Australian Historical Medals

Lot 641    SESSION 3 (2.30PM TUESDAY 31ST MARCH)    Australian Historical Medals

Estimate $12,500
Bid at live.noble.com.au
SOLD $9,500

COMMONWEALTH CELEBRATIONS, Victoria May 1901, in gold (14ct; 13.93g; 28x50mm) (C.1901/10), with suspension loop, with stick pin ribbon bar 'Advance Australia/Victoria' (14ct; 7.47g), with replacement ribbon, this with an identical style stick pin ribbon bar 'Union Is Strength/Australia', reverse of medal inscribed, 'The Rt Hon Edmund Barton P.C., K.C., M.P./Prime Minister/Commonwealth of Australia'. Toned extremely fine and very rare.

An article in Table Talk newspaper, Melbourne, Victoria dated Thursday 3 January 1901 headed " Toby" Barton in Excelsis, reads as follows.

Schoolboys are responsible for the Federal Premier being universally known in Sydney as "Toby." The name attached itself to him when a Grammar School boy, and has stuck ever since, so that it is a common thing just now to hear that "after all it was only right that Toby should be at the head of the first Federal Ministry." It is pleasant to recall now that he is a Sydney native, and was born at Glebe Point on January 18th, 1819. He is one of the "old boys" both of Fort-street Public School and Sydney Grammar School; went from there to the University, and was called to the bar of New South Wales in 1871. Although Mr, Barton has been Speaker of the Legislative Assembly for four years and Attorney-General twice, it has been as a member of the Federal Conventions that he made his mark, having never given his whole heart to anything so completely before. He has several relatives in Melbourne. One sister is Mrs. A. B. Robinson, wife of the well-known commercial editor of the "Age," whose son, Arthur Robinson, has lately entered Parliament. Mr. Bryant, the barrister, is also another of his nephews. Mr. Barton is one of the Australian politicians who has never grown rich, although he has earned enormous sums at the bar.