Very Fine Pair of Mid-Victorian Parcel Gilt Bronze Oil Lamps, by Hinks

Footnote: James Hinks (1816-1905). Leaving home at 16 he tried many trades from wood turning, japanning, brush making, die sinking, medal making and even being a pub landlord, before manufacturing oil lamps. Working from the Crystal Lamp Works, Great Hampton Street, Birmingham, he was joined by his son Joseph and renamed the company ‘James Hinks and Son in 1862’. They won a patent for ‘improvements in lamps’ the following year and swiftly launched the ‘Patent Duplex Lamp’, which using two wicks instead of one, gave out twice the light. By the turn off the century the company had bases in London and Birmingham, supplying railway companies for trains, stations and signals. To the domestic market, Hinks’ lamps were ‘a byword for domestic beauty’.