I have a couple of petrol cans from between the wars. I think they are stamped with the company name one Shell and one BP[1]. Large rectangular cans with a conical upper section and a huge brass cap with a slot for insertion of a bar for opening. They are large, possibly 15 or 20 gallons capacity.
Does anyone recognise the description? I think they date from the era when petrol pumps were a rare sight.
And is anyone even able to guess at their value?
[1] Bit vague about this, I'd have to go to the garage to check.
Yes, but as I say, I have five gallon Jerry cans, these are larger. about the same height but square not flattened. I'll have to get to the back of the garage and dig one out, I'm sure they will be marked with a capacity.
Yes, I'd guess so, they're practically as new. They were put into an attic before the war and left there until 1992. So they've been stored dry all that time.
I wonder if they have anything to do with the war effort. They have double handles like milk churns and were part of the effects of the previous owner of a house of ours, passed on to us along with a few other memorabilia he didn't want (mostly owners manuals for a range of cars for the inter war period). He used to be the local mayor and also on the ARP and had a lot of military stuff such as camp beds, practice bombs, fire fighting equipment and so on.
I wondered if these were for refuelling trucks or possibly from the era when he also ran the local grocers and garage, which didn't have a fuel pump and sold motor spirit by the tin.
They'd certainly have been a two man job if that size. ;-)
Plenty of large WD ones around, but they'd not be marked Shell or whatever. I'll ask my older bro next time I phone him - he's well into this sort of thing.
Are they galvanised with a round threaded cap about 3.5 to 4 inches across? I seem to recall a mobile hardware supplier using similar cans to those you describe for delivering paraffin in the 1950's. I suspect they are likely to be from The Great War, it is very likely that somewhere I have an illustration showing some, but as with trying to find anything in Google about them it might take a while before turning anything up.
If you knew your history, then you'd know there was only one that was referred to as The Great War. It was also known as 'the war to end all wars' at the time.
Fair comment, I was just surprised that any were still in use in the 1950s. Would have thought that wear and tear would have finished them all off by then.
Perhaps something to do with the fact that they were galvanised and made of about the same gauge steal as a milk churn. The 50's decade was only
32 to 40 years after WWI. If they have been well looked after many WWII Jerry Cans which were made of less robust non-galvanised metal are still in use 60 or more years after they were manufactured.
When I was a kid (1950s) I used to get sent to the local oil shop for some paraffin for Dad's blowlamp. In the shop was a big can (two actually) like the one you describe It was fitted with a hand operated pump to dispense paraffin into the container you asked him to fill. I think each pump squirt was half a pint, but it was a long time ago, and I can't be sure. Certainly, I can't remember the shopkeeper having any other means of measuring what I bought.
The shop and its neighbours was bulldozed in the early 1960s and the area is now council maisonettes. In any case, health and safety rules would rule out the use of such containers nowadays - isn't there a limit of 5 gallons for the amount of fuel you can store in a domestic garage without a licence?
So my guess is that cans this size are rare and might attract some interest if you put them on ebay. If you do try to sell them that way, photograph one alongside a standard 1 gallon can, so that people can see just how big the ones you are selling are. Otherwise people will assume they are just a squarer jerrycan.
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