20^th November 2025

Next club meeting 1^st December – Winter Bourse and Members Evening

Our club’s annual get-together enjoying Henry’s buffet, the craic, the quiz and of course our own dealing bourse. So do remember to bring along your coins that you wish to trade with other members.

The 5^th January meeting will be the annual short talks by members, competing for the Marc Myhill Memorial Shield. The quiet week between Christmas and the New Year is a good time to start thinking of talk topics (if not earlier)!

Meetings are held at the Abbey Baptist Church, Abbey Square, commencing at 7.00 p.m.

A Note from the Treasurer

The club subscription has been held at £20 for the coming year and subscriptions are due now! Please remit as soon as possible.

Club membership cards can be collected at the meeting.

November 2025 Meeting

Arthur Sottley gave a lengthy and informative presentation on Alexander Davison’s Trafalgar Medal, and Nelson’s funeral.

Commencing his talk Arthur acknowledged his collaborators; Sim Comfort who specialised in the Naval medals of Matthew Boulton; Martyn Downer, a former director of Sotheby’s; and Philip Attwood, retired curator of coins and medals at the British Museum. He also referenced the work of Susan Amos on the state funeral of Nelson in 1806.

By the time of the Battle of the Nile in 1798 Nelson was already a national hero.

Alexander Davison was a business man and supply contractor for the British Government, and a prize agent who was also a friend of Admiral Nelson. Davison was responsible for several acts that glorified Nelson's public image. These included the creation of a medal commemorating the victory at the Battle of the Nile (from which Davison profited as Nelson’s prize agent).

The medal was minted in gold for Nelson and his captains, in silver for junior officers, in gilt bronze for petty officers and bronze for other ranks. They did not have suspension loops.

Nelson’s victory at Trafalgar over the combined French and Spanish fleets was of profound relief to the nation, which standing without effective allies, had been under the very real threat of invasion by Napoleon’s armies. Trafalgar completed negated any chance of a seaborne invasion of Britain.

To commemorate this important victory Matthew Boulton issued approximately 15,000 medals in total, in gold, silver, white metal, gilt bronze and bronze, and these were originally issued without suspension. The issue of the medals was delayed because of a difference with Lady Hamilton over the portrait of Nelson.

Many recipients engraved the reverse of the medal with their names and ships (see below)

Mathew Boulton’s Trafalgar Medal

Below is the Trafalgar medal attributed to Davison:

However, there is no record of this medal being struck by Matthew Boulton nor of any order by Davison. Exhaustive research suggests that the dies for this medal were cut by Thomas Halliday, a former apprentice of Boulton, and were struck at Halliday’s own mint in Birmingham. About 300 of these medals were struck and were given to men that served on HMS Victory at the battle. Certainly, they were given to the 48 ratings and 12 marines who took part in Nelson’s funeral procession of 9^th January 1806.

It is suggested that this medal should be renamed “Halliday’s Badge of Distinction”.

A photograph of Greenwich pensioner James Sharmen, ex-HMS Victory veteran, shows him wearing the Matthew Boulton medal, the Halliday medal and the Naval General Service Medal. The latter medal was retrospectively issued between 1847 and 1851 for those who served in the navy between 1793 and 1840.

Nelson’s funeral was a most elaborate affair, as appropriate for the nation’s hero. After Trafalgar (21 October 1805) it took many weeks for his body to reach Greenwich, finally arriving there on 24^th December. His body lay in state from the 5^th to the 7^th January. It was on that latter day that 48 ratings and 12 marines from HMS Victory arrived at Greenwich, and these men would accompany the coffin to the Admiralty, Whitehall, by river on the State Barge the following day.

The river procession was a spectacular event in itself. The special uniforms worn by the Victory men for the occasion led to the adoption this clothing as the later general naval uniform. Prior to this there were no official uniforms for other ranks.

The sixty men from the Victory, bearing the ships ensign, were also in the procession from the Admiralty to St Paul’s Cathedral, and were allotted places close to the coffin at the cathedral. Each man was reported in the press as wearing a badge of distinction (Halliday’s medal shown above).

As the coffin was being lowered into the crypt the men of the Victory fell on the flag covering the coffin and took pieces of it as mementoes of he occasion.

The funeral arrangements were largely the work of two men. One was Sir Isaac Heard, Garter King of Arms and the other Ange Denis Macquin, Professor of Classics and the Arts. The arrangements they made have formed the basis of all subsequent British state funerals.

All admissions to St Paul’s were by ticket only – for example as above

Arthur Sottley’s presentation was heartily received by the club.

The support of OMRS – the Orders and Medals Research Society – in the presentation material is acknowledged.

Future Events.

London Coin Fair – Shortlands, London, W6 –7^th February 2026

Midland Coin Fair - National Motorcycle Museum –14^th December 2025 & 11Jan 2026

Spinks Auctions –10^th December 2025

Noonans, Mayfair, W1J 8BQ –10 &11^th December 2025; 14 & 27^th January 2026

Morton & Eden – February 2026

St James Auctions –4^th December 2025

Baldwins –9^th December 2025

Past Events

In 2015 Peter Hall spoke on “The Death of Commodus (AD192) - the aftermath: in Britain and the Roman Empire”.

In 2005 Julian Baker described the Portable Antiquities Scheme

The club auction was held in 1995

In 1985 we had a talk on the excavations at Silchester.

In 1975 the club auction took place

Club Secretary