Can anyone please help me identify this pewter button?

VanitysBaby

VanitysBaby

Jr. Member
Oct 14, 2008
51
8
Bangor, Maine
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All Treasure Hunting

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What ever they are made from, they have a lot of flaws...I doubt if they are that old.

SS
 

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so, the older they are the more flawless they are? and everyone who made them made perfect buttons the first try? and people make reproductions of nothing? :icon_scratch:

i get so frustrated trying to identify stuff i forget it for a decade and just find more stuff. way more fun :P
 

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CRUSADER said:
I know it's possible, but don't they look odd to you?
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Yes, but so do many not so old buttons. I wouldn't want to guess either way because I know nothing about it. I just don't rule anything out when I don't know, unless it's very obvious.
 

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Iron Patch said:
Yes, but so do many not so old buttons. I wouldn't want to guess either way because I know nothing about it. I just don't rule anything out when I don't know, unless it's very obvious.
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Based on your knowledge it would be a safe guess.
 

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VanitysBaby said:
so, the older they are the more flawless they are? and everyone who made them made perfect buttons the first try? and people make reproductions of nothing? :icon_scratch:

i get so frustrated trying to identify stuff i forget it for a decade and just find more stuff. way more fun :P
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Who said repro's of nothing & why the frustration, you are getting free advice to enhance a sale. If you want to spent a lot of time finding what Regiment it's copying, then that's up to you, maybe someone on here will spend hours looking for you, but not me.
The point about flaw's is that the British Military would not accept buttons as poorly done as this. They would never get through Quality Control, no Queen wants her Crown so poorly modelled & no troop would want to parade in these. Specially as the closest matches are to the Guard Regiments like the Grenadier & Dragoon Guards. The button manufacturing in Birmingham & London with hundreds of year of making buttons behind them at this point would go out of business producing such poor examples. If you can find any other 1 piece lead-alloy or white metal Button from the late Victorian period that looks anything like this then we might have a good debate on our hands. I understand IP's point that there are thousands of buttons I haven't seen yet & not to rule out anything but if he saw a cob that looked wrong he would be the first to point it out. The button doesn't follow any of the normal conventions, so what does that leave, a very poorly done & extremely rare 'set' of buttons, or someone copying the style of existing ones with the wrong metal & wrong construction (like many of the repro's,some cast from the impression of a real buttons, hence the degraded detail). I know which side of the fence I'm on, & hang me later for it if I'm wrong, but I'm happy to put it out there.

Lastly, there are many deliberately done poor copies which were fashion buttons. Most of them have the same traits, they look British Military/Coat of Arms but have some obivious flaws.
Is this a Roman Coin?
 

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i get frustrated when it's a wild goose chase chasing maybes... i had considered that maybe someone copied them by making a mold from a real button and used inferior metal. it's just a maybe but it seems like a good one. someone not so skilled making replacement buttons? if the metal is so soft the faces became that worn why are they not worn so much that the body is no longer round? could the design be an applied metal that's softer? too many maybes. i looked online for maybe 100 hours not even exaggerating. two of the buttons are grayer and different from the others on back so the design and initials were important enough to someone at some point to make these more than one time...

my favorite idea is just plain fun..... they were part of a clever disguise made just well enough so that they fooled the enemy long enough to get a jump on them. i watch too many movies :)

i appreciate everyone's input. i will sock them away for another 30 years and call it unsolved.

what do you think of the horse. i don't even care what they are i think they are amazing. unfortunately not long after i posted them the photos i posted started showing up in google searches for pewter british guard buttons.

i have tried searching crudely made buttons and have found one local made example. if a soldier lost buttons off his uniform how did he get more? maybe that's the right direction. think i will sell gold today instead. MUCH easier.

it's odd how tiring it is to sit 6 hours and sift though text for answers but i get nothing but exhilarated digging a neck deep hole chasing the high of finding just about anything. oh what i'd give for a boy friday to do the research part. :)
 

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Its not a bad thing to want answers, it maybe one of those that do sit in a drawer for years, until you accidently get the answer. I'm 90% sure that they are not proper British Military issue, but I'm often wrong, well at least 10% of the time:laughing7:
 

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10% is something worth bragging about, too bad we all couldn't only be wrong that much:) i do know my grandmother had them in her "old" buttons when i was a little girl and i'm 51 now. in the button world i'm not sure what constitutes "old" though. i thought that because they leave marks just like pencil when pulled across paper meant they were pewter. they are more silvery than most pewter i see. i like puzzles but maybe that's just my crazy side loving to be aggravated. :P
 

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VanitysBaby said:
10% is something worth bragging about, too bad we all couldn't only be wrong that much:) i do know my grandmother had them in her "old" buttons when i was a little girl and i'm 51 now. in the button world i'm not sure what constitutes "old" though. i thought that because they leave marks just like pencil when pulled across paper meant they were pewter. they are more silvery than most pewter i see. i like puzzles but maybe that's just my crazy side loving to be aggravated. :P
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Sound more of a heavier lead mix than the usual pewter.
 

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maybe. i have old viking ship pewter buttons and they are a duller color with no pock marks. if i ever do find out what they are i'll post it here. thank you for giving me more information than i started with.
 

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after looking for several more hours i decidedly to sheepishly add here that quite a few of the nicer looking brass and gold colored buttons i already sold had what i naively called a "flaming peach" on them.

Grenadier-Guards-Cap-Badge.jpg
 

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VanitysBaby said:
i made lots but i'm wondering if it was enough....
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The flaming bomb of the Grenadier's is not a particularly sort after or rare regiment. If its ebay, you can make more than its worth by saying you don't have a clue, or mystery or etc..
 

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honestly, the button guy offered me more money for the last couple of batches than i took because i wanted him to have fun selling them. he's an elderly gentleman that goes to button shows and that's pretty much his life now that he is retired. i also do not want to put the time into what it would take to sell them individually on ebay. i recently talked to my kids and found out they could give a crap less about ever inheriting my buttons, the button guy is in florida, and i developed a taste for fenton glass. i would feel worse if i sold them for a lot and they were worthless than if the buyer makes a fair profit himself. plus, my grandmother is watching.
 

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my mom's friend Marnie once bought a ring at a yard sale then went back and offered the people more money when she found out the stones were real. they wouldn't take it. proud to be a Mainer. :)
 

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VanitysBaby said:
my mom's friend Marnie once bought a ring at a yard sale then went back and offered the people more money when she found out the stones were real. they wouldn't take it. proud to be a Mainer. :)
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We operate in a similar manner. If every detectorist had these ethics, we wouldn't have a bad name.
 

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