Author: Rebecca Penfold, Assistant Curator

In 2021, our previous Assistant Curator wrote a very informative piece on Behind the Scenes: A Growing Collection about what the Museum do with acquisitions and how they are processed. This system is still in place today, helping us collect items unique to REME history. Although the process has not changed, we have taken in many more items since then. While we show many of these new acquisitions from kind donors through our acquisitions display and social media posts, here are a couple of the objects that have stood out over the past year. In no particular order:

Lighter, the ‘discosphoserator’. 2025.13.

Lieutenant Colonel (Lt Col) William Frederick Knight served in the REME until 1946. According to Lt Col Knight's family, he spent quite some time in Cairo servicing vehicles. Part of the family’s donation of Lt Col Knight’s items was an invention he made in the desert: a lighter he called a ‘discosphoserator’. Although common for soldiers to create makeshift lighters during the World Wars, this item was collected due to its uniqueness and the story attached to it, literally in this case. A note was added to the lighter by Lt Col Knight to explain that because the Egyptian matches broke so easily, he needed to make the discosphoserator.

Lt Col Herbert Charles Gordon Piggott’s Sword. 2026.18.

While the museum has an extensive weapon and sword collection, it was decided that we would take in Lt Col Herbert Charles Gordon Piggott’s beautiful Infantry Officer’s sword due to its George VI markings to help fill a gap in the collection. Lt Col Piggott served with the Machine Gun Corps (Cavalry) in World War I, then later the Royal Army Ordnance Corps (RAOC) before becoming REME. He was stationed in many places around the world throughout his career, including Bovington, Hong Kong, India, Burma, Kenya and Egypt. He retired in 1951/52. This item highlights how the museum considers if an item will help to fill a gap in previous collecting patterns, such as this sword and its George VI markings.

Dennis Lavis’ Medals. 2026.1.1 and 2026.1.2.

We also accept the medals of anyone who served in REME, so many come into the museum during the year. Among those this year are the medals of Lance Corporal (LCpl) Denis Lavis. Lavis served in REME from 1951-56 as an Armourer and the museum now holds his British Korea Medal and his United Nations Service Medal Korea in the collection. Lavis previously recorded an oral history with the museum in 2021. He stated that when he started his career, “there [were] two of us in the REME that had passed the Armourer’s course, and so the CO said … ‘Which one of you wants to go to Korea’, and I thought “Ooh…!” So, we tossed and I won”.

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While this article focuses on just a handful of the objects that the Museum collects, we do also accept a wide range of archival material from letters and diaries to photographs. With all items we check for duplicates to make sure our resources and space are not used by multiple copies or multiples of the same objects; the process of the Acquisition Panel is a necessary part of ensure a broad range of REME heritage is preserved, and the Museum follows the Collection Development Policy.

If you have anything that you would like to donate, please check our Donate an Item page to find out how to get in touch and what we need to know about your potential donation.

Published 'A Growing Collection: Five Years On', The Craftsman, June 2026.