Tobacco Cutter

Guernseyman Mike Tidd chose to submit the mechanical tobacco cutter that his father made during the German occupation of the island between 30 June 1940 and 9 May 1945.

It's an object which now resides in Richard Heaume's Occupation Museum.

Mike writes: "Its function was to compress and then finely shred tobacco leaves. Dad showed considerable ingenuity utilising the materials he could get his hands on. The frame is made from a 'borrowed' German barbed wire fence post; the gears are from a variety of bicycle and motorbike parts and the arm that works the cutting blade is made from a motorcycle engine connecting rod.

"The tobacco is loaded into a trough in the middle with a lid. As the pulley wheel revolves, it turns a large bolt that compresses the tobacco and the cutter chops the compressed leaves as they emerge from the trough. In the good times, Dad powered this with an electric motor. Later on, he or Mum would pedal a bicycle frame with a pulley drive to the cutter."

The object is the only one like it that Mr Heaume has ever seen and is, in Mike's view, a lovely example of a Guernseyman's ingenuity in wartime.