Hildesheim Lower Saxony Germany Seal, Image & Found by Ianp.
Found near Southport. It measures 22mm x 18mm x 4mm.
One side has HILDES- above HEIM in two straight lines across its centre. Around this curved on the inside of a raised border circle is ZUCKER then an illegible section then B(R?)IE and a 5 pointed star at the bottom. The other side has a coat of arms on an ornate shield with a German eagle in the top half and vertical lines in the first and third quadrants of the lower half, all contained in a raised circular border. It matches the arms of Hildesheim.
Appears to be a bag seal from Hildesheim in Lower Saxony Germany possibly attached to a sugar sack as the German for sugar is zucker.
From Paul Cannon, "I believe the inscription can almost certainly be reconstructed as “*ZUCKER RAFFINERIE around HILDES-HEIM”. The sugar refinery at Hildesheim was refining and producing sugar from beet. It received partially refined sugar from the sugar factories in the district and completed the process to produce the final product. It is referred to by the above name in the following book ‘Verzeichnis der Rübenzuckerfabriken und Zucker-Raffinerien im deutschen Reiche’ (1900) [Directory of Sugar Beet Factories and Sugar Refineries in the German Empire, printed in Magdeburg, 1900]. This records the full details of the 54 sugar refineries then within the German Empire plus the 398 ordinary sugar factories that were supplying them. Hildesheim is recorded as sugar refinery no: 21 on p131."