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Title: The Silversmith in Eighteenth-Century Williamsburg
An Account of his Life & Times, & of his Craft
Author: Thomas K. Ford
Contributor: Thomas K. Bullock
Release Date: October 10, 2018 [EBook #58066]
Language: English
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THE
SILVERSMITH
in Eighteenth-Century
_WILLIAMSBURG_
An Account of his Life & Times, & of his Craft
_Williamsburg Craft Series_
_WILLIAMSBURG_
Published by _Colonial Williamsburg_
MCMLXXX
_The Silversmith
in Eighteenth-Century_ Williamsburg
[Illustration: Decorative capital]
Through many years before the Revolution and for a time early in the
war, James Craig and James Geddy the younger were probably
Williamsburg’s foremost craftsmen in the jewelry, watch repairing, and
silversmithing way. Geddy’s shop stood on Duke of Gloucester Street
“next door below the Church,” Craig’s Golden Ball still farther down.
At one time Craig advertised in the _Virginia Gazette_ that he had “Just
imported from London—A choice Assortment of Jewellery, Plate, Toys and
fine Cuttlery. There are some fine visual Spectacles fit for all ages.”
Not long afterward in the same paper Geddy listed in some detail “A NEAT
Assortment of PLATE, WATCHES, AND JEWELLERY,” and emphasized that “the
Reasonableness of the above Goods, he hopes, will remove that Objection
of his Shop’s being too high up Town ... and the Walk may be thought
rather an Amusement than a Fatigue.” A much more typical notice was that
of Patrick Beech reproduced on the following page. It bears little
resemblance to a modern newspaper advertisement, but it is so
characteristic of its own time that any one of Williamsburg’s several
pre-Revolutionary silversmiths might have penned it.
Fifteen men, possibly sixteen, followed the silversmith’s craft in
Williamsburg between 1699 and 1780, while this small city was the
capital of the Virginia colony. Through the years, most of them took
advantage of the newspapers to announce the location of their shops, the
arrival of shipments of goods from London, and the kinds of articles and
services they had to offer.
All of them combined with silversmithing some other craft, most often
that of jeweler or watch repairer. Time and again they assured
prospective purchasers that their wares, whether country made or
imported, were in the very latest fashion. Each one without exception
offered the “highest” price for old gold and silver, including gold
lace, either in cash or to be credited against new work. And very often
they felt it necessary to specify that sales would be “for ready money
only.”
[Illustration: _Advertisement appearing in Purdie and Dixon’s
VIRGINIA GAZETTE on October 6, 1774._]
PATRICK BEECH,
_At the_ BRICK SHOP, _opposite Mr._ Turner’s _store_,
WILLIAMSBURG,
BEGS leave to inform the public that he makes and sells all sorts of
GOLD, SILVER and JEWELLERY WORK, after the newest fashions, and at the
lowest prices, for ready money only. Those who are pleased to favour
him with their commands may depend upon having their work done in the
neatest manner, and on the shortest notice; and their favours will be
most gratefully acknowledged.... He gives the highest prices for old
GOLD, SILVER, or LACE, either in cash, or exchange.... Commissions
from the country will be carefully observed, and punctually answered.
Interestingly, it was a Williamsburg silversmith of a generation earlier
who established a high water mark of colonial newspaper advertising.
After a preliminary notice, the _Virginia Gazette_ appeared on August
19, 1737, with its entire back page occupied by the announcement of a
lottery to be held by Alexander Kerr, jeweler and silversmith of
Williamsburg. As if this extravagance on the part of a Scotsman like
Kerr was not startling enough, the same full-page notice appeared again
two weeks later.
[Illustration: A typical London goldsmith’s trade card or shop bill.
This one is reproduced from _The London Goldsmiths, 1200-1800: A
Record of the Names and Addresses of the Craftsmen, their Shop-Signs
and Trade Cards_, by Sir Ambrose Heal. As one may note, a great deal
of work and imagination went into the preparation of Heming’s trade
card. William Hogarth, the eminent English artist who served six
years as apprentice to a London silversmith, is known to have
engraved two or three goldsmith’s trade cards of simpler design.]
HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE
DIEU ET MON DROIT
_Thomas Heming_
GOLDSMITH to his MAJESTY
_at the King’s Arms in Bond Street
FACING CLIFFORD STREET_
_Makes and Sells all sorts of Gold &
Silver Plate in the highest Tastes.
Likewise all sorts of Jewellers work, Watches_,
Seals in Stone, Steel & Silver, Engrav’d.
_Mourning Rings, &c. &c. &c. and at the most
Reasonable Prices._
NB. Gives most Money for the above Articles
_or Lace burnt or unburnt, &c._
Kerr proposed to sell 400 tickets at one pistole each and give 80 prizes
worth, at “common saleable Prices,” a total of 400 pistoles. (A pistole
was the old quarter-doubloon of Spain, or a similar gold coin, worth
about four dollars.) The top prize in the lottery, a combination of a
diamond ring, an amethyst pin, a heavily jeweled pendant, and an
ornamented gold box, was to be worth 62 pistoles; the other prizes
ranged down to 40 valued at two pistoles each. The list included rings,
earrings, snuff boxes, toothpick cases, spoons, tongs, gold buttons,
buckles, and boxes of various sorts.
