Antiques Roadshow’s late Henry Sandon’s best moments – from ‘charming’ details out of guests to Victorian tea lessons

ANTIQUES Roadshow's Henry Sandon's best moments have been remembered - including how he "charmed" guests into revealing how much they paid for their items.

Archive footage also shows the time the late TV icon taught the show's audience how to use a bizarre Victorian teapot.

Sandon's son John confirmed that he died peacefully at a care home in Malvern, Worcestershire yesterday morning.

Sandon joined the BBC show in 1979 after making his name as a curator at the Museum of Royal Worcester.

He recounted his fondest memories from his time on the show in a 2010 highlights programme.

Sandon said: "I'd seen some of the earlier ones and loved the programme very much.

"It was delightful for me when I was asked to do series 2. The first recording was quite interesting.

"It was the first time I had the pleasure of meeting actual people and talking about their things.

He added: "It was nice and simple and easy, and I enjoyed it very much.

"It's a nice, comfortable, happy little programme that no-one envisaged would go on forever, almost like The Archers.

"It's almost incredible. Here it is, still, after all these years, still surviving."

Sandon also told how he would charm guests into revealing secret details about the antiques they had brought along.

He said: "I suppose I'm kind to people. I can wingle out of them little facts they may not want to give.

"Certainly about how much they paid for it, which sometimes they don't like to do.

"Then you can judge whether they're going to be shocked or surprised at what you tell them the value is - which is always rather nice."

POTTED CHARM

Antiques Roadshow presenter Fiona Bruce added: "Henry Sandon, modest to the last.

"Not surprisingly, Henry effortlessly charmed all the people he meets on Roadshow days.

"A queue even formed to kiss him once."

In a 2017 episode, Sandon showed guests a teapot sculpted to show his bespectacled face on one side and his son John's face on the other.

Sandon drew laughs from the audience by posing next his side of the pot and putting his glasses on it.

He explained how it was an old-school Victorian teapot which drinkers would fill up from the bottom by flipping it upside down.

Sandon said: "Hands up who'd like to try it? You know what to do - fill it up through the hole in the bottom.

"Don't spill it - there you are. Very clever, aren't they really?

"That's very early Victorian. Not my one."

John said: "To the millions who tuned in every Sunday evening to watch The Antiques Roadshow, Henry was like a favourite uncle.

"His enthusiasm for even the humblest piece of chipped china was infectious.

"His joy when he discovered a rare Staffordshire pottery owl jug, nicknamed 'Ozzie', was a magic TV moment few will forget."

The museum said: "It is with great sadness we share the news that Henry Sandon passed away on Christmas morning.

"Our curator and then patron of the Museum for many years, a much-loved expert who shared his knowledge and enthusiasm for pots and Worcester in person, in books & on TV. Sorely missed."

Sandon memorably found Ozzie the Owl during an Antiques Roadshow episode in the 1990s.

The slipware owl that was brought along to the roadshow in Northampton, where Sandon gave it a valuation of £20,000.

Sandon had three sons with his wife Barbara, to whom he was married for 56 years before her death in 2013.

He is survived by his sons David, Peter and John, his three grandchildren and his two great-grandchildren.