Petrol tin stenciling for MG water - in WW1?

[andrewupton]

I just started work on restoring a petrol tin to use for my WW1 Vickers display. I am doing it up as a semi-officially adopted replacement for the canvas condensor bag, but also to illustrate in the sort of role of having additional replacement supplies immediately to hand. So having primed it with red oxide this afternoon I ultimately plan to repaint it a suitable khaki colour to afford some front line camoflage.

Knowing how front-line soldiers can be in "appropriating" kit for other purposes , I'm tempted to stencil something along the lines of "MG WATER" in white on both sides to provide some evidence of ownership and purpose, but as I have only ever seen similar markings on WW2 era petrol tins (after they had been officially adopted for that purpose) I would be interested to see what other people think to this idea, or any evidence or similar they might wish to put forward before I do so.

[Richard Fisher]

Hi Andrew,

It's not something I've ever seen on WW1 cans. I think they turned numbers over so quickly that it wouldn't have been logical to do so. There would normally have been a fair few around so getting another wouldn't have been a problem (people complaining about stealing something they stole in the first place comes to mind!).

Regards

Richard

[britplumber]

All the markings I've seen on similar items (and on my own can) are hastily hand painted markings, my own has later HG markings slapped on.

[andrewupton]

Thanks for the replies. The problem is Richard I've seen, via a WW1 truck restoration elsewhere, the original instructions for painting tins carried on motor vehicles (basically all black with a white P, W or O for petrol, water and oil respectively), and despite this being documented original surviving examples are virtually/totally non-existent. So the practice would be appropriate to the period, but not to a MG branch that I'm aware of.

Marking the tins with the letter does make sense to allow ready identification of the contents, and prevent mixing up different ones. Maybe I might just stick with a white W either side for water, since it's pretty close to normal practice. Hmm...

[Richard Fisher]

Hi Andrew,

I was specifically referring to your proposal of 'MG WATER' rather than other markings. Might be best just to chalk on 'MG' or 'W' and leave it at that.

Bare metal is always universal though!

Richard