The Crimean War in the Nursery

Using tin toys to construct miniature worlds may seem harmless enough. Like using dried peas in a pellet gun, where’s the harm in that? But such reenactments of the Crimean war were a serious business: in the year following the Battle of Inkerman (Crimea) on November 5, 1854, the events were recreated in a commercially successful game featuring tin soldiers and miniature brass cannons. The trilingual caption to the printed label – in English, German, and French – clearly identifies the target audience: children from the nations of the Western alliance. Wars and heroic deeds are regarded as milestones of world history. As such, they provide rich pickings for adults eager to make bogeymen out of one-time national enemies and impress their worldview on the minds of children, both then and now.