[arnhem2280]

Firstly if the box and condolence slip are original then that's great for the buyer. As Major root was killed in an accident in December 1944 then he would never have received his British medals as they were not manufactured/issued until the end of the war. They would have been sent to his next of kin. You do see photos of servicemen wearing the ribbon of the Africa Star during the war but they did not receive the medal until post WW2.

All Major Croot's medals including the TD and Dutch award would be unnamed and could only have been mounted post war by someone other than him.

My understanding is that there was either an incomplete or missing name and address on the box. As to the condolence slip they are a complete nightmare. There is a whole thread dedicated to them on the Medal Forum. They were being faked in large numbers during the 70's and 80's just after a large number of unnamed medal boxes came onto the market and very quickly disappeared only for them to start turning up named to servicemen who had been killed in high profile actions.

Many of these were sold to unsuspecting collectors who eventually realised that they had been scammed and in all probability they have returned to the market.

What collectors have to bear in mind is that the vast majority of servicemen and woman only received a small brown box with unnamed medals in it, unless that is they served either before the war or post war and received a named medal or they were an other rank and received a named gallantry award. (officers gallantry medals are with the exception of the VC unnamed) .

If the purchaser of the box and slip is willing to post images on the forum I would be very interested to see them ( and may end up kicking myself for not bidding!)

Cheers

Arnhem