CANDID childhood photographs of the Prince of Wales and the Princess Royal were due to be auctioned in Swindon today.

One shows the prince with a bucket on his head and holding a spade as if it were a rifle. In another Charles and Anne dressed in sailor outfits and building sandcastles.

The nine black and white photographs were taken during the maiden voyage of the Royal Yacht Britannia in 1954.

Today they were due to be sold to the highest bidder at Dominic Winter Book Auctions in Maxwell Street, with an expected price of £70-£100.

The firm's documents expert, Richard West-wood-Brookes, said: "Shortly after her coronation, the Queen and Prince Philip went on an extensive tour of the Commonwealth, leaving the royal children behind.

"Towards the end of the tour, the Royal Yacht Britannia was commissioned and the children sailed out to meet their parents at Tobruk.

"These are possibly the only images of the royal children taken on that voyage that are available on the open market."

On a grim note, the auction was also due to feature a collection of historic documents about the treatment of British prisoners in POW camps during the Boer War at the beginning of the last century.

The collection was expected to fetch between £3,000 and £5,000.

Many of the prisoners died in what historians cite as a shameful incident in Britain's history. They included women and children.

The documents are the personal papers of Major Sir Hamilton Goold-Adams, who rose to become deputy governor of the Orange River Colony during the final stages of the war.

Mr Westwood-Brookes said: "This is an archive of considerable historical importance in the history of South Africa, and in the study of British colonial power in the region."