London’s Royal Exchange

The above image shows London’s ‘old’ Royal Exchange, which was destroyed by fire in 1838. It is the second of three Royal Exchange buildings to have occupied the current site, the first one having been destroyed by the Great Fire of London in 1666. The ‘new’ Royal Exchange, the current one, was opened by Queen Victoria in 1844, and a contemporary image of the building is shown below.

The reason for this history lesson, is due to my discovery of several coloured copperplate images of the Royal Exchange buildings that I bought at an auction over twenty years ago. I recently came across them while sorting through a chest (which itself is something of an antique) containing miscellaneous papers that I was intending to throw away. I have scanned all of the smaller images, and these are displayed on this site’s ‘Scanography’ page. The scanned images do not do justice to the originals, some of which are dated in the 1700s, and which are all rather beautiful. I have displayed them on ‘Beyond 1984’ just out of interest, and I would be grateful for any feedback on their rarity, and value.