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Niels Bohr famously dissolved the medal he got for his Nobel Price for chemistry in acid when the Nazis invaded his home country of Denmark, to prevent it from falling into the Nazis' hands.
Unlike him, the most recent recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize of all things, who shall not be named here, because she doesn't deserve being named, handed her medal to a deranged megalomaniac and fascist wannabe dictator.
Honestly, when I made that comment, I did think that he probably wasn't the earliest example.