Simple white clay pipe adorned with three metal bands marked ‘ECB London’, ‘MS’ and ‘U’, and ‘EP’, which probably came from other pipes.
Dr D A Higgins of the Society for Pipe Research, told us that it is a typical Scottish clay pipe of late C19th or early C20th date. Thick, chunky pipes like this were favoured in Scotland and made by many different manufacturers. Those from the larger firms often had a pattern number on the left hand side of the stem [this one does not].
The metal bands are nothing to do with the pipe, but could well have come from others. Briar pipes typically had a metal band like these to join the wooden bowl with a vulcanite stem. Some, more expensive, clays with stems of vulcanite or other materials also had a metal band. The diamond-shaped band could have come from a ‘Bulldog’ pattern of pipe, which had a diamond-shaped stem section. These bands would have been made since the mid C19th as composite pipes only really came into circulation after around 1850.
