Issued to Joseph Turner Hutchinson

Triton XVI, Lot: 1624. Estimate $2000. Sold for $2600. This amount does not include the buyer’s fee.

HANOVER. George III. 1760-1820. AV Medal (42mm, 47.17 g, 1h). Beilby Porteus Prize Medal for Christ’s College at Cambridge. By J. Philip. Dually-dated 1808 and 1872 in Roman numerals on edge. GEORGIUS III PIUS FORTIS DEFENSOR FIDEI, laureate, draped, and armored bust left / OB INSIGNE INS S PUBLICE LEGENDIS ELOQUIUM (for his outstanding eloquence in publicly reading the Holy Scriptures), view of the gateway; in five lines in exergue, COLL CHRISTI PIETATIS/ERGO D ALUMNUS OLIM/BILBY PORTEUS/EPISC LOND/1808 (to Christ’s College out of loving duty, its late former student Beilby Porteus, Bishop of London). Edge: JOSEPHUS TURNER HUTCHINSON MDCCCLXXII. BHM 632; Eimer 991. EF, some marks on the obverse.

Awarded annually by Christ’s College for excellence in the reading of the Holy Scriptures, the Beilby Porteus medal carried the portrait of George III, who was the current monarch at the time of the medal’s inception. This particular medal, awarded in 1872, bears an inscription for Joseph Turner Hutchinson, who would later receive his B.A. thence the following year, and his M.A. in 1876. His legal and political career continued, as he served as Queen’s Advocate of the Gold Coast Colony from 1888-1889, and the Chief Justice there from 1889-1895. Knighted by Queen Victoria in 1895, he then served as the Chief Justice of Grenada, Cyprus, and Ceylon, before returning to his home as the High Sheriff of Cumberland in 1918.