The discovery that a set of war medals awarded to prominent locally-born aborigine Reg Saunders could be duplicates has not deterred interest in their auction this week.
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Both the set of medals to be auctioned in Sydney on Friday and another set on display in the Australian War Memorial are believed to be legitimate.
The late Captain Saunders, who was born at Purnim, was the first Aboriginal commissioned officer in the Australian Army and is arguably Australia’s best-known Aboriginal soldier.
Purnim Community Group member Geoff Rollinson is leading a bid to acquire for the south-west the set of eight medals that Captain Saunders was awarded for his service in the Second World war and the Korean war.
The medals are to auctioned by Noble Numismatics in Sydney on behalf of the estate of the late Kenneth Maxwell Lyon.
Noble Numismatics consultant John O’Connor said it had been told Mr Lyon bought the set of eight medals from a Canberra antiques shop in 2004.
Mr O’Connor said the medals bought by Mr Lyon were not marked as duplicates so it was not known whether they were originals or duplicates.
A spokesman for the Australian War Memorial in Canberra, which has a gallery dedicated to Captain Saunders, said it received its set of medals from Captain Saunders’ daughter, Glenda Hume of Queensland.
Its set is also believed to include the Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) that Captain Saunders received for his community service as a government Aboriginal liaison officer and as a member of the Australian War Memorial council.