A NUMBER of years ago, before I was a Member of Parliament, I went to a local car boot sale and looking through all the bric-a-brac and things from days gone by, I came across a bronze plaque.

It looked for all the world like a huge old Victorian penny. It had Britannia on the front, being shadowed by a lion, there were two dolphins and, at the bottom, a smaller lion was ripping apart an eagle.

The lion with Britannia was the lion of courage, and the other lion was ripping apart the German eagle, while the dolphins signified the dominance of the seas enjoyed by the United Kingdom at the time.

There was writing around the edge because the plaque was intended to commemorate the life of a fallen soldier. Such a plaque was known—rather crudely, given that it was to commemorate the life of one of our fallen soldiers—as a dead man’s penny.

The service people were from the fledging Air Force of the time, from the Navy or those who had fallen on the battlefields.

I remember looking at the plaque, wondering what had happened to the family of the fallen soldier, why the plaque had ended up there, what was the story behind the plaque and what was the story of the soldier’s life and the family he left behind.

It struck me that, more often than not, such plaques reach the market—militaria shops, auction sites—because the family has died. I emphasise strongly from the outset that militaria shops do us a great service by helping to keep alive the spirit of historical campaigns and conflicts that we only read about in the history books.

I decided to call an adjournment debate in Parliament around the time of Remembrance to raise awareness of these pennies and their importance as a symbol of a life lost

I found out later that 1,355,000 of these plaques were given out. They were struck from 450 tons of bronze. They arrived in a box, sometimes with the medals of the soldier, airman or seaman, and every one of them had a certificate signed by King George V.

They were given predominantly after the war, although some were given before its end, to the families of the fallen.

What does this mean in our day and age, 100 years on?

We have had other wars, but World War One was the only occasion on which these plaques were struck in honour of the fallen. Each plaque was individually struck, not engraved, with the name of a serviceman, but no mention of their rank.

It was struck simply to commemorate the serviceman or woman who gave their life doing their duty in the service of their country. In fact, 1,500 were given to women service personnel. They were given out all across the Commonwealth, to everybody engaged in the conflict.

I want to raise awareness. One day I hope that we will be able to follow Lord Ashcroft’s commendable example by collecting the plaques for these fallen people and displaying them in a room in order to commemorate those who died preserving the integrity of democracy and the freedom of our country.

Sadly, over the years, some of these plaques have been scrapped, because nobody knows what they are, although I do not think that many of them are finding their way to scrapyards.

The previous Member for Croydon South promoted a private Member’s Bill that resulted in legislation preventing war memorials from being attacked and melted down, and I would like these plaques to be covered by its provisions, because they mean something.