1872 — "For Improvements in Fire-Arms" [England], 25 July 1872. Manuscript Victorian patent document on vellum, folded and docketed, a rare and excellent example of a patent of invention for a guns, granted to William Edward Blake of New York City. Large printed document completed in manuscript and measuring approximately 76 x 51 cm, with original blue paper revenue stamp for five pounds, and a double-sided yellow wax seal measuring 16 cm in diameter. Small perforation at fold, age-toning to verso, otherwise in very good and original condition, a lovely and bright document, as issued, with a scarce large Victorian wax seal in its original round tin case. A round black tin container houses the massive double-sided yellow wax seal, diameter 16 cm (6.25 inches), attached to the document by original red plaited cords, one side being the Great Seal of the Realm, the other being Queen Victoria seated on a fully caparisoned royal horse. Diminutive fissures to sides of seal, otherwise in very good original condition, with vivid and crisp wax impression. The Commissioners of Patents' Journal, September 1872 issue, records this patent, no. 2224, being granted provisional protection for six months, as also stated in the document itself. Rare official patent document for an invention for "improvements in fire-arms" valid for fourteen years and issued to William Edward Blake, an inventor from New York City. Patent number 2224 was valid in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Channel Islands, and Isle of Wight, with the condition that the specified stamp duty payments were remitted at the times specified, one hundred pounds being payable in the seventh year after the initial patent issue date, for example. Excerpt from the patent: "... Whereas William Edward Blake of the City of New York, United States of America, hath by his petition humbly represented to Us that he is in possession of an Invention for Improvements in Firearms, which the inventor believes will be of great public utility, that he is the first and true inventor thereof... that the same is not in use by any other..." End Excerpt In the following year, 1873 William Edward Blake would receive at least one patent from the United States Patent Office, "for improvements to gun-stocks and spades, patent number 135,624." Blake described this dual-purposed instrument to be especially useful to American soldiers, in particular the Corps of Royal Sappers, Miners, and Engineers, by reducing the weight and number of tools carried over long distances. In essence he devised a two-in-one gun and spade by affixing a small shovel to the gun-stock which served dually as the shoulder rest when firing. It is conceivable that the present patent, valid in the United Kingdom, was for the same apparatus. Little is revealed about Mr. Blake in the present document, apart from his American citizenship and skill in manufacturing firearms for improved efficiency. Further research, however, may find the inventor to be a relation or even a partner of other Blake family gun makers. For example, John Henry Blake, was the manufacturer of a bolt action 7-shot revolving magazine sporting rifle, which was similar to a military type tested by an Ordnance Board of Governor's Island, New York, in July 1891. Blake, P. & E. W. of New Haven, Connecticut, manufactured Model 1821 muskets; the two partners are believed to have been the nephews of Eli Whitney Sr., and also to have been the trustees of the Whitney Armory from 1823 until Eli Whitney Jr. came of age in 1842. And earlier, the firm French, Blake and Kinsley, musket makers, secured a contract for 4,000 stand of arms on 20 October 1808, having delivered at least 2,175 units by 7 October 1812. The Great Seal of the Realm or Great Seal of the United Kingdom (prior to the Treaty of Union the Great Seal of England, then until the Union of 1801 the Great Seal of Great Britain) is a seal that is used to symbolize the Sovereign's approval of important state documents. Sealing wax is melted in a metal mould or matrix and impressed into a wax figure that is attached by cord or ribbon to documents that the monarch wishes to make official. Queen Victoria had to select four different Great Seal designs during the sixty-three years of her reign. England's patent law began to be criticized in the 1850s, for obstructing research and benefiting the few at the expense of public good. According to historian Adrian Johns, the campaign "remains to this day the strongest ever undertaken against intellectual property", coming close to abolishing patents altogether. Despite much public debate, the system wasn't abolished, though it was reformed with the Patent Law Amendment Act of 1852. This simplified the procedure for obtaining patents, reduced fees and created one office for the entire United Kingdom, instead of different systems for England and Wales and Scotland. Around the same time, however, an anti-patent movement began to take shape, and would continue until the early 1870s, spirred by inventors, entrepreneurs, and radical laissez-faire economists. Prominent activists included Isambard Kingdom Brunel, William Robert Grove, William Armstrong and Robert A. MacFie. A new sequence for numbering patents also began in October 1852. Patents applied for between October and December 1852 were numbered from 1-1211. For each subsequent year patents were numbered in annual sequences beginning with the number 1. This system was in place until 1915. Manuscript