After two postponements, probably in order to sell every last ticket,
the drawing took place “at the Capitol.” This doubtless meant on the
steps or portico or in the yard, rather than within the building itself.
The outcome was recorded in a single sentence in the _Gazette_:
“Yesterday Mr. Kerr’s lottery of Jewels and Plate was drawn; and the
highest Prize came up in Favour of Mrs. Dawson.”
Kerr’s long list of prizes—and the items listed for sale in
advertisements of other eighteenth-century Williamsburg
silversmiths—reveal that the articles these smiths made in their shops,
like the ones they imported, were of great variety but mostly of small
size. Besides the silver buckles, sugar tongs, teaspoons, toothpick
cases, and snuff boxes of the lottery list, other silversmiths
advertised thimbles, soup and punch ladles, salt casters or shakers,
watch chains, cream buckets or “piggins,” and plated as well as solid
silver spurs. Among these, the soup ladles were the largest items.
If Williamsburg smiths made larger items on special order as they may
have, no such pieces have survived, nor has any mention of them been
found in shop records. Custom-made articles would not have been
advertised, of course.
_SILVERSMITHS AND GOLDSMITHS, BLACKSMITHS AND DENTISTS_
Patrick Beech, as his advertisement suggested, was obviously a jeweler
as well as a Silversmith. James Craig of the Golden Ball, who made a
pair of earrings for Washington’s beloved stepdaughter, Patsy Custis,
was primarily a jeweler rather than a Silversmith. James Geddy, Jr.,
combined the cleaning and repairing of watches and clocks with
silver- and goldsmithing. John and William Rowsay, brothers and partners
in a Williamsburg shop, sold not only plate and precious stones, but a
wide assortment of general merchandise, to wit:
[Illustration: _Advertisement appearing in Dixon and Nicholson’s
VIRGINIA GAZETTE on October 16, 1779._]
_Just imported and to be sold by the subscribers in_ Williamsburg,
A NEAT assortment of cutlery, pinchbeck shoe and stock buckles, plated
do. watch chains seals and keys, paper snuff-boxes, playing cards,
pins and needles, ivory combs, linen, muslins, cap lace, corded
dimity, ginghams, calicoes, silk and thread flockings, bohea tea,
_&c._ Also a few hogsheads of good RUM, by the hogshead or quarter
cask. (1)
JOHN & WILLIAM ROWSAY.
This versatility of crafts was almost universal among colonial
silversmiths, especially in the southern colonies. Not one of the
Williamsburg smiths limited himself rigidly to the making and selling of
silver and gold articles. Any who tried would probably not have enjoyed
a large income in this essentially small town in an essentially rural
colony.
Even so, no Williamsburg silver worker was half so versatile as the most
famous silversmith of them all—a Bostonian by the name of Paul Revere.
Besides being a horseman of considerable note, Revere was an
accomplished designer and worker in silver, and a skilled engraver on
silver and copper. He drew and engraved political cartoons that helped
stimulate the Revolution, then engraved and printed the first issues of
Continental paper money to help finance it. As the owner and operator of
a copper foundry, he cast church bells and Revolutionary cannon. He
manufactured gunpowder for a while, too, and made and installed dental
devices that he advertised as being not only ornamental but also “of
real Use In Speaking and Eating.”
Several other colonial silversmiths also doubled in dentistry, a fairly
normal coupling of crafts since both demand skill in working silver and
gold. This tendency, however, was deplored by the “real” dentists of the
day, those who might or might not have had a touch of the slender
medical training then available. But the displeasure of these
practitioners was certainly no greater than that displayed by the
trained silversmiths whenever a blacksmith tried to edge into their own
craft.
On the other hand, there was not the least jealousy between silversmiths
and goldsmiths—for these are but two different names for the same craft.
All silversmiths are equally goldsmiths, and vice versa. But
long-standing custom and the prestige attached to the more precious of
the two metals often moved men who worked almost entirely in silver to
proclaim themselves publicly as “goldsmiths.”
James Craig advertised as a jeweler during his first two decades in
Williamsburg. Then when he branched into silver work he asked to be
addressed as “Goldsmith in Williamsburg,” and named his shop the “Golden
Ball.” James Geddy, Jr., customarily advertised as a “goldsmith,” but
this conceit seems not to have impressed the legal profession in
Williamsburg. Deeds and documents drawn up by more prosaic hands refer
to him twice as “silversmith” and once as “jeweler.”
By combining several vocations, some if not all of the Williamsburg
silversmiths seem to have made at least a respectable living. In
addition to those whose names have already appeared in this account,
three others deserve mention.
