time it was always "gentlemen" serving in the rank and file as though it had never happened before, I suppose there is a degree of truth in that, given the relatively short time in which they were formed and the numbers involved.
Although, I have never felt that I really needed to have even a single recipient in the past, perhaps I should buy one?

And of course the City of London was the center of the Press World at the time and had a lot of coverage as I am sure that a number of the different news outlets had staff who served as members..... Just think wat it would have been like with Twitter.... LOL

Mike

My finger hovered over the "Bid" button on a number of occasions, then I remembered how all my recent, Covid-19 period purchases, are cluttering up my son's study in London, and thought better of it.

I consoled myself with the thought that I have an officers group to the CIV with WWI medals to boot, along with his wife's RRC Nursing group, and moved swiftly on...

Regards

Rpry