The Illuminated Address presented to William John Davis Esq by the National Society of Amalgamated Brassworkers, on the occasion of their 25th Annual Meeting, ‘signed on behalf of the Members [by] J. Ramsden, President, W.C. McStocker, Vice President, A. Cashmore, G. Benwell, J. Botterill, C. Cox, E. Smith’, Birmingham, 25 May 1897, 6pp, by Edward Morton, Illuminating Artist, 17 Bennett’s Hill, Birmingham. Red morocco, gilt and embossed, front cover with inscription ‘To W.J. Davis Esq; from The National Society of Amalgamated Brassworkers, May 26, 1897’; very fine and highly decorative, UNIQUE £150-200

Provenance: Birmingham Ephemera associated with the late W.J. Davis, the property of a Lady, DNW Auction T7, 7 October 2009, lot 342; ex libris David Griffiths.

The full text reads: ‘We, the undersigned Members of the National Society of Amalgamated Brass-workers, on the occasion of our 25th Annual Meeting, have much pleasure in asking your acceptance of this Address, together with the accompanying Cheque for £333, as a mark of our esteem and regard and also as a recognition and appreciation of your faithful, honourable and valued services to our Society as General Secretary for the past nineteen years.

During this long period you have laboured with untiring energy to improve the condition of your fellow Members.

We wish to place on record that you were the first General Secretary appointed to our Society in September 1872, and we would take this opportunity of mentioning some of the principal events which have taken place during the time you have held this important office, viz:– The Bonus was obtained, 1872: Great Arbitration, 1879: Enrolment of the Society, 1889: Brass-workers re-union, 1889: Great Strike and Bonus restored, 1890: Increased Bonus to 20 per cent obtained. Bonus paid to Members only, 1896: Conciliation Boards and Alliances formed, 1896