John Brodnax was the first to follow the craft in Williamsburg. The son
of a London goldsmith, he originally settled in Henrico County near what
is now Richmond. The date of his arrival is unknown, but about 1694 he
moved to a forest crossroads seven miles from Jamestown called Middle
Plantation. Five years later this became the colony’s capital “city” and
was renamed Williamsburg. In 1711 Brodnax was appointed “Keeper of the
Capitol and publick Gaol” at a salary of £30 a year, later raised to
£40.
[Illustration: _Frontispiece of_ A New Touchstone for Gold and
Silver Wares _by W. B., published in London in 1679. By William
Badcock, a London goldsmith, it was the standard seventeenth-century
reference book on metalwork. The forge, bellows, and tools are
typical of those of the craft, of which St. Dunstan was the patron
saint._]
The Intent of the Frontispiece.
1 _St._ Dunstan, _the Patron of the_ Goldsmiths _Company_.
2 _The Refining Furnace._
3 _The_ Test _with Silver refining on it_.
4 _The Fineing Bellows._
5 _The Man blowing or working them._
6 _The_ Test _Mould_.
7 _A Wind-hole to melt Silver in without Bellows._
8 _A pair of Organ Bellows._
9 _A Man melting or Boiling, or nealing Silver at them._
10 _A Block, with a large Anvil placed thereon._
11 _Three Men Forging Plate._
12 _The Fineing and other_ Goldsmiths _Tools_.
13 _The_ Assay _Furnace_.
14 _The_ Assay-_Master making Assays_.
15 _His Man putting the Assays into the Fire._
16 _The Warden marking the Plate on the Anvil._
17 _His Officer holding the Plate for the Marks._
18 _Three_ Goldsmiths, _small-workers, at work_.
19 _A_ Goldsmiths _Shop furnished with Plate_.
20 _A_ Goldsmith _weighing Plate_.
Brodnax died in 1719 leaving an estate of £1,000, a very considerable
amount in those days, including nearly £200 worth of old gold and silver
and close to £300 of finished work. Whether he acquired this estate
through silversmithing alone cannot be determined now. It seems highly
unlikely in view of the limited economy of that time and place and the
experience of others in the craft at a later and more opulent period. He
may well have gained his wealth by inheritance, by the sale of his
backcountry lands to William Byrd in 1711, or possibly, as so many
others did, from the sale of tobacco produced on those acres.
Anthony Singleton was born in Williamsburg in 1750, possibly served as
apprentice to James Craig, and opened his own jewelry and goldsmith shop
in 1771 opposite the Raleigh Tavern. Little is known today about
Singleton’s career as a craftsman in silver. After making his mark as a
captain of artillery in the Revolution, he moved to Richmond and married
Lucy Harrison Randolph, daughter of Benjamin Harrison the Signer, sister
of William Henry Harrison the President, and widow of Peyton Randolph of
Wilton.
Although Singleton held a number of public and private offices of trust
and responsibility, and by virtue of his marriage had gained membership
in Virginia’s aristocracy, he most solemnly enjoined in his will that
his sons “be brought up to some mechanical profession.”
William Waddill announced in 1767 his intention to open shop “next door
below the Old Printing Office” in Williamsburg. He called himself a
“Goldsmith and Engraver” and offered to buy up old gold and silver and
rework it “in any taste the owner chooses.”
Whether he did open a business as intended is not known, but a few years
later he was a jeweler and engraver—and perhaps a partner—in the shop of
James Geddy, Jr. Since Geddy married Elizabeth Waddill and named one of
his sons William Waddill Geddy, the two men were presumably
brothers-in-law. Waddill followed Geddy by a few years in leaving
Williamsburg to find greener pastures in the growing cities of Richmond
and Petersburg.
_SURVIVING WORK OF WILLIAMSBURG SILVERSMITHS_
William Waddill’s known work illustrates how very slight is the amount
of surviving silver that can be ascribed with any certainty to
Williamsburg smiths. He engraved plates for the printing of paper
currency in Virginia, and he made a silver nameplate and handles for the
coffin of Governor Botetourt, whose remains lie buried beneath the
chapel floor at the College of William and Mary. The coffin plate,
purloined by Union soldiers during the Civil War, has since been
returned to the college, which has loaned it to Colonial Williamsburg
for display at the restored house and shop of James Geddy.
Also on display there are several articles of silver that can now be
attributed to the hand of Geddy himself. One is a small saucepan or
pot-like cup, with a straight silver handle added at a later time; the
others are spoons. The saucepan and three of the spoons bear the “I·G”
maker’s mark of James Geddy, Jr., the “I” being the eighteenth-century
equivalent of “J,” at least in certain situations.
The saucepan is believed to have once been the property of Colonel
William Preston, a burgess from Augusta County for a time before the
Revolution. Preston is known to have purchased other articles from
Geddy, and this particular piece of hollowware has come down through his
descendants. One of the teaspoons marked “I·G” was found as long ago as
1930 at the site of the Palace kitchen, but its attribution to Geddy
remained uncertain for nearly forty years. Then, in 1968, five more
silver spoons were unearthed in the yard behind Geddy’s house, two of
them having the identical maker’s mark. Another of the excavated group,
a tablespoon, lacks any mark to show the maker, but does have the
initials I^GE engraved on the handle, almost certainly those of James
Geddy and his wife Elizabeth.
