Original Imperial Japanese WWII Hand Held Air Raid Siren with Scarce Original Leather & Canvas Cover - Dated 1941 - Fully Functional

Original Item: Only One Available. This is a rare fully functional intricate Japanese WW2 handheld siren. It still has a good amount of the original olive brown paint finish on the aluminum body, which would lose paint relatively easily. It has very nice folding bakelite handles on the sides, which enabled it to be stored in a small pouch. It also has a fantastic data plate with Japanese Kanji date mounted to the back. This example retains the original leather and canvas cover, the first time we have ever seen this, a rare treat!

The date is in the standard long form indicating years into the current emperor's reign: 昭 和 16 年  月. This would be read: SHOWA (current reigning emperor) 16th year of reign - 1941. The marking for month is there, but there was not a number indicated for that. It was common to see a mixture of Japanese characters and Western numbers during this period.

The bakelite handles have minor chipping but nothing serious, and the folding crank handle works properly. The siren mechanism works perfectly, and is quite loud when cranked up to full cycle. It even has a functional finger actuated closure to control the volume of the siren, which could quickly silence it if needed.

Offered in nearly complete and very good condition. We don’t know if we’ll every see an example this complete again! These were used during the Air Raids over Tokyo and other major Japanese cities towards the end of World War Two.  

Comes ready to annoy your neighbors!