Many of the papers relate to Davison's role as prize agent for the British fleet led by Rear-Admiral Sir Horatio Nelson at the Battle of the Nile, 1798-1814. There are also letters to Davison from Lady Frances H. Nelson, 1798-1806.

Administrative / biographical background
Davison was born near Woolner, Northumberland, in 1750. He started his business career in Canada, working as a merchant and shipowner with his younger brother George. From 1784 he flourished as a government contractor based in London, providing army uniforms, weapons, transports, and general supplies. After his appointment as sole agent for the prize ships captured at the Battle of the Nile in 1798, he operated as a banker. Davison was a personal friend of both Nelson and his wife Fanny, and so found himself in the middle of the bitterness of their marriage breakdown. Davison dabbled in politics, but in 1804 was prosecuted for corruption during a parliamentary election campaign at Ilchester in Somerset, and imprisoned at Marshalsea in London. His fortunes dwindled after Nelson's death. He was imprisoned at Newgate following a conviction for fraudulent accounting in 1809. From 1795 Davison owned an estate at Swarland Hall, near Felton in Northumberland, where he commissioned the planting of trees positioned to represent the British fleet during the Battle of the Nile in 1798, and an obelisk memorial to Nelson. Davison died at Brighton in 1829.