The teaspoon found at the Palace site is also engraved on the handle in
the same fashion but with the initials C^AA. Christopher Ayscough was
gardener at the Palace in the time of Governor Fauquier; his wife, Anne,
was the governor’s housekeeper. Fauquier thought so highly of Mrs.
Ayscough’s stewardship that he bequeathed her £250 sterling, a very
generous sum. Possibly the silver teaspoon found beneath the brick floor
of Anne Ayscough’s kitchen was also a gift from the governor to her and
her husband. How it got under the floor can only be guessed at.
St. Paul’s Church in Edenton, North Carolina, possesses a silver chalice
and paten bearing the inscription: “The Gift of Colonell Edward Mosely
for the use [of] the Church in Edenton in the Year 1725.” They show the
initials AK and are of American make. George Barton Cutten, author of
_The Silversmiths of Virginia_, does not hesitate, therefore, in
ascribing them to Alexander Kerr of Williamsburg.
Two theories are at hand to explain why these and a few other articles
are the only ones still in existence that can be attributed to
Williamsburg craftsmen. One is that marauding Union soldiers carried
away in their knapsacks all the Williamsburg silver they could lay hands
on. This theory is most often advanced south of the Mason and Dixon Line
and has some truth in it, to be sure. But not the entire truth,
apparently. Cutten declares that there is little silver of southern
origin in the northern states today—less than might be expected had
there been no Civil War.
The other and probably more reasonable explanation is that Williamsburg
silversmiths fashioned few pieces of plate of any great size. Silver
work in Williamsburg, it appears, was limited mainly to the manufacture
of small articles and to the repair of items large and small.
[Illustration: _This is a shop where smaller pieces were made. We
would refer to it as a jewelry shop. The workmen are shown melting
the metal, hammering on an anvil, soldering with a mouth blow pipe,
and setting the stones._ DIDEROT.]
[Illustration: _This is a shop of a silversmith who made large
pieces such as tea sets, trays, and tankards. A workman can be seen
pouring the molten silver into the mold. The two men in front of the
forge are hammering the cast ingot into a sheet and the three seated
workmen are flattening out the forged sheet and hammering it into
various shapes._ DIDEROT.]
Everything we know of the time and the people reinforces the belief that
the planters of Virginia—the only ones who could afford large outlays in
silver—bought their plate in London rather than having it made by smiths
of the colony. To the older generation of planters England was “home.”
They were bound to the mother country by ties of sentiment and culture.
Their church was the Church of England, their books and songs were
English books and songs, and English-made goods were to them obviously
better than the country-made variety.
So strong was this preference for wares imported from London that it
persisted through the various nonimportation associations and
buy-American movements. In Williamsburg, curiously enough, the leading
silversmiths seem to have been less enthusiastic “associators” than were
tradesmen elsewhere—certainly less enthusiastic than such leaders of the
planter group as George Washington.
Washington, whose preference for British goods was as strong as
anyone’s, nevertheless sponsored the nonimportation agreement adopted at
the Raleigh Tavern in May 1769. James Geddy, Jr., in a newspaper
advertisement of that September, declared that he had
now on hand a neat assortment of country made GOLD and SILVER WORK,
which he will sell at the lowest rates for cash, or exchange for old
gold or silver. As he has not imported any jewellery this season, he
flatters himself he will meet with encouragement, especially from
those Ladies and Gentlemen who are friends to the association.
Geddy, however, did not subscribe himself as a member of the Association
until July of 1770, and only three months later he ventured to
advertise, along with country-made wares, “a small, but neat assortment,
of imported JEWELLERY (ordered before the association took place).”
The boycotting of British goods, however, was a political technique
adopted for a particular purpose—to put pressure on Parliament to repeal
the Townshend duties or other offensive legislation. When that purpose
was accomplished, or seemed certain to be, the old preferences for
imported goods reasserted themselves. Thus we find Washington in August
1770 ordering from London a quantity of expensive clothing and some
jewelry “if the Act of Parliament Imposing a Duty upon Tea, Paper, &ca,
for the purpose of raising a Revenue in America shoud [sic] be Totally
repeald before the above goods are shipped.” And by the next spring
Geddy was again advertising goods just imported from London.
Throughout the colonial period it was generally more convenient for
Virginia planters to acquire high quality goods in London than in
Virginia. This was a consequence of the narrowly channeled two-way trade
between the great plantations of the Chesapeake Bay and the great
commission-merchant warehouses along the Thames. The planters grew and
exported enormous quantities of tobacco, almost all of it sent to London
and sold there. Against the proceeds they ordered whatever they needed
and wanted of manufactured necessities and luxuries: textiles, clothing,
furniture, hardware, ceramics, glass, and silver.
