Mr Boulton's Trafalgar Medal (silver), 1805
Obverse, a bust of Lord Admiral Nelson facing left |
Reverse, a depiction of a sea-battle with Trafalgar's name and date given in the exergue |
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Obverse, a bust of Lord Admiral Nelson facing left |
Reverse, a depiction of a sea-battle with Trafalgar's name and date given in the exergue |
After Nelson’s victory at Trafalgar in 1805 the prominent Birmingham industrialist Matthew Boulton distributed about 15,000 Trafalgar Medals at his own expense to participants in the battle. These medals were all in white metal, but subsequent years saw a number of presentation issues in other metals, and between 1860 and 1895 the London die-sinker W. J. Taylor was commissioned by Boulton's heir to produce a new run, of which this silver piece is one.
The medals all share the same design, which shows a view of the battle, with Nelson’s signal ‘ENGLAND EXPECTS EVERY MAN WILL DO HIS DUTY’ above.
This is one of a number of the Taylor restrikes of the medal that was mounted in a watchglass, which has finely preserved the detail of the frosted finish. Lester Watson purchased this medal from the London dealers Baldwin in 1927.