Lets start with a quick chat about our meetings :
LONDON BRANCH warmly welcomes you to “The Carpenters Arms” - at 12, Seymour Place, Marble Arch, Central London W1H 7NE – its only a five minute walk from Marble Arch Underground Station (which is on the Central Line, and inside Travelcard Zone 1)
Our meetings take place every month, starting at 5 pm, in a room upstairs from the public house.
There is always the opportunity for collectors to purchase cards from other collectors, or swap, and usually at least one dealer in attendance with a good stock of cards.
We also hold an auction, every time, which starts at 6.15, and has approximately 100 lots, many of which are brought to the meeting on the day by our members. So we never know what will go under the hammer. We take 10% of the proceeds from each lot for club funds, which is used to pay for the Christmas buffet and
We do not charge any admission fees, and you do not have to be a Society member to attend - so if you work in London, or are visiting the capital for the day, why not pop in? You will quickly find that this is a very friendly Branch which welcomes new faces, and will hopefully become a more regular visitor....
Our meeting dates calendar for 2026 is
- Monday 19th January
- Thursday 19th February
- Monday 16th March
- Thursday 23rd April
- Monday 18th May
- Thursday 18th June
- Monday 20th July
- Thursday 20th August
- Monday 21st September
- Thursday 22nd October (our AGM)
- Monday 16th November
- Monday 21st December
Some notes from our archives....
Most people believe that as soon as the Cameric Club was founded in 1935, and started meeting at the Bonnington Hotel in London on a regular basis, this was their London Branch. However it was not. And nor did it begin when they moved it to Caxton Hall in 1939.
The truth is that London was only ever where the main Council meetings took place. And it is not until 1963 that any mention of a London Branch is made. Indeed, looking back through the "Cartophilic World" magazines, we find that these had always previously said, simply, "Cameric Club Meetings are to be held at Caxton Hall, Westminster". Then quite suddenly, in the "Cartophilic World" magazine dated July-August 1963 (Vol.15 No.166) it reads : "London Branch. Meetings are to be held at Caxton Hall, Westminster on the following dates - Monday 26th of August 1963, and Thursday 10th of October 1963".
So that means that the first ever true "London Branch meeting" was on the 26th of August 1963.
There is a further piece in the same magazine, which explains further, saying :
- "Still more change. The Cameric Cigarette Card Club has decided to form a London Branch, so that their committee can devote itself to the Club`s general policy, leaving the London Branch to look after its own affairs."
Therefore it was as a Cameric Branch that it appears in the first ever edition of "Cartophilic Notes and News", January/February 1965, Volume 1, Number 1, on page 19, where you will find the following announcement :
- BRANCHES. Members who were not previously members of the Cameric Club are, of course, now entitled to attend any Branch Meeting of the Cameric and are assured a very hearty welcome. If you live anywhere near London, Leeds, Manchester or Birmingham, do go along and introduce yourself. You will find them a friendly crowd. Spend an enjoyable evening and acquire a few cards for your collection."
The inside back cover of that edition has a table of dates, for these four branches - and some other information, which reads :
- LONDON BRANCH
Secretary - Mr. F.H. Pitts
New Malden, Surrey.
Meeting Dates :
Monday, 15th Feb
Tuesday, 9th Mar
Friday, 2nd April
Wednesday, 19th May
Wednesday, 9th June
Thursday, 1st July
Friday, 23rd July
Thursday, 12th Aug
Thursday, 2nd Sept
* Saturday, 25th Sept *
Monday, 18th Oct
Wednesday, 17th Nov
Monday, 6th Dec
Thursday, 30th Dec
All at 6 p.m. at Caxton Hall, Westminster, S.W.1
except * Branch A.G.M. 10 a.m. - 6 p.m
During the 1970s we used to meet on either Mondays or Fridays, from 6 pm until 9 pm. At that time our Branch Secretary was Roy Wheeler who used to live in Pinner.
In 1980 we issued a set of “London Branch Personalities” cards. These were standard sized, with black and white images to the front, of officials and prominent collectors who attended our meetings; the backs had “London Branch Personalities” in a top oval, followed by the subject`s name and notes about their collecting specialities on the backs.
Card number one commemorated Fred Piper, who had died that year. A full list of the other cards in the set can be found at: http://www.nslists.com/80lond.htm
We stayed at Caxton Hall until March 1984; it was not our choice to leave, but it was closing at the end of the month, an event not entirely unexpected, as the registry office, previously used by so many stars and celebrities, had been closed since 1978, and the building was slowly being abandoned around us giving us the sense of meeting in an old deserted and spooky house. We were still all very sad, as a lot of us had spent many pleasant hours there with all the card events we had visited; the Cartophilic Society’s Annual General Meeting, as well as the Britannia and London Cigarette Card Company auctions. However we were heartened by the fact it would not be demolished, it would be turned into new homes, flats and offices. Little did we realise that the building would continue to moulder away behind locked and silent doors, and conversion would not start to take place until 2006.
