By
Patrick Hayes | 2 Oct, 2022
The Bonhams
Instruments of Science and Technology auction on the 28th of September featured an impressive 14 cryptologic-related lots. Included among those lots were two Enigma machines and two sets of Enigma spare rotors, which I inspected for Bonhams in August in preparation for the auction. In particular, one of the Enigma machines — the auction's star lot — had a rare D reflector (Umkehrwalze D, UKW-D) installed.
There were only a few bidders attending the auction in the Bonhams salesroom. A representative of a London museum was present, but was not there to bid on any of the cryptologic objects. As has become the norm, especially post-Covid, many of the bids came through auction aggregators such as LiveAuctioneers.com and The-Saleroom.com rather than in-person. Some other bids came via telephone (though to a lesser extent). The only in-person bids from the Bonhams salesroom came in the latter part of the auction.
Interestingly, the set of non-matching Enigma rotors (
lot 25) sold for £300 more than the set of matching Enigma rotors (
lot 23). This came as a surprise to a contact of mine at Bonhams, who I spoke with after the auction. Indeed, the matching rotors, originally split up between lots, were sold together upon my recommendation. The NEMA spare rotor box (
lot 20) sold for well above its £1,000-1,500 estimate, selling for almost as much as the NEMA machines offered at the auction.
The two CSP-1757 slide rule cipher devices sold very well too.
Lot 15 sold for £1,200 and
lot 19 sold for £1,400 (excluding buyer's premium), above their £300-£400/500 estimates. The Beyer Krypto pocket watch
(lot 22), a very attractive piece of cryptologic history, also received a lot of interest from bidders. However, the Kriegsmarine signal book (
lot 14) didn't reach its reserve price, achieving only £12,000 of its £15,000-20,000 estimate. This may well be due to Bonhams offering multiple similar signal books in recent years, or so my contact at Bonhams told me.
Bidding was a little slow to pick up for the two Enigma machines offered at the auction. Whilst they both went on to sell for just above their upper estimates, their final sale prices still seemed a little low in my opinion. Global uncertainty aside, it should be pointed out that the electrical functionality of both machines was untested, with lot 24 having some mechanical functionality issues too. All of this information was included in my inspection report to Bonhams, and provided in condition reports to bidders prior to the auction.
As I missed the opportunity to view the other lots during viewing hours, I was given my own private viewing after the auction. Overall, it was a successful auction, and it was definitely worthwhile attending in person.
