Card of the Day - 2021-11-09

This may be a terribly tatty Taddy but it just happens to be the only Taddy Card I own. It came to me in a mixed lot and I never had the heart to part with it.

Taddy isued three groups of Royalty cards, but this is the first we will deal with. It  is a set of twenty-five cards, which were actually entitled ”Royalty Series” - this is stated to have been issued with “Backs in Myrtle Green, with advertisement for “Myrtle Grove” Tobacco.

Now I thought that was a bit odd, because I was sure my back was blue, and indeed it is, but not only is it not green, it is entirely different, having the advert for variously sized tins of “Premier Navy Cut [Tobacco], Mild Medium and Full Strengths”.

In addition there is no illustration of this back within our original Taddy reference book (RB12, issued in 1948). There is an illustration of a “Premier Navy Cut” back which accompanies “Natives of the World”, but it it much more modern in style, or it could be the back that is quoted for “Boer Leaders” which states “Taddy`s Premier Navy Cut” but does not describe further so might be the same as the one which is shown. Are there any Taddy experts who can clarify this?

There were also two smaller groups, the first being a small five card set(?) which was untitled and un-numbered, and early researchers gave that the name of English Royalty, the cards show Queen Victoria and the two generations below her, these being King Edward VII and King George V, plus their Queens – whilst the second is usually considered as part of a mixed lot known as “Royalty, Actresses, Soldiers” which are again un-numbered and untitled. The Royalty cards in that lot were the Emperors and Empresses of Austria and Germany, the King and Queen of Italy, the Czar and Czarina of Russia, and our own Prince and Princess of Wales. This seems to cover European Royalty, so I tend to lean towards the original theory, that this was a set all its own of ten cards, perhaps with that name, and that the Actresses and Soldiers were also supposed to be alone as separate sets.

I seriously think we need a Taddy specialist to get in touch!