To the planter aristocrats, silver plate (not to be confused with plated
silverware) performed three functions at once. It was a form of stable
investment, easily watched over, easily identified in case of theft, and
easily converted into cash if needed. In the absence of safe-deposit
boxes or bank vaults, silver in daily use was as safe a form of
“savings” as the times offered. Secondly, plate was a form of social
ostentation in which all members of the group indulged to a greater or
lesser degree. Finally, plate was useful in the proper serving of the
owners and their guests; a well-to-do planter would have thought it
impossible to get along without quantities of food and drink on his
table, and almost as unthinkable not to have some silver articles on the
table, too.
Although only the wealthy families possessed an occasional large and
elaborate silver piece of London manufacture—such as epergnes and
monteiths—many Virginians not of the planter aristocracy did own silver.
Alexander Purdie, for example, one proprietor of the _Virginia Gazette_,
owned real estate, nine slaves, and 130 ounces of plate when he died.
Other professional men and even artisans in colonial Virginia also owned
silver in amounts that seem large in contrast to what their modern
counterparts generally possess.
One other circumstance that helps explain the dearth of silver articles
made in Williamsburg was the scarcity of raw material. There simply was
not very much silver or gold in Virginia for colonial craftsmen to work
with. Despite the great hopes of the early Jamestown settlers—hopes that
in Captain John Smith’s day nearly cost the settlement its life—no
silver has ever been mined in Virginia, and precious little gold. For
his raw material, the colonial Virginia silversmith thus had to depend
on imports.
Precious metal might come into the silversmith’s hands in any of three
forms. One was bullion, bars of the virgin metal fresh from the mines
and refineries of Mexico or Peru. Another was in the form of minted
coins of various countries. The third consisted of silver or gold
articles already wrought, but available for one reason or another to be
melted down and reworked.
Perhaps in the seventeenth century a certain amount of bullion reached
the English colonies from the Spanish Main in pirate ships. But there is
no reason to suppose that this flow continued in the eighteenth
century—and certainly not into Virginia. Governor Spotswood’s expedition
in 1718 had returned with Blackbeard’s head swinging from a bowsprit and
his followers in irons, most of them to be hanged afterward at
Williamsburg.
Of course, pirates would as soon have coin as bullion, and pirate ships
sometimes found haven in colonial ports, especially in those where no
official inquired how poor sailor men suddenly acquired such great
wealth. Some said that the colonial officials of North Carolina, New
England, New York, and even Pennsylvania could be encouraged to look the
other way on such occasions. At any rate, a sizable amount of silver
coin entered the colonies in this fashion, at least in the seventeenth
century.
Little of this lucre came directly into Virginia, but for other reasons
than the attitude of the governors. The rural colonies of the South
could offer neither the concealing refuge of large cities nor the lusty
recreation that such cities in the middle and northern colonies promised
to pleasure-hungry sailors.
In the eighteenth century, however, some coins from France, Spain,
Portugal, Arabia, Mexico, and Peru did arrive and circulate in
Virginia—pieces of eight, doubloons, pistoles, pistareens, crusadoes,
and “dog dollars.” The last, thought to be Dutch in origin, were so
called from the crude representation of a lion on one face. Curiously,
there were few British crowns, half-crowns, or shillings.
Despite this variety, coined money was by no means plentiful in the
colonies in the eighteenth century. The scarcity of specie, in fact, was
one of the strongest colonial arguments against the stamp tax in 1765.
Nevertheless, coins of known weight and fineness provided the colonial
silversmith with a fairly reliable source of raw material.
The third possible source—plate to be melted down and reworked—was less
certain as to quantity but of trustworthy quality. Customers who wanted
articles of silver made in the newest fashion often had to provide the
smith with raw material—usually an equal weight of plate in the older
style. If the old pieces had been wrought in England the mark either of
a lion passant or the seated figure of Britannia attested to the
fineness of the metal used.
But this source was of little help to the smiths of Williamsburg.
Although Virginia probably contained as much concentrated wealth and as
much plate as any other colony, the Virginians who held most of it
leaned toward England in heart and pocketbook. If they wanted their
silver refashioned, where more logical to have it done than in
London—where fashions were made and where the pieces had been wrought in
the first place.
_LEARNING TO BE A SILVERSMITH_
No one earned the right to be a master craftsman in silver—or a master
of any other craft—in the eighteenth century without serving a long and
thorough apprenticeship.
A boy of the working class in England was usually launched on his life’s
career by the time he was 14, and sometimes when he was only 10 or 12.
The class of society into which he happened to be born and his father’s
vocation usually determined the road he would take. The oldest son
almost automatically followed the father’s trade and inherited his tools
and shop, if he had one.
The same custom prevailed in the English colonies, including Virginia,
but in modified form. Here the freedom of movement encouraged by the
beckoning frontier of opportunity, and especially of cheap land, broke
down many social and economic barriers. A man of one class could more
easily climb into the class above or aspire to have his son do so. Even
the long-standing apprenticeship system suffered. Not every man who
arrived in the colony, or moved to its western reaches and set up shop
as a master craftsman, had actually earned the ancient right to employ
that title.
But by and large, colonial boys became colonial craftsmen only by
completing an arduous apprenticeship period of seven years—more or less.
