After the chest arrived at the MR laboratory, I performed a thorough condition assessment to identify problematic areas on the chest. From this I could provide the conservation team at the Mary Rose Trust with some well-thought-out treatment suggestions. This is something a conservator should always do before starting a conservation treatment, both to assure that the most problematic issues and damaged areas of an object are not overlooked and to better be able to decide on appropriate treatment methods. As the chest had been left to dry without any treatment after excavation, the wooden boards were left both brittle and dry. In addition to problems related to the dry wood, a few other problematic areas were also identified, such as corroding iron nails and active bronze corrosion on the chest’s frontal piece which consists of metal, glass and paper. After all treatment suggestions were approved by the conservation team, I began to conserve the chest.
My first treatment task was to look further into the active corrosion product surrounding half of the metallic frontal piece. At first, I was slightly worried it might have been bronze disease, which is a very damaging corrosion process that would potentially need chemical removal. I started out using a scalpel carefully to figure out if it was mechanically removable. Surprisingly enough, it was possible to remove almost all of it with a scalpel, which indicated it was not bronze disease, which was a relief. To remove any remaining corrosion particles, I cleaned the metal carefully with cotton sticks wet by denatured alcohol (IMS).
