A month or so ago I acquired a portion of the Enid Marx archive. Most of the items involved related to the Wilding series - but the attached image (drawn on tracing paper) looks like an essay for an intaglio head. Can anyone identify it?
Frank

Enid Marx used drawings of the Queen on her first essays from the first stage of the QEII high value preparation apart from the Wilding portrait.

The attach essay has a similar portrait to your copy and could have been taken from the same tracing.

I have other essays by Enid Marx that do not use the Wilding portrait.

Many thanks - it tallies perfectly! I've cut out the two versions of the heads and put them side by side to allow a comparison.
Frank

There was no requirement in the first stage of the preparation of the QEII high values that the Wilding portrait of the Queen had to be used.

The instructions issued on 19 February 1953 stated:

“The design should include a space for the representation of the Queen’s effigy which, on the reduction of the design to actual stamp size, is not less than the space occupied by the Queen’s portrait on the current 2½d stamp.”

The Wilding portrait of the Queen was a requirement for second stage of preparation. On 15 March 1953 Post Office Supplies Department wrote to Waterlows asking if they could engrave a die of the Queen’s portrait for the high value stamps.

My items have been included in “Preparation of the First Queen Elizabeth High Values” which has just been added to the Displays section.