During this time they learned the “art and mysterie” of the craft and
gained skill in using its tools. At the age of 21 they became
“journeymen” for an additional period until they acquired enough capital
to set up in business for themselves.
Unlike the countries of Europe, the colonies in America did not have
uniform laws regulating every aspect of the apprenticeship system. Some
colonies had no legal regulations at all, some limited the effect of
controls to specified trades or to certain aspects of apprenticeship,
and some had laws that were honored in the breach more than in the
observance. In sum, the colonies generally did not follow the European
example of employing the authority of government to insure high
standards of training and practice in the trades and crafts.
[Illustration: _A work bench which could accommodate five workmen,
allowing each to take advantage of daylight. The latticed floor
caught filings and bits of metal which were salvaged and
subsequently refined._ DIDEROT.]
[Illustration: _The shop of a London clock and watchmaker. The large
octangular faced clock hanging on the wall is typical of the kind
that would have been found in public places. It was later called the
Parliament clock. One may be seen at the Golden Ball._ UNIVERSAL
MAGAZINE.]
The traditions of apprenticeship, however, survived the ocean crossing
somewhat better than the legal sanctions. Law or no law, the required
seven-year minimum for apprenticeship in England was also customary in
America. This seems to have been especially true of such highly skilled
crafts as silversmithing, although wide variations appeared in the
practice of other crafts.
Let’s assume that young John Goodkin of Williamsburg, age 13, must be
apprenticed out to learn a trade. Apprenticeship will provide the boy
with an assured future livelihood, and at the same time relieve his
father of the burden of supporting him. The master craftsman who accepts
young Johnny as apprentice will not only teach him the trade but also
provide him with board, lodging, clothing, and an occasional shilling
(but no wages) for the full period of his apprenticeship. He will also
teach Johnny, or see that he learns, a smattering of the three R’s. In
return the master will gain the services of—he hopes—a willing and
receptive helper for seven years at minimum cost to himself.
The terms of apprenticeship were sufficiently standardized and
frequently enough resorted to that printed forms were customarily used,
with blank spaces for names and dates to be inserted. One copied by hand
in the York County Deed book of 1762 reads as follows:
“This Indenture Witnesseth that John Webb an Orphan hath put himself ...
apprentice to William Phillips of Williamsburg Bricklayer to learn his
Art, Trade and Mystery; and ... to serve the said William Phillips from
the day of the date hereof for ... five Years next ensuing during all
which Term, the said Apprentice, his said Master faithfully shall serve,
his Secrets keep, his lawful commands at all Times readily obey; He
shall do no damage to his said Master, nor see it to be done by others,
without giving Notice thereof to his said Master. He shall not waste his
said Master’s Goods nor lend them unlawfully to any. He shall not
committ Fornication, nor contract Matrimony within the said Term. At
Cards, Dice or any other unlawful Game he shall not play whereby his
said Master may have damage. With his own Goods, nor the Goods of others
without Licence from his Master, he shall not buy nor sell. He shall not
absent himself day or night from his said Master’s Service, without his
Leave, nor haunt Alehouses, Taverns, or Play Houses, but in all Things
behave himself as a faithful Apprentice ought to do during the said
Term. And the said Master shall use the utmost of his Endeavours to
teach, or cause to be taught or instructed the said Apprentice in the
Trade or Mystery of a Bricklayer and procure or provide for him
sufficient Meat Drink; Cloaths, Washing and Lodging fitting for an
Apprentice....”
Johnny Goodkin of Williamsburg may himself want to be an explorer and
trapper in Virginia’s endless western territories. Or, like young Ben
Franklin, he may want to go to sea. But it is his father who makes the
decision. And more often than not the father’s own decision is made for
him by whatever openings for apprentices exist at the moment.
In Johnny’s case the decision is easily reached: Mrs. Goodkin’s cousin
is a silversmith in Williamsburg and agrees to accept the boy as
apprentice. Thus Johnny can look forward to a thoroughly respectable
career. He may never rise to the social heights attained by Anthony
Singleton; in fact he is unlikely to. But he may make himself so well
respected by his fellow citizens as to be chosen by them a member of the
city’s Common Council. That honor was bestowed on James Geddy, Jr., in
1767.
As an apprentice to a silversmith, what will Johnny do? Probably he will
arise very early in the morning and do household chores like any son of
the family. One of his duties in the shop will doubtless be to light the
fire in the forge. If necessary he will replenish the supply of
charcoal, perhaps by fetching a sack from a bakery. The baker produces
charcoal as an incidental by-product in the course of heating his ovens.
[Illustration: _Above are a forge and various tools, such as a mold,
bellows, and soldering lamp, which would have been found in an
eighteenth-century silversmith’s shop._ DIDEROT.]
In addition, the young apprentice serves as errand boy, delivering
finished goods, collecting bills, and carrying supplies. He also brings
cakes and ale for the daily interlude that corresponded to the coffee
break of today.
