Scale: 1:96. One of the ‘Fly’ class of small, shallow-draught gunboats built by Yarrow Shipbuilders, Scotstoun, for use on the river Tigris. These gunboats were sent out in sections, and assembled at Abadan; the yard there could reconstruct a ‘Fly’ in a week. ‘Firefly’ herself was completed by Yarrow in July 1915 and assembled in November of that year.

Armament on these boats was a single 4-inch gun, a 12-pounder gun, and numerous small arms. They were 120-feet in length, displaced 90 tons, had a service speed of nine knots, and a crew of 22.

The ‘Firefly’ was captured by the Turks on 1 December 1915, at the Battle of Ctesiphon, during the advance on Baghdad (see also SLR1431). Re-captured in February 1917, she was sunk by insurgents on the Euphrates on 14 May 1924. This silver model was once the property of the first Lord Fisher and, from the way in which it is mounted, looks very much a decorative item, like a table centrepiece.