A Bound Collection, or Sammelband of Mid-Nineteenth Century Pamphlets Regarding Life Assurance and Insurance, Its Provision, and Controversies

Consisting of 10 pamphlets, details as follows: 1) Life Assurance: Its Schemes Its Difficulties and Its Abuses. W. S. D. Pateman, London, 1852. 29 pages + 3 of ads. 2) The Elements of Success of a Life Assurance Agency. Fourth edition, 16 pages. 3) Christie, Robert Letter To The Right Hon. Joseph W. Henley, M.P., President of the Board of Trade, Regarding Life Assurance Institutions. Thomas Constable and Co., Edinburgh, 1852. 47 pages. 4) Neison, Francis G. P. - Mr. Christie and The Law Property Assurance Society. John Crockford, London, 1852. 8 pages. 5) No. 1. Hints to the Agents and Friends of Assurance Offices, By The Spirits of Robert Christie, Esq., F.I.A.!! Manager of The Scottish Equitable Assurance Company, and William Newmarch, Esq., Secretary to the Globe Insurance Office. G. E. Petter, London 1852. 12 pages. 6) Strousberg, B. H. - Conspiracy Detected; In A Letter to the Right Hon. Joseph W. Henley, Esq., M.P., President of the Board of Trade. G. E. Petter, London 1852. Second edition. 29 pages. 7) Templar, A. Indisputably Disputed: A Review of The Professions and Practices of Certain Modern Life Offices Effingham Wilson, London, 1852. 76 pages. 8) Thomson, William Thos. F.R.S.E. On The Present Position of The Life Assurance Interests of Great Britain. William Blackwood and Sons, Edinburgh and London, 1852. 16 pages. 9) Beaumont, J. A. A Few Lines to The Managers of The Life Insurance Societies of The United Kingdom, Suggesting A Remedy For The Doubts and Difficulties Attendant Upon The Business of Life Insurance C. Rosworth and Sons, London, 1852. 14 pages. 10) Hartnoll, J. Hooper A Letter to the Right Hon. E. Cardwell, M. P., President of the Board of Trade, on the Inoperative Character of the Joint Stock Companies' Registration Act. As A Means of Preventing the Formation of Bubble Assurance Companies. W. S. D. Pateman, London, 1853. Second edition. 56 pages. The book is bound in contemporary Victorian reddish brown half-calf, over marbled paper covered boards, simply lettered and decorated in gilt to the spine, with yellow endpapers front and rear, and speckling to all edges of the text block. The text block itself is firm, the outer binding is heavily worn, the hinges are fragile and beginning to split, the leather is worn, rubbed and chipped, as is the marbled paper. The text block is lightly marked, with occasional annotations and underlining, the pamphlets are age toned to varying degrees depending upon the quality of the paper. With excellent provenance, originally the property of Francis Boyer Relton, who joined the Sun Insurance Office in 1835 as a boy, and remained there for 47 years, rising to the position of Office Secretary, and receiving the honour of being satirised in the novels of Eden Philpotts, with his ink ownership inscription to the front endpaper and to the title page of no. 8. Also, with the later Sun Fire Office Library stamp to the front endpaper, and more recently from the archives of the RSA Insurance Group with their barcode strip to the front pastedown. Relton became a historian of Insurance in retirement, and presumably donated his books to the library of his former company. A collection of pamphlets from an important period of development in the history of British life assurance, showing the conflict between the old established companies, and the proliferation of newer, undercapitalised companies, which were prone to run into debt and collapse, thus damaging the confidence in the potentially lucrative market they were attempting to enter. Leading gradually to Government legislation, and an increasing attempt to standardise and manage the risks within the insurance companies. The majority of pamphlets are rare in commerce, there are no readily locatable examples of nos. 2 and 7 in institutional holdings, and several of the others are limited to only 1 or 2 recorded surviving copies. No. 2 is of particular interest, it is anonymously published, and illustrativ. …