A Boer War Collection
Moorabool’s February 2026 sale included a rare and coherent Boer War collection — campaign medals, Staffordshire commemorative figures, and related militaria spanning both sides of the South African War of 1899–1902.
De Wet and Baden-Powell: Enemies, Mirror Images
The reuse of the same Staffordshire mould for both figures is historically resonant as well as commercially pragmatic. Robert Baden-Powell and de Wet were the two most famous commanders of the entire South African War — on opposite sides.
Baden-Powell won fame defending the siege of Mafeking (1899–1900) and became a British imperial hero, later founding the Boy Scout movement in 1907.
De Wet was his ideological opposite: the undefeated guerrilla commander who humiliated British forces at every turn and was lionised by the substantial pro-Boer faction in Britain and South Africa- Liberals, Irish nationalists, and Quakers among them — who opposed the war as imperial aggression.
That the same heroic mould served both men perfectly captures the ambivalence of British public opinion: the same broad-hatted, martial figure in the veld could be patriot or freedom fighter depending only on the inscription at his feet.
Campaign Medals
Further Items
