A SWISS OR GERMAN VARI-COLOUR GOLD SNUFF-BOX

Nellie Lisa Bass, Baroness Burton of Burton-on-Trent and of Rangemore, was born in 1873. She was the daughter of Michael Arthur Bass, 1st Baron Burton of Burton-on-Trent and of Rangemore and Harriet Georgina Thornewill, and descended from William Bass, who founded the brewery business of Bass & Co in Burton upon Trent in 1777. In 1894 she married Colonel James Evan Bruce Baillie (d. 1931) of Dochfour in Inverness-shire. He was the Member of Parliament for Inverness-shire between 1895 and 1900 and gained the rank of Honorary Colonel in the service of the Inverness-shire Battalion, Royal Horse Artillery. After her first husband's death Nellie married as her second husband Major William Eugene Melles (d. 1953). For a discussion on the goldsmith Daniel Marchand and his marks see L. Seelig, Eighteenth century Hanau gold boxes, Silver Society of Canada Journal 2015, pp. 32-55.