John Grey & Sons(?)

John Grey & Sons?
Well the bridge is GH&S but a replacement

This is an unbranded vintage, probably British, certainly European somewhere, sunburst Ukulele in very good, (from the photos and description), condition. The buy it now price was very reasonable, (read bargain); reasonable enough that even though there was a make an offer option I didn't quibble and paid the full asking price. It's almost certainly from the 30's, (the only doubt in my mind is it looks in such good condition, and with no case, it looks newer), and from the bridge I was thinking George Houghton.

Where it arrived I found it's a small Concert with a scale length of 360mm, (14¼ inches), rather than a Soprano, even given the fact that I don't think it is the original bridge, (It looks newer and there is a fair amount of glue around it), the nut to 12th fret length bears out this should be the scale length.  However the Headstock shape and the finish make me now think it was originally a Barnet Samuel/Rose Morris model, (it is from sometime around the take-over but since they both used John Grey and Sons to brand their Ukuleles I'll call it a John Grey for now).

It does look to have been of a reasonable quality when it was made, with a good original bone(?) nut, a good separate fretboard, (and brass bar frets suggesting it might even date back to the 20's?) and the tuners are original too, (though a couple of screws have been replaced; probably when the bridge was done). Coming from that period, only good models had friction tuners and not wooden pegs, and having replaced the 3 old nylon strings it came with I can hear it has a very nice tone.