Pierced Year 1919 Silver Fob, full English hallmarks on the rear: :”W.H.R.” the makers; the Anchor of Birmingham; Britain’s Silver mark the Lion Passant; a boxed “U” of the Birmingham assay offices in the year 1919.

The Silver fob was an ornament to hang from a Silver watch fob chain, the latter being the chain connecting precious watch from the vest button hole to the vest fob pocket. It was considered part of a gentleman’s wear. Birmingham, known as “Silver City”, was the main producer in Britain of these fobs (and of many other types of Silver ornament, including chains, lockets and Vestas), and the above Pierced Year 1919 fob could have originally been commissioned by any one of the hundreds of jewellery houses, clubs and associations throughout England.

This Silver fob was created right at the end of the Great War, a period when Britain suffered huge shortages of skilled labour due to the deprivations of the war. The quality of the engraving of this fob is a poignant reminder of those troubled times, good when compared with the superficial laser work of one hundred years later, but quite simply not at pre-War level of excellence.