Valentine card: P.14384-R

Titles

Valentine card

Maker(s)

Publisher: Mansell, Joseph

Entities

• Valentine card

Categories

• Print

Description

8vo-size collage of white silk leaves, flower swags on embossed, silvered paper, hand-coloured, cut-paper figures on gauze clouds and turquoise and pearl beads mounted on a white silk panel edged with gilded lace paper. The card has been cut from its backing sheet and is laid down on a piece of heavy, cream card which has been cut down from a larger piece. Lace-paper medallions at upper and lower centre with hand-written verse and motto in blue ink: 'Time cannot change or sever / A heart that's thine for ever'; 'Love'. A maker's stamp could not be found on the paper, although the similarity in style of the handwritten verse/mottoes, silk panel, embossed silver swags and hand-coloured cut paper figure(s) with other valentines in the collection, P.14410-R-22 and P.14342-R-79, both of which are marked as by Joseph Mansell, would suggest that this valentine is also by Mansell, made around the same date. On the verso, written in graphite in a modern hand onto the card mount are dimensions as follows: '10 6/10 x 8 1/10 / 1 1/2 all round'. Another faint graphite inscription: '2 wm / 1852'. This inscription relates to a watermark found on the valentine and firmly identifies it as that which is described in a letter to Glaisher from J.C. Acton dated 1st April, 1925: ‘Dear Sir, I have found a really beautiful jewelled Valentine, the best I have seen - ; I am sending it for you to look at – It is so very perfect – (only one ‘jewel’ missing – _and_ it has a watermark with date – 1852 - / The price of this one is £1.00 / The Cobweb one is scarce - 7.6 [7 shillings and sixpence] / Railway train 7.6 [7 shillings and sixpence] / Cupid’s dream 5 [5 shillings] / 3 small ones 7 the 3 [7 shillings for the 3] / 1 in box 5 [5 shillings] / I hope some of them will be different to what you have- / yours faithfully / J.C. Acton.’. See Valentinesarchive1. J.C. Acton was one of the daughters of the Brighton-based dealer, Walter Acton from whom Glaisher procured many of the valentines in his collection. The Actons frequently sent Glaisher valentines on approval and he also visited their shop during trips to Brighton. One of the Misses Acton, presumably J.C. Acton, had her own collection of valentines of which Glaisher was very envious and from which he persuaded her to sell him some: 'I got her even to take one out of her album.'. See Fitzwilliam Museum, MS 892-1985, 14 September, 1924, letter to Miss Catherine Parsons (written on headed notepaper from The Grand Hotel, Brighton). The Acton's 'jewelled Valentine' is most likely the valentine described as 'the pearl one' in a letter from Glaisher to Parsons where it had apparently been suggested by Parsons that this valentine be framed. See Fitzwilliam Museum, MS 939-1985, 12th April 1925, letter to Miss Catherine Parsons: 'I quite agree about the Acton one in its box & about framing the pearl one …'. Of the valentines listed in the letter from J.C. Acton, it has been possible to trace three other valentines, in addition to the 'jewelled Valentine', to Glaisher's collection: _Cupid's Dream_, P.14383-R; Stevengraph sachet valentine, P.14366-R, which is almost certainly the valentine described as 'Railway train' in the list and P.14603-R, the '1 in box' which is inscribed on the box lid in Glaisher's hand: 'Miss Acton's valentine'. P.14384-R was included in the exhibition of valentine cards, _For ever thine: the nineteenth century valentine_, held in the Charrington Print Room at the Fitzwilliam Museum in 1995, no. 52.

Legal notes

Bequeathed by Dr J. W. L. Glaisher, 1928