Information Regarding Johnson Matthey & Co.

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Information Regarding Johnson Matthey & Co.

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JOHNSON MATTHEY & Co.


A topic for recording information regarding the important firm of smelters, refiners, assayers and metallurgical chemists, Johnson Matthey & Co..

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If you have any details of the above company, or their earlier entities, advertisements, details of the individuals involved, etc., anything that you are willing to share, then here's the place to post it.

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Re: Information Regarding Johnson Matthey & Co.

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Notice is hereby given, that the Partnership heretofore subsisting between us the undersigned, George Matthey, John Scudamore Sellon, Edward Matthey, Richard Davies Matthey, Percy St. Clair Matthey, John Scudamore Pybus Sellon, and Cyril George Rigby Matthey, carrying on business as Assayers and Metallurgical Chemists, at 79, Hatton-garden, in the county of London, under the style or firm of Johnson, Matthey, and Co., has been dissolved, by mutual consent, as and from the 13th day of April 1891, and that the business of the Partnership will henceforth be carried on by Johnson, Matthey, and Co. Limited, by whom all debts due from and to the Partnership will be paid and received.—Dated this 25th day of June, 1891.
GEORGE MATTHEY.
JOHN S. SELLON.
EDWARD MATTHEY.
RICHARD D. MATTHEY.
PERCY ST. CLAIR MATTHEY.
J. S. PYBUS SELLON.
CYRIL G. R. MATTHEY.


Source: The London Gazette - 21st July 1891

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Johnson Matthey & Co. Ltd. - London - 1920

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WHITE CITY THEFT

Platinum Worth £1,000. - A sensational robbery took place at the Franco-British Exhibition on Monday night, when a glass case in the machinery hall was broken open and two ingots of platinum, weighing 214 ounces, valued at £1,000, belonging to Messrs Johnson, Matthey, and Co., Hatton Garden, were stolen. There were other pieces of platinum in the case, but these were not removed. The total value of the contents of the case was £15,000. Mr Sellon, managing director of Messrs. Johnson, Matthey, and Co., Hatton Garden, stated the robbery of the firm's ingots took place late on Monday night, and was discovered before midnight. He was only informed about it on Tuesday morning. The two platinum ingots were each about 20in.long, and weighed together 214 ounces. Their value was £1,000. The stolen property was insured.


Source: The Cardiff Times - 24th October 1908

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Johnson Matthey & Co. Ltd. - London - 1920

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A CLERK'S ROBBERIES

Edward John Wakefield, 37, clerk, pleaded guilty at the Clerkenwell Sessions, London. yesterday, to having stolen 28oz. of gold and silver metal, value £91 15s., and fifty-one pieces of gold, worth £20, belonging to his employers, Messrs. Johnson, Matthey and Co. (Limited), gold refiners and assayers, of Hatton-garden. Prisoner had been for over twenty years a trusted employe, having started as an errand boy. On September 10 Wakefield called at the premises of Messrs. Bryer and Sons. refiners, of Barbican, London, and presented for sale an ingot of gold, valued at £91 15s. One of the assistants in the office where he received payment recognised him as an employe of the prosecutors, and communication being at once made to them the prisoner was arrested, and made a full confession, telling how for years by the systematic stealing of tiny particles of gold he had substantially added to his income, and how, when he had enough pieces to melt down into a valuable ingot, he used a blow-pipe and a crucible to transform innumerable fragments into one solid block. Receipts found at his house showed that in December, 1897, he received £88 for the sale of gold; in January 1898, £118 14s.; in August, 1900, £79 5s.; and in October, 1900, £85 16s. In addition there was discovered £20 worth of irregularly shaped scraps of gold locked up in the safe, together with two £20 notes.

His lordship ordered the accused to be imprisoned in the second division for twelve months.


Source: Evening Express - 3rd October 1901

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Johnson, Matthey & Co. Limited - London - 1903

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GOLD IN CROWNS AND HALF-CROWNS

The Deputy-Master of the Mint states in his report recently issued that much of the worn silver coin in course of withdrawal from circulation contains gold in sufficient quantity to render its extraction profitable, under the present improved methods of refining. Last year worn crowns and half-crowns withdrawn from circulation, weighing 117,048 ounces, were subjected to the process of refinage, in order that the gold contained in them might be extracted before they were melted for re-coinage, and 81.27 ounces of gold were recovered. No refinery being now attached to the Mint the operation was performed by Messrs. Johnson, Matthey, and Co., the well-known metallurgists, at a charge which left a margin of profit sufficient to justify the Mint in the course pursued.


