Anyone fancy adding a VC to their cabinet?

[Battery Command Post]

Honestly, these things should automatically go back to the crown, or the unit, or IWM if the family try to sell them...they aren't commodities to be bought and sold!

I agree there should be some form of caveat whereby when or if family lines dies out, the medal should be returned to the crown and put on permanant display in a dedicated museum.

As we don't have that, I suppose Lord Ashcroft is the next best thing and at least the collection can be seen in the IWM.

Hopefully without causing an argument, can I just ask why you think this should be the case? To me it seems to go against the whole concept of the Victoria Cross.

Rob

[Adrian]

Personal opinion, you can either agree or disagree with mine but my opinion is what it is, that's how I feel.

If the case is that there is no more family line to the holder, why not return it to the state that awarded it as a national treasure. Or obviously in the case of a Commonwealth or former Britich territory, to the Government of that country to display in a National Museum.

Think of all the VCs Lord Ashcroft owns, nothing against the bloke and I admire him for his dedication to round them all up, but it also might be considered selfish unless they're on display to the nation.

[KradSpam]

I think the Ashcroft VC's were on display at the IWM for a while, no idea if they are still there.

[aj4010]

Personal opinion, you can either agree or disagree with mine but my opinion is what it is, that's how I feel.

If the case is that there is no more family line to the holder, why not return it to the state that awarded it as a national treasure. Or obviously in the case of a Commonwealth or former Britich territory, to the Government of that country to display in a National Museum.

Think of all the VCs Lord Ashcroft owns, nothing against the bloke and I admire him for his dedication to round them all up, but it also might be considered selfish unless they're on display to the nation.

I broadly agree with that, there could be a snag though. With an item of such value I suspect there will be a very long line of "long lost" relatives suddenly appear when it becomes known that the medal will be handed over to the state, all clutching legal documents as "proof." It could be a legal nightmare.

Best Regards,

Andy

[Adrian]

Obviously it would be a bit of a nightmare and something would need to be written into the constitution whereby it would only go to direct descendants and those people would then nominate the next person etc and if none then it's returned to the state.

What happens in the U.S. regarding the CMoH? These aren't legally allowed to be sold or even leave the U.S., am I correct in my thinking?

There is no right or wrong answer, only personal opinion and my musings are just that.

[Paul D]

The thing that makes the VC different in many ways from other countries high awards is the price , £300,000 plus for a medal !!. If they are sold by a family we are talking about the amount of money that can change the lives of the folks involved not just buy them a new car or a holiday and without knowing the circumstances of those people and in some cases the wishes of the recipient who knowing the potential value authorise the sale after they have left us. This has actually been going on since the institution of the award and i'm aware of many from WW1 where the VC was sold so the recipient could put food on the table as unfortunately if they were an NCO / Other rank the fact that they had won the VC stood them in no stead to obtain jobs etc on their return from the war.

[Jerry B]

Though the idea that Victoria Crosses are displayed for the nation would be great -and many are, there are 25 in the Royal Engineers Museum in Chatham, including John Chard's from Rorke's Drift-, I agree with Paul. Who of us could afford to give away a quarter of a Million pounds, certainly not me and the impact that that amount of money would have on most peoples lives is something to be considered and if anyone who has one, either because they earned it or their ancestor earned it has the right to do with it as they see fit. Lots of us have others peoples medals in our collections and we did not refuse to buy them -or any other item- because we thought it was wrong and it does seem a bit odd that we as collectors think that it is wrong to sell medals, IMHO