SPLENDID SILVER SALTS

One of the most exciting finds, four Paul Storr salt cellars, only just made it onto the show. The owner turned up at Salisbury Cathedral in 1990 with one of the salts in a brown paper bag, thinking it was made of brass.

When expert Penny Brittain, then working on the Roadshow’s reception, saw the mark of silversmith Paul Storr, she begged him to go home and get the others, without revealing much. He returned just as filming was ending with all four, to expert Brand Inglis. ‘They were made by one of our greatest silversmiths,’ he said of the salts, modelled as shells and dated 1811 and 1813.

The owner’s parents, who were in service, were given the silver gilt set as a retirement present. His father passed them on to him, and they lived in a plastic bag in a cupboard. ‘If my daughter-in-law hadn’t told me the Roadshow was in Salisbury, they’d still be sitting in there,’ he said. ‘If anything happened to my wife and I, the children would have had no idea of their value. They would probably have gone in a job lot house clearance.’

VALUED AT: £40,000.

CURRENTLY: Later sold at auction for £66,000 to the Salters’ Company and are now in Salters’ Hall, London.