Harold E. H. Nelson

Harold Edward Hughes Nelson (22 May 1871 – 25 February 1948) was an artist, illustrator, designer of bookplates, advertisements and postage stamps, copper etcher and engraver, and lecturer.

[4] The Studio, in a review of 1900, wrote of his work, "…bright and spirited, while in beauty of drawing it would be hard to find their equals among modern book-plates."

In the 1920s and 1930s he worked in an Art Deco style, his most notable designs being the Wembley Lion with a 'setting sun' motif on the British Empire postage stamps of 1924 and 1925.

However, his drawing of St George and the Dragon for the £1 stamp for the Postal Union Congress, 1929, harks back to his earlier style.

There, Nelson (and his wife Margaret) became friends with Charles Robert Ashbee, the designer, author and entrepreneur who was influential in the English Arts and Crafts movement.