Here is a photo of English soldiers during World War 1. I have seen many older photos from the early 1900's with people making and playing homemade cigar box instruments over in the UK.
There is defiantly a long history of making homemade instruments in England and they seem to have loved making cigar box fiddles as I have seen them making this exact style of instrument in both World War 1 and 2.
Anyways, check out these guys doing there thing!