FREEMASONS. (Photograph Album.) Presented to Bro. H. Bond. As a mark of esteem & regard by the officers & past masters of the Avondale Lodge No. 2395. On his retirement from the Master's chair. 26th February 1902. 1902
4to photograph album, 16 double-sided mounting leaves with 22 10 x 16cm carte de visite portraits of Lodge members inserted; some spotting to images. Full padded calf impressed with snake-skin pattern, overlapping edges, fold-over band with metal clip. The wording is inscribed on a silver label on front board. Back board shows indenting from being placed on other books; some sl. marking, but a very nice example of a presentation album.
¶There are two Avondale lodges, No. 2389 in Middlewich, Cheshire and No. 2395, originally based in Brixton London, at the Clarence Rooms, Coldharbour Lane. Both were established in 1891 and named after the Duke of Clarence and Avondale otherwise Prince Albert Victor of Wales, eldest son of the future King Edward VII. Clarence was initiated as a mason in 1885 and died in 1892. He had been implicated in the 'Cleveland Street Scandal', centred on a homosexual brothel and his name has been put forward as a possible candidate for the Jack the Ripper murders - or that a group of freemasons killed Mary Kelly to prevent her stating publicly that Clarence, heir to the throne in 1888, had fathered a child by her.
Stock #77116
£225
46, Great Russell Street - (opp. British Museum) - Bloomsbury, London WC1B 3PA
