Description:The St Albans Female Friendly Society Medal was ordered from Matthew Boulton by Lady Dowager Spencer in 1803. She specified that each Lady's membership number should appear in the centre (this appears as 200 on the designs). Boulton's medal ledger records that 200 medals were provided at a cost of £10 and that the dies cost £2/12/6. An example of one of the tokens is on display at Soho House Museum.
This image is from the Phillp album, a collection of watercolours and sketches by John Phillp (c.1778-1815). Phillp may have been Matthew Boulton's son but the evidence is inconclusive. He was born in Falmouth, Cornwall and came to Soho in 1793. Boulton paid for William Hollins to teach him architectural drawing in 1795. During his time at Soho he produced designs for silver, plate, medals and tokens.
Conservation and cleaning had to be undertaken on the album before it could be scanned and this was carried out as part of the Digital Handsworth Project.