More of our Victoriana collection
The Museum has a reasonably good collection of Victorian boxes and on this page we aim to show you some more of them. New boxes are being added all the time, so check back regularly.
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On the left you can see our oldest box, this superb Second National Standard No.2 Small Wallbox by Smith & Hawkes of Birmingham. Made in 1859, they were an improvement on the First National Standard with a flap and the delightful Pedimented Hood to help keep the rain out. There are still around 30 of these on the streets and several in museum collections. When first introduced, this box would have been painted bronze green. It was not until 1860 that red started to appear and it took a full ten years to repaint all of the boxes around the country.
Our 2nd National Standard was one of three originally owned by Bill Sait, a prodigious colector who sadly died in 1997. We now have six of Bill's 116 boxes in the collection, all either Victorian or Edwardian.
Below left is a line up of early Victorian wall boxes. Yes, I know it says "GR" on that one, but believe me, it is Victorian. In fact it is unique and was formerly located at Wrexham in Clywd. At some point the VR cipher was ground off and the replacement letters GR were screwed on. No one really knows why, and it is the only box known in this condition in the UK. It was made by Bernard P Walker at the Eagle Foundry in Birmingham in 1880 (WB82/5). We have recently acquired an "unmodified" version of the box which is on display, although not shown here.
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| Above right is another unusual box; made in 1881 by W T Allen of London, it resulted from an incorrectly read specification. Instead of being 10" wide and 13" deep, it is 13" wide and only 10" deep (Oh, sorry, for those under 30, 1"=2.24cm). 70 boxes were made and put into service before the mistake was rectified (WB86). |
Above are four more early boxes.From the left these are:
WB77 Smith & Hawkes No.1 Large size of 1861
WB78 Smith & Hawkes No.2 Small of 1861
WB 83/1 Smith & Hawkes type C of 1871
WB 83/2 Bernard P Walker type C of 1874
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Originally there were just two sizes of wall box "Large No.1" and "Small No.2 ", but by 1871 the very large wall box had been introduced and this became Type A. The old No 1 became Type B and the old No.2 became Type C. You can see our large A size box below. In the picture above the smaller boxes show some interesting changes as the collection time plate moves from a position at the top of the box to the door. This made it easier to remove the plate for changes or replacement. The tablet holders on all of these are later additions. Incidentally, Smith & Hawkes, Bernard P Walker and Eagle Range & Foundry Co are actually the same factory in Birmingham; it just changed hands rather frequently during this period!
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A size Wall box (WB84/1)
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B size wall box (WB85/2)
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C size wall box (WB87/1MA)
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Eagle Range "ludlow" (LWB 152/2)
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2nd type of Lamp Box (LB202)
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Above left you can see the A, B and C size boxes in roughly the right proportions to each other. Notice on the small C size box the aperture has been modified to accept larger envelopes. That was a 1960s modification to 10,000 mostly Victorianand Edwardian boxes accomplished over three years by one man with a Land Rover and an oxyacetylene torch! And to close this section, I've included the superb Victorian "Ludlow" front by Eagle Range & Foundry with enamel plate by Chromo of Wolverhampton (LWB152/2) and the cute little Victorian lamp post mounted box (LB202). An earlier version had the "Only" omitted and is extremely rare, just one example is left in service in deepest Kent. You can see more Ludlows in their special section here.
Another recent addition is another Victorian box, although this is not obvious to a casual observer. To see it click here.
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