54 
NOTES ON FIRE INSURANCE MARKS. 
country village by the owner’s firm belief that the house could not 
be burnt as long as the Mark stayed there. A modified idea is 
that they are lucky ; as similarly old horse shoes are nailed over 
doors. 
The different Marks may be conveniently divided into four 
principal types. First, those having in the field some object con¬ 
nected with fire, as Phoenix, Protector, this last, one of the rarest, 
represents a fireman in the costume of 150 years ago, most dra¬ 
matically turning a hose on a building bursting with the most 
realistic and awe-inspiring flames—the bridge on which the fire¬ 
man is standing is said to represent old London Bridge ; second, 
a punning or emblematic reference to the name of the Company, 
e.g., Bristol Union—a bundle of sticks; Farmers’ Insurance 
Company—a wheatsheaf. This last is a very scarce Plate, not in 
the Guildhall collection, nor mentioned in lists of other Collectors. 
The Company was early absorbed in the Alliance. Gloucester 
Castle, Britannia, Globe, are further examples of this class. A 
third class is the Heraldic —Birmingham, Manchester, Salop, with 
the Arms of Shrewsbury—three leopard heads. The Salop is a 
scarce Plate. The curious reason that so few are in existence 
appears to be that most of the old houses in that district, being 
largely built of timber, have perished, and the Fire Plates with 
them. The specimen here illustrated has been through the fire, 
and was in a very dilapidated state when received. 
Fourthly, miscellaneous—as Church of England, Royal, and 
several others in the collection. 
The origin of the Church of England Assurance Company is 
interesting. It was founded some 100 years ago as a philanthropic 
agency to compensate poor villagers for the often total loss of their 
belongings, when a fire swept away perhaps a whole street of 
thatched cottages and left the occupiers homeless and with no 
worldly goods. It altered its title to “England Insurance Institu¬ 
tion” in 1893, and the latter .Company has gone out of existence. 
The limit of space compels the omission of any extracts from 
the immensely interesting history of the Sun, the oldest present 
Fire Insurance Company in the world, possessing an unrivalled 
collection of old charters, policies, firemen and watermen’s costumes 
and badges, old fire squirts and other primitive fire extinguish¬ 
ing appliances. The histories too, of the Royal Exchange, and 
of the Norwich Union which have been kindly supplied by the 
Secretaries of those Companies, must for the same reason be 
