Antique 1917 Gorham Co 24K gold gilt bronze Italian War Relief Anna Coleman Ladd

Description

Antique 1917 gold gilt bronze medallion made by the Gorham Company for the "New England Italian War Relief Fund" effort.  The artist and sculptor Anna Coleman Watts Ladd from Manchester, Massachusetts designed the medal, supposedly after a book illustration drawing by John Singer Sargent.**
Measures about 1 1/16" across. It is stamped along the edge "(G)orham Co." and "A.C. Ladd" is signed in relief under the image of the mother and child.
According to a contemporaneous 1917 numismatic magazine, it is made of "bronze gilded with 24K gold"
.
*** We have not tested it for metal content.
Please see photos for condition. There are a few small light marks along the edge and on the front which don't seem to come off easily with soap and water so it could use a professional cleaning. The one spot on the front (near the infant) is a tiny raised or pitted spot- you can feel something there. Sold "as is" in vintage condition as found
.
We ship by USPS priority mail and will need to be signed for at delivery.
***A 1917
American Numismatic Association's
magazine has an entry for this medal.
Numismatics: An Illustrated Monthly Magazine for Those Interested in Coins, Medals, and Paper Money-
1917- Volume 30
:
"To help swell the treasury of the New England Italian War Relief
Fund, a medallet was issued to be sold at a recent benefit in Boston, the
sale to be in charge of the wives and children of the Italian Reservists of
that city. The medallet is illustrated here from a specimen furnished by Mr. J. deLagerberg.
The model for the medal was designed by Anna Coleman Ladd of Boston, who gave her work without charge to the cause.
The medals are of bronze gilded with 24k gold, and are the product of the Gorham Co.
The inscription on the obverse is “New England-Italian War Relief Fund.” On the reverse, “We Support the Brave, Shield the Destitute, Save the Wounded. A. D. 1917.”
**This medal is also mentioned in
a 1923 Massachusetts Historical Society publication
"Collections -Volume 76"
,
whose "Committee of Publication includes Henry Cabot Lodge, Malcolm Storer and Worthington Chauncey
"
.
An article entitled
:
"Numismatics of Massachusetts" 1923
by "Malcolm Storer, M.D. -Curator of Coins and Medals, Massachusetts Historical Society, Boston Museum of Fine Arts and Boston Medical Library" states about this medal:
"New England Italian Relief. Ob. New England . Italian . War . Relief . Fund . Half figure of woman and child facing.
Rx. In laurel wreath We / Support / The / Brave / Shield / The /  Destitute / Save / The / Wounded / A.D. 1917.
27 mm.
Gilt. From the drawing of John Singer Sargent
to illustrate "Nedda."
In the listing description, we show 3 photos of the above citations taken from online records including a photo of the John Singer Sargent frontispiece from "Nedda, The Story of an Italian Reservist's Wife" by Lewis Niles Roberts, Cambridge University Press, 1917.
These photos are for reference only- they are only screen shots of online resources which can be easily found and only the actual medallion is included in this auction.
According to a Wikipedia article...
Anna Coleman Watts Ladd
(July 15, 1878- June 1939) was an American sculptor in Manchester, MA. She was born in Bryn Mawr, PA  and educated in Europe where she studied sculpture in Paris and Rome. She married Dr Maynard Ladd in Salisbury, England and then moved to Boston. She studied with Bela Pratt for 3 years at the Boston Museum School. Her “Triton babies” piece was shown at the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco. (It is now a fountain sculpture in the Boston Public Garden.) In 194, she was founding member of the Guild of Boaton Artists.
In late 1917, her husband was appointed to direct the Children’s Bureau of the American Red Cross in Toul. She learned about the work of Francis Derwent Wood in London who developed lifelike masks to help soldiers with facial deformities. She worked with the ARC in France in the “Masks for Facial Disfigurement Dept. in Paris. Ladd founded the ARC “Studio for Portrait Masks”. Her services earned her the Legion d’Honneur Croix de Chevalier and the Serbian Order of Saint Sava.
After WWI, she depicted a corpse on a barbed wire fence for a war memorial commissioned by the Manchester-by-the-Sea American Legion. Her sculpture Triton Babies is featured on the Boston Women’s Heritage Trail.