| Description | Correspondence and Memoranda.
The General Letter Books form two series. The first series covers the period 1805-1809; there is then a gap of eleven years before the beginning of the second series, which is complete to 1845. The two volumes in the first series are entitled "Mint Consignment Letter Book" (1805-1807) and "Mint Office, Soho, Letter Book" (1807-1808).
The volumes in the second series are each entitled "Mint and Coinage Letter Book." Inside the front cover of the letter book, 1820-1823, is the following explanatory memorandum in the hand of Zaccheus Walker Jr.: "N.B. All copies of letters previous to the 1st January 1820 have been folded up along with the letters received,—for which see boxes containing the correspondence." Below this John Robinson has added: "Copies of letters relative to cash agency transactions from above date to September 7, 1820, will be found in the Private and Household letter book." This clearly indicates that this book began a new series, and that the copy letters for the period immediately prior to the year 1820 were not pasted into books, but folded up with the incoming letters. A letter book for the period 29 Apr. 1830-1 May 1831 may be wanting.
The remaining letter book contains copies of correspondence with George Harrison of the Treasury, with copy lists of orders for coin.
The Memorandum Books are of various descriptions and do not form a series. The most important of these is the first, entitled "Memoranda, Calculations, Estimates, and Charges, of Coinage and Coinage Machinery."
The Mint and Coinage Correspondence for 1799 is a large series of letters, divided into monthly bundles. The majority of the letters are from firms or individuals ordering or paying for casks of pennies and halfpennies. There are also many letters from Zaccheus Walker at Soho, again about orders for coins. There are also twelve monthly bundles of press copies of the replies to these letters, written in the main by William Cheshire on Matthew Boulton’s behalf. There is also a large bundle of general correspondence, mostly about supplies of copper, and a bundle of press copies of general outgoing letters. All these letters came to the Assay Office in a large wooden box marked "Mint and Coinage Correspondence 1799."
Following the files for 1799, loose general Mint Correspondence have been found for several years from 1821 to 1844, but this series is not complete. Most of the letters are addressed to John Robinson and Joseph Westley, and many deal with the supply of copper to the Mint.
The bundle of Zaccheus Walker’s correspondence relating to the Royal Mint found its way out of the Matthew Boulton Papers at some point. The new owner pasted the letters into a volume, which was purchased by Birmingham Library in 1924. It was added to the Boulton & Watt collection, but has now been restored to its original home. It contains letters from M. R. Boulton, Master of the Mint W. W. Pole, Deputy Master J. W. Morrison, James Lawson and George Rennie.
The mint agents also kept files of correspondence and memoranda relating to Overseas Mints. The first file, for the Calcutta Mint, was opened by Zaccheus Walker, and closed not long after his death in 1822. The second file, relating to both the Calcutta and Bombay Mints, consists of a large amount of material kept by John Robinson and later Joseph Westley. This file may be a later amalgam of several smaller files. The Assay Office removed the Bombay material and mixed it in with Matthew Robinson Boulton’s Special Correspondence relating to the Bombay Mint, but the papers have now been re-united. Both these files contain letters, estimates, notes, calculations etc., particularly relating to the ordering and manufacture of the parts of the various mints from subcontractors such as Boulton Watt & Co.
Various smaller bundles of correspondence and papers relating to various Coinages were also found, including one for the Guernsey coinage, two for coinages for J. Colville, and a miscellaneous bundle.
The files of Cashier’s Memoranda contain miscellaneous correspondence, memoranda, inventories, and so on, particularly documents made or used in connection with the making up of the books. The contents of these files have been numbered precisely in the order in which they were arranged in the bundles. Possibly some of these documents belong more properly with the Cashier’s Vouchers, described above.
There are also various Miscellaneous Papers which were found scattered through the collection and whose place in the order of the records has been lost. |