British C7 Civilian Respirator (Cold War)

[Wolf793]

another rare/interesting pickup from the weekend at Overlord Show the British C7 Respirator, this might get a bit long because these do require a bit of explaining:
During the Early 1950s there was much concern in Britain about what would happen if the Cold War ever went hot, the government decided to Embark on a program to make a Civilian respirator to issue to every member of the population (very much like they had during ww2) and the result was this thing, for all intents and purposes this is a General Civilian respirator from ww2 with added extras like actual Plexiglass eyepieces (rather than a celluloid window) and an Exhale valve and Upgraded filter, for whatever reason the programme was canned (some speculate from cost others they knew it'd be pointless in a nuclear exchange) and most of the remaining C7s were recalled and destroyed/recycled, these days these are pretty rare beasts, the specifics about my example then, this one is a Size 1 (Small) and made by Leyland Birmingham Rubber company in May of '54

[BrodieBartfast]

An uncommon respirator in good shape, nice find! It's funny how these have ended up being much less common and more expensive than WWII-era masks in the long run, of course due to the aforementioned production numbers. Comparable to the Avon C2 'Mickey Mouse' respirator in rarity, and severely underrated as a collectible.

B.B.

[Wolf793]

I got lucky on the price of this one the guy only wanted £50. Which sounds steep but the last one I saw got to £90ish on eBay

[BrodieBartfast]

I got lucky on the price of this one the guy only wanted £50. Which sounds steep but the last one I saw got to £90ish on eBay

I've seen them go for a lot more than that, so lucky is an understatement! Always nice when you can snag a rare gem at a decent price.

B.B.

[Wolf793]

I've seen them go for a lot more than that, so lucky is an understatement! Always nice when you can snag a rare gem at a decent price.

B.B.

I should probably also say it came with original safety pins for the head harness wrapped in brown paper, I want to find a carrier for it but apparently the bags are even rarer than the masks, the only one I've ever seen was on another gas mask forum but to have a complete kit would be nice.