_TOOLS AND TECHNIQUES OF THE COLONIAL SILVERSMITH_
From the founding of Jamestown to the time of the Revolution some 300
silversmiths practiced in the three cities of Boston, New York, and
Philadelphia alone. Another 200 worked in the smaller centers of New
England and the middle colonies and in such southern places as
Charleston, Annapolis, and Williamsburg. Unfortunately, if any of these
500 colonial silversmiths left a written account of his shop practices
and methods of work, it has not been found.
Accordingly, our knowledge of the ways in which colonial smiths worked
is derived from other sources. Most of it comes from a few technical
handbooks and illustrated encyclopedias published in Europe at about the
same time. Inasmuch as many colonial silversmiths gained their knowledge
of the craft and of its standards of good practice as apprentices in the
old country, it is probable that silversmithing practices in America
were similar.
Not identical, though. The environment of the new country altered in
some manner or to some degree almost every single attitude, habit, and
craft practice. For example, in eighteenth-century England the
silversmith whose shop was located within the purview of an assay office
could sell the articles he made (with certain exceptions) only after the
pieces had been assayed and stamped with the appropriate hallmarks,
including one denoting the fineness of the metal. Since the colonies had
neither assay offices nor regulations governing the work of
silversmiths, each smith was responsible for the quality of his own
work.
Because most re-used plate came originally from England and because
coins were generally minted at or near sterling fineness (925/1000ths
fine, or 92.5% pure silver, the rest of the alloy being copper), most
American silversmiths presumably turned out work that was not too far
from sterling purity. They could not afford to slip much below that
level, after all, since they competed for favor and sales with the much
esteemed plate imported from England. In many advertisements in the
colonial press, smiths explicitly warranted their work to be of sterling
quality. However, among the pieces of early American silver that have
actually been assayed in recent years, only a portion have met the test;
quite a number have not.
While American smiths no doubt resented the general preference of their
customers for articles of English manufacture, they could not overlook
the fact that English fashions in design dominated colonial life.
Accordingly, silver of colonial make imitated the London styles in
plate, being usually some years behind them.
But the American designers were neither unimaginative nor slavish
imitators. Their designs modified the English originals rather
freely—usually in the direction of simplicity and utility. American
silver, dispensing with the heavy ornamentation for ornament’s sake that
often characterized the work of London silversmiths, tended to be
substantial, serviceable, and vigorous in form, befitting the
environment in which it was to be used.
Acquiring a complete set of Silversmith tools, or at least a reasonably
adequate set, must have been something of a task in itself. When John
Coney, a leading Boston silversmith, died in 1722 at the age of 67, the
inventory of his goods reflected his many years at the craft. Among the
articles listed were 116 hammers, 127 nests of crucibles, 80 anvils of
different shapes and sizes (some called “stakes” and “teasts”), and
unnumbered punches; plus chisels, swages, stamps, vises, files, and an
almost endless variety of other tools.
[Illustration: _Various hand tools used by the silversmith,
including a small lathe, vises, clamps, caliper, shears, and
pliers._ DIDEROT.]
John Burt, another Boston silversmith of the eighteenth century, got
along with only 40 hammers, 15 pairs of tongs and pliers, 37 “bottom
stakes,” 155 punches, and other tools in like sparsity. A glance at the
illustration on pages 27 and 28 from Diderot’s _Encyclopedia_ (published
in France, 1751-1772) indicates the infinite diversity of anvils that
would be needed to produce every possible shape and size of hollow ware.
Even with all these tools—plus forge, ingot molds, drawing bench,
binding wire, and many other essentials of the craft—the silversmith was
limited to six basic methods of working silver. These were casting,
forging, raising, hollowing, seaming, and creasing—the principal methods
still employed by hand craftsmen today.
But forging, raising, hollowing, and creasing are all hammering
processes, though they differ significantly in the manipulation of the
metal under the hammer. In essence, thus, there are only three
techniques of forming silver into an article of desired shape: casting
the molten metal in a properly shaped mold; hammering an ingot into the
shape desired; and building the desired shape from smaller pieces
soldered together. Wire produced on the drawing bench might be one of
these smaller elements. Filing is considered to be a finishing rather
than a forming process.
These forming and working processes, as they would have been used by an
eighteenth-century silversmith, will be described in more detail in a
moment. But the smith, before he could do any work, had to acquire a
supply of refined metal, probably from his customers. He then charged
them only for his services in fashioning the new pieces, either a set
amount for the type and size of article or a fixed fee per ounce of
silver in the finished article.
Early in the Revolution, for example, General George Washington ordered
a set of 12 silver “camp cups” from the Philadelphia Silversmith Edmond
Milne. He supplied Milne with “16 silv^r Doll^s” to make the cups out
of. Possibly these were Portuguese or Brazilian crusadoes or “cross
dollars.” As it turned out, there were 1¾ ounces more silver in the 16
dollars than Milne needed for the 12 cups. He retained the excess for
his own use and credited its value against his charge for workmanship.
Coins went directly into the smith’s “black lead” or graphite crucible.
Old plate had to be broken up first into pieces of suitable size. Then
the crucible was set down into—not on—the charcoal fire in the forge.