Anyway with the closure of the Caxton Hall, our branch meetings, and the Cartophilic Society`s own 1984 Annual General Meeting had to relocate. We chose to go to the Eccleston Hotel near Victoria Station.
The following year we celebrated our Golden Jubilee, with a meeting on the 28 September 1985, and we issued this one off commemorative card to mark the event.
You can read more at https://csgb.co.uk/cardoftheday/2023-06-21
Oddly, the card states "50 years, of the London Branch", but gives the date as "1935-1985"
1988 was the Golden Jubilee of the Cartophilic Society, to celebrate this an exhibition and lunch took place at London`s Barbican on, October 15. This included three displays of cards from 1888, 1938 and 1988. All members attending the lunch received a special souvenir, a postcard sized copy of “The Marquis of Lorne” card (as shown on this more recent cover) which at that time was the earliest dated card in existence.
At the end of 1988 we decided to move on from the Eccleston Hotel, and our January 16, 1989 meeting took place at the Victory Services Club in Seymour Street, close to Marble Arch tube station. These were much more accessible premises, and also half the rent; we celebrated our move with a sixty lot auction. You can read the story of the VSC at https://www.vsc.co.uk/about-us/our-story
In The "Card Times" Magazine for December 1994, I have unearthed an advance notice for their seasonal Christmas Meeting, which was to be held on Monday 12th of December at 5pm, in the El Alamein Room of the Victory Services - just two minutes from Marble Arch. There was a bumper auction at 6.30 pm, free dealers tables, and free Christmas Cheer. I am not sure whether this was the first ever such event, but as I work through the magazines in my library I will find out ...
1995 was the 60th anniversary of the Cartophilic Society and we decided to mark the event by issuing another set of cards; this second series of “London Branch Personalities” is now of twenty cards, and has “1935 1995” in the formerly blank bottom bar. A list of all the personalities appears at : http://www.nslists.com/95lond.htm
In 1998 we were involved with the Sixtieth Anniversary Celebrations of the Cartophilic Society. This card was given away to members at the special celebration, and what could be more fitting for a subject than Andertons Hotel, where The Society was first discussed all those years ago?
On the 29th of April, 2000 we celebrated the Millennium by hosting the Cartophilic Society AGM at Watford Leisure Centre. We had hoped to go to a location in Central London, but costs were too steep. It was also a sad day because the Society President Edward “Ted” Knight, as shown here, was retiring. He was very pleased with being the subject of this commemorative card, and that the new President, Derek Jenkins, presented him with an enlarged and framed copy.
Shortly after that we left the Victory Services Club, we settled into our current home, a very comfortable, Victorian-themed snug, complete with Chesterfield sofas, called “The Carpenters Arms”. The hostelry was established in 1776, rebuilt in 1872, and is now coincidentally the HQ of another “London Branch”, that of CAMRA, the Campaign for Real Ale – in fact, we perhaps ought to let you know they feature six different guest ales every month!
In 2009 we again co-hosted the Cartophilic Convention with Hants and Surrey. This time even Watford was too costly, but this time things had increased far enough to push us to the border of the M25. Anyway it was the first time we had visited Surrey. We eventually decided on The Xcel Leisure Centre in Walton On Thames, and we had high hopes, in fact, our Commemorative Card, says it “…is expected to be one of the biggest ever….” This year, President Jenkins gave his final report, because he was retiring; being sworn in was his replacement, current Vice President Walton and a member of our club. A wag or two found the similarity in name of our new President and our location to be amusing. But why is it every time we bring the Society Convention to our area, we are having a Presidential changeover?
On Monday March 16, 2020 we met as usual, but under strange and straightened circumstances. Coronavirus was taking a grip and we had only half the usual number of attendances. Our “bring and buy” auction still raised £300, but we decided that we would suspend the future meetings “for the time being”. At the time we actually said “Let us all hope it is not be long before we can return…”
But as of August 2020 we still could not....
In 2025 our long standing Club Secretary, Oliver Sanders, stepped down. Our new Secretary is another Oliver, Oliver Sanders, who is a regular dealer at many card fairs, including our own annual Card Convention. We also said farewell to Treasurer Derek Heywood, and Chairman Steve Crowther - whose seat is now occupied by Brian Shorthouse and David Roche, respectively.