Circa 1905
Height of bust: 19cm (7.5in)
Copper. Bronzed bust on stepped copper base inscribed 'Made of Copper / from / Nelson's Flagships', and ‘Presented by / British & Foreign / Sailors Society’, the whole mounted on a turned ebonsied base bearing a brass plaque inscribed 'Presented by the Directors of the British and Foreign Sailors Society to J. Shaw Tomkins Esq, Honourable Secretary and Treasurer of the Great Yarmouth Branch as a token of appreciation of his service to the Society’
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The copper is a mixture of that stripped from the 80-gun third-rate ship-of-the-line Foudroyant in to which Nelson transferred his flag after the Battle of the Nile, and H.M.S. Victory. Foudroyant was finally wrecked in 1897 in a storm off Blackpool where she was being exhibited as a historical relic of the hero and the sailing navy. Victory as a continuously commissioned ship of the Royal Navy underwent periodic refits and was thus an ongoing source of such material.