Ship Lantern - authentic or replica

tombrown

I have an old brass ship lantern that I recently acquired. It had previ9osuly been in a pub.

Unfortunately I cannot post an image of it (I believe I need 50 posts to do that), so let me try & describe it:

It is brass, 14" high with two straight solid side 10" each; the front is curved with a large glass panel/lens in it (i.e. it is curved triangular shape).

The top is hinged and there is an old electric light fitting in there (I assume either added later if this is authentic or part of the original design if it is just a replica for use in a home)

There is a green curved glass inset (with a brass frame) that slots in behind the main glass window.

On the lid there are two engraved plates - one simply has "Starboard" on it (hence the green glass inset) and the other has the makers name, but no date. The maker is "LG Murray & Co. Limited, Lokshaws (?), Glasgow Sc." (There may be other letter(s) before "lokshaws", but I can't make it out)

I'm going to polish it up & refit an electric light in it, so not really that worried if it is genuine or a replica as it will look good no matter what, but I am curious.

tombrown

OK - a quick bit of random posting got me up to 50 (hope I didnt offend anyone ), so here is the image. For some reason the inset came out as blue in the picture, but it really is green

whisky_galore

Can't see image, there's a hell of a lot of replica ship stuff out there.

Don't know about polishing it up, may affect resale value. Once patina is gone you can't get it back.

tombrown

Thanks

As I say, I'm not to worried about resale value as I plan to use it rather than sell it. That is, of course, unless someone tells me it is worth €10K, in which case I may change plans:)

I am now inclined to think it is a replica as the electric light fitting is on a brass bracket that has the same amount of tarnish/discoloration as the rest of the interior of the lamp, and so does not look like it is retrofitted. I removed the bracket & it is in the photo I posted (bottom left corner)

coylemj

Even if it's an original, I seriously doubt that it's worth much - you already said that it came from a pub where no doubt it sat alongside other durable artefacts of an earlier age like Singer sewing machines and manual typewriters. For obvious reasons, lamps like your model were made from rustproof metal so most of them have survived.

It's a side lamp for a ship or large boat of some kind, the quadrant shape tells you that it was intended to be visible from straight ahead and the side, the colours red for port and green for starboard are also use on planes, the lights at the tips of the wings have the same colour arrangement. They were a popular fitting with owners of barges and larger boats on the inland waterways but the bigger brass models like yours were also tempting for thieves so you don't see many of them in situ these days, that's why most of then ended up in pubs and bric-a-brac shops.

whisky_galore

Unless you can identify that it came from a specific ship, and the more well-known the better, like an ocean liner or something, I wouldn't plan my retirement on it.

tombrown

Thanks for the feedback.

Based on your inputs a small amount of imagination, I will declare this is the front starboard lantern from the Terra Nova, and was brought back to Ireland by Tom Crean

whisky_galore

tombrown wrote: »

Thanks for the feedback.

Based on your inputs a small amount of imagination, I will declare this is the front starboard lantern from the Terra Nova, and was brought back to Ireland by Tom Crean

Sure, why not?:p

Mesrine65

whisky_galore wrote: »

Don't know about polishing it up, may affect resale value. Once patina is gone you can't get it back.

http://www.wikihow.com/Patina-Brass

whisky_galore

Mesrine65 wrote: »

http://www.wikihow.com/Patina-Brass

Sounds too much like hard work.

tombrown

I've left it as is, save a light polish. So saved on effort both of a heavy polish and on recreatign any patina.

Looks good, except I prefer it without the green screen and my wife prefers it with ... guess who wins there