Source: The Aberystwith Observer - 23rd August 1873

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Some detail of the New York branch, Johnson, Matthey & Company, Inc.

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Johnson, Matthey & Company, Inc. - New York - 1922

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DEATHS

PYBUS-SELLON - On May 23rd, off Lisbon, Mr. J.S. Pybus-Sellon of the firm of Messrs. Johnson, Matthey & Co., platinum dealers and chemical merchants, Hatton Garden. Aged 36. The late Mr. Pybus-Sellon was educated at Eton and Paris, and had been a director of the firm of Messrs. Johnson, Matthey & Co. for about twelve years, his work being principally connected with the chemical department. The deceased gentleman had been in indifferent health for some time, and it was while returning from Brazil, where he had hoped to recuperate, that he died and was buried at sea.


Source: The Chemist and Druggist - 11th June 1898

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Johnson, Matthey & Co. Ltd. - London - 1905

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BENJAMIN CHARLES STAPLES

Benjamin Charles Staples entered at an unusually early age the service of the eminent assayers and metallurgists, Messrs. Johnson and Matthey, and having shown an aptitude for figures, Mr. Percival Norton Johnson was not long in discovering his talent, and finding an employment suited to his taste in the assay offices connected with his business.

The young assayer found, with the growth of the business surrounding him, that much might be done to simplify the process of working out his results, for himself as well as for others of less arithmetical ability, and conceived the notion of tabulating his calculations, which had assumed the form of voluminous detail, in manuscript; these he re-arranged with peculiar accuracy, spending the leisure of some six or seven years in the laborious work, and the results were considered so trustworthy and of such value that, with the sanction of Messrs. Johnson and Matthey, he published them, and they now (as 'Staples’ Tables) form the text-book of the assay offices generally in England, those of the Indian and Colonial Mints, and of most foreign establishments of eminence connected with the bullion trade.

After about 25 years’ service with this firm, Mr. Staples was elected by them to fill a vacancy occurring in the assay office of the Goldsmiths’ Company in January, 1864, which he retained until his premature death. His ability was there, as in his former sphere of work, duly appreciated, and the Court elected him a freeman of the Goldsmiths’ Company without the usual fees.

He had been in bad health for some time prior to his death, and having been thrown out of a phaeton, sustained such a serious shock to his nervous system that he never recovered from it, and finally succumbed to the fatal malady of consumption on the 26th April, 1872, at the early age of 45 years.


Source: Journal of the Chemical Society - 1873

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Details of Johnson Matthey's display at the Vienna Exhibition of 1873:

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Johnson, Matthey & Co. - Vienna - 1873

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OF INTEREST TO SCIENTIFIC INVESTIGATORS

A well-known London firm of assayers and metallurgists, Messrs. Johnson, Matthey and Co.. of Hatton garden, announce that, in furtherance of scientific research, professors and recognised scientific investigators will with pleasure be supplied with metals of the platinum group, in moderate quantities, and for periods to be arranged, free of charge, on condition that the precious metals are ultimately returned (in any form), and that the results of the investigations are furnished.


Source: The Cambrian - 10th February 1899

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Percival Norton Johnson died on the 1st of June, 1866, aged 73. He was the only son of John Johnson, at one time the only commercial assayer in London; and after working with his father for some years, he established himself in Hatton Garden half a century ago.

He rapidly rose to the highest eminence as an assayer and metallurgist; and his opinion was so much sought after that he could hardly get through the work which crowded upon him.

It is not a little remarkable that the extreme accuracy of his assays was made a ground of objection to them. He for the first time reported the exact amount of gold and silver in the specimens submitted, whereas, before, the quantities had only been stated approximately; and this was not relished by the buyers of bullion, inasmuch as contingent advantages in buying upon exactly known value were not so great. Upon this being represented to him by the merchants, he at once stated that he was willing, if required, to purchase all bars upon his own assays ; and this was the reason of his taking up the refining business, in which he so largely and successfully engaged. His ability in this (as in all other branches that he entered upon) was soon recognized publicly; and when the gold bars from the Brazilian " Gongo Soco" mines, which came over in very large quantities, were refused at the Mint on account of brittleness, he was consulted on the matter, and undertook to refine and toughen them, in which he perfectly succeeded.

