Seed Merchants, A C Gilbert & Son, Image & Found by Bobhoe.
Found nearby Timberland, Lincolnshire, size unknown.
SEED / GROWERS inscription around - (A).C. GILBERT & SON curving downwards (.B)ILLINGHAY. curving upwards // no decipherable markings
There is an "invoice from A.C. Gilbert and Son Ltd - Seed Growers, Seed and Manure Merchants, Billinghay" held by Lincs To The Past, Lincolnshire Archives.
In a private communication with them Dr.Mike Rogers, Collections Access Team Leader (Archives & Remote Access), Economy & Culture, Lincolnshire County Council, added the following information, "The earliest Trade Directory we hold with a relevant entry is Kelly's 1881, which describes the company as "Gilbert Abraham Creasey & Son, seed growers, seed & manure merchants". The latest county directory we hold is Kelly's 1937, in which the company still appears.
White's directory for 1872 mentions an Abraham Gilbert, farmer, who may be related.
The item at the Museum of Lincolnshire Life forms part of a larger collection of family papers and objects from Billinghay Dales, which includes a couple of diaries produced for "Gilbert and Son" in 1946 and 1956 [LCNLL : 1979/559.1 and LCNLL : 1979/559.2].
There appears to have been a related "Gilbert TP & Son Ltd" of Billinghay, corn & blue pea merchants, for which there are invoices [LCNLL : 1979/615/1-2], a 1952 diary [LCNLL : 1979/654.1] a Vitovis Supreme Products note book [LCNLL : 1979/662], and a pencil [LCNLL : 1979/703]."
The Billinghay Times & Advertiser, Issue No 03/09, May—June 2009, has an obituary for Charles Creasey:- "He will be well remembered by many farmers in the Billinghay area as he joined local firm A. C. Gilbert and Son Ltd. and was employed as their Spraying Operative. There were very few farms, in the Billinghay area and beyond, where Charles had not sprayed their potatoes for blight." Possibly an extension to the business and there is till a private limited company by that name at WATERHILL FARM, KIRKBY GREEN, LINCOLNSHIRE, that was incorporated a hundred years ago on 29/4/1913, whose business is now listed as mixed farming.
