So clue number two to the theme for this week was the name of the inn, which was the Crown.
A crown was the highest value coin you could get, and it was worth five shillings (or five bob). You could also get a half-crown, which was worth two shillings and sixpence.
I still do not know whether series one and two, the two twenty five card sets, are the same as the fifty card set? Nor who the artist was?
Richard Lloyd was founded in 1875. However, by the time this set was issued, as the reverse of this card tells us, it was but a branch of Cope Brothers of London and Liverpool. And had been so for twenty-three years.
Our original World Tobacco Issues Index gives the measurements, 65 x 36 m/m, and the fact that the cards are numbered, plus the most important information that this is one of three sets of “Old Inns”.
A1 was titled, or as appears in that book inscribed “Old English Inns”. The cards have a green back and there are twenty five in the set.
A2 was inscribed “Old Inns Series Two” and it is again a set of twenty five cards. However the backs are in blue.
B was inscribed “Old Inns”, but is a set of fifty cards. And again the backs are in blue.
The A1, A2, and B categories also appear in the London Cigarette Card Company catalogue for 1950. They also give the dates, which are 1923, 1924 and 1925 respectively. They retailed the odds at 2d each for the first set of twenty five and the set of fifty, whilst the second series of twenty five was a shilling a card. As far as the prices for sets, the first series was 6/- a set, the second 30/-, and the set of fifty cards 10/- because it was a set of fifty.