It was in this gold that he discovered the existence of palladium; and having succeeded in its separation, he introduced it commercially, at once determining and making known the best uses to which it could be applied.

After he had been in business some years he visited Germany, and was much interested in mining operations there, to which he gave special attention. It was at this time that he met with the compound alloy called "German silver," then in a very crude state of manufacture. He brought over with him some of the metal, analyzed it, and upon the basis of his analysis he commenced and carried on its manufacture, and introduced it to general use, laying the foundation of the enormous business which has since arisen in this branch of metallurgy.

About this time he was much engaged in mining pursuits, and was consulted upon, and visited professionally, nearly all the mines in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, and many important ones abroad. He was the first to introduce into Cornwall the German shaking-, jigging-, and washing-table, with important improvements of his own. He will always be remembered throughout the mining districts for his great kindness and consideration toward the miners, whose social condition it was his constant aim to improve. At great expense to himself, he erected schools in the neighbourhood of the mines, and took an active part in their supervision. He also used his utmost endeavours to alleviate the toil of the workmen in ascending and descending mines, and with this view he, at the Tamar mines, made the experiment of a sloping gallery, which ran for a considerable distance under the river, by which means the miners could walk up and down without the use of a ladder.

Amongst his many inventions of less note may be mentioned several pottery colours, amongst them the "rose-pink," at a time when that colour was much wanted in the potteries.

His greatest success, however, and that which has proved the most valuable to the progress of chemistry and manufacture generally, was the platinum business. To him undoubtedly belongs the credit of having been the first who successfully refined and manufactured platinum upon a commercial scale, and introduced it for the important purposes to which it is specially adapted. The first large and perfect sheet of pure platinum ever produced was made by Mr. Johnson at 79 Hatton Garden; and, seeing the immense importance of the metal, he ever since made it his speciality.

His eminence as an analyst should also be noticed; so great was it, that the only other commercial assayers in London, though his rivals, used to send him all compounds or minerals of a difficult and complicated nature to report upon for them.

Accomplished as he was in his department, and singularly successful in perfecting whatever he undertook, his opinion was always sought for with earnestness and received with confidence. Few men have worked more perseveringly and effectively for the improvement of their profession.

Mr. Johnson was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society on April 30, 1846.


Source: Proceedings - Royal Society of London - Volume 16 - 1868

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Johnson Matthey & Co. Ltd. - London - 1914

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GENTLEMEN WHO COMPOSED THE JURY OF THE PYX - 16th MARCH 1847:

William Bateman - Foreman
Jonathan Hayne
Percival Norton Johnson
George Smith Hayter
Benjamin Preston jnr.
Samuel Holditch Thomas Hayne
George Richard Johnson
Edward Barnard jnr.
Robert Hennell
James Henderson Watherston
Henry John Lias
Jeremiah Fuller

Source: Tables Shewing the Legally Appointed Weight of British Gold and Silver Coin - James H. Watherston - 1847

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Johnson, Matthey & Co. Limited - London - 1896

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Messrs. Johnson, Matthey, and Co., the old-established firm of assayers and refiners of the precious metals, have decided to register themselves as a joint stock company. The nominal capital (ordinary and preference shares in equal moieties) is £900,000, of which £750,000 is now issued, and £600,000 paid up, leaving an uncalled liability on the ordinary shares of £150,000. The whole of the issued capital is taken up by the members of the firm, who will continue to manage the business as directors, and no change is contemplated in the character of its operations. The Company acquires the business as from January 1 last. The following gentlemen will form the Company: G. Matthey, J. S. Sellon, E. Matthey. R. D. Matthey, J. S. Pybus-Sellon, C. G. R. Matthey, P. St. C. Matthey, and R. S. Sellon.

Source: The Electrical Engineer - 17th April 1891

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AN EXTRAORDINARY NUGGET

Messrs. Johnson, Matthey, and Co,, the metallurgical chemists, of Hatton-garden, have at present in their possession a remarkable gold nugget found at Spitzkoff in the Transvaal, nearly as big as a hen's egg, very smooth in surface from water abrasion, very free from impurities, containing 920 parts of pure metal to the 1,000, and valued at £44. If "finds" of this sort multiply it may be safely predicted that the Boers will have soon to face an invasion vastly more formidable than British troops. Gold dust is arriving here from the Transvaal in increasing quantities, and the particles are larger and richer than they were at the outset.


Source: The Aberystwith Observer and Merionethshire News - 15th December 1883

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