Charcoal on top of the melting silver kept it from absorbing too much
oxygen.
Pure silver is a highly ductile and malleable metal with the relatively
low melting point of 1761 degrees Fahrenheit. Sterling silver melts at
an even lower temperature, so only 15 or 20 minutes in the forge, with
constant use of the bellows, would be enough to melt the crucible’s
charge. Most impurities in the metal would be sopped up by the porous
graphite of the crucible itself. The molten metal was then poured out
into a two-piece cast iron ingot mold or into an open mold called a
“skillet.” In either case, the cooling metal released any oxygen it
might have absorbed in the form of spitting bubbles that left the
surface of the ingot pitted with tiny holes.
If the piece of work to be made was a small ornament, it would be cast
directly in a sand mold formed by the smith around a pattern of his own
making. The acorn-like finials atop teapots or on the covers of tankards
were normally made by casting, often a dozen at a time.
Perhaps, however, some customer ordered a simple, straight-sided silver
cup, too large to be cast. Our smith could have made it by any one of
three methods and the result would be the same in size, shape, weight,
and appearance. Generally only another silversmith could hope to tell
which was made by which process: forging, raising, or seaming.
To _forge_ such a cup the silversmith would have taken a billet of
silver perhaps 3/16 inches thick and from it cut a disk of the same
diameter as the lip of the finished cup. Then by careful and repeated
hammer blows, using shaped anvils of the proper size and curvature, he
would pound the metal into the form he required.
To _raise_ a cup, the smith would start with silver in the form of a
flat sheet as thick (or thin) as he wanted the cup to be. He would have
made the sheet himself, of course, by beating an ingot to the required
thinness. From the sheet he would cut a disk whose diameter equalled the
average diameter plus the average height of the finished cup. By
carefully hammering the silver just beyond the edge of the anvil, he
would force the metal around the outer part of the disk to rise and
“shrink” until the cup was shaped.
To make a _seamed_ cup the smith would again use thin sheet, cutting
from it a small round piece for the bottom of the cup and a slightly
curved oblong piece to form its side. He would roll the latter into a
somewhat cone-shaped cylinder and solder together the edges. Then he
would solder the small disk into the lower end of the cylinder so that
the cup was formed. This was by far the quickest and easiest method of
making hollow ware. The silversmith’s solder is itself composed
predominantly of silver.
Whatever method the smith used to form the cup, he would finish it by a
process known as planishing. In this procedure the small irregularities
in the surface of the piece are carefully hammered smooth by repeated,
deft blows of a flat, polished hammer. The face of the planishing anvil
is likewise polished to mirror-like smoothness. After planishing would
come the filing off of burrs in crevices of the design, and then an
all-over polishing with pumice, tripoli, and rouge. At this point the
piece would have been ready for surface ornamentation—by engraving,
chasing, or repoussé.
Engraving means the cutting of a design into the surface of the work;
some metal is removed in the process. Chasing is the impression of a
design on the surface by the use of appropriately shaped punches.
Repoussé consists of raising a design, somewhat like bas relief, by
hammering from the back or inside of the work. In the second and third
techniques the metal is displaced but not removed.
[Illustration: _Shown here are a few of the larger anvils and stakes
on which the silversmiths shaped their silver into the finished
articles. Since the silversmith had no tool the exact shape of the
articles he made, he had to employ many different shaped tools in
the process of manufacture._ DIDEROT.]
[Illustration: _The silversmith often used small anvils, stakes, and
dies. Figure 13, for instance, is a spoon mold used to make the
final shape of the spoon. Figures 16, 18, 20, and 22 are button
punches used to impress a design on smaller pieces._ DIDEROT.]
Stamping was normally used only in the forming of such small articles as
the bowls of teaspoons. In this procedure a piece of silver was forged
to the desired thickness and outline, and placed between a hollowed-out
lower die and a rounded upper one. When the smith forced the two dies
together by a blow of his heaviest hammer, the bowl of the spoon was
formed. By filing, planishing, and polishing—and possibly some
engraving—the one-piece spoon was quickly finished.
A soup ladle, having a much larger and deeper bowl, would have been
formed by the raising process, with the handle made as a separate piece
and soldered to the bowl. In fact, only the simplest articles and the
smallest ones could be formed by one process alone. The accomplished
colonial silversmith had to be able not only to refine and assay his own
silver, but to work it up in any combination of techniques that the
design made most appropriate.
As an example, the body and spout of a teapot might each have been
formed by the seaming process, the base by forging, the top by raising,
the finial by casting, and parts of the hinges by drawing. Then all the
parts would have been soldered together and the piece planished,
polished, and finished off with engraved, chased, or repoussé
decoration—or a combination of these. Finally, the smith would have
attached a wooden handle, which he might have obtained from a
cabinetmaker—or made himself.
Among the silversmith’s final procedures would have been the stamping of
his mark, his initials, or his name on the piece. This practice of
identifying the maker of an article of gold or silver ware is of long
standing, though perhaps not so ancient as the custom by which a painter
or sculptor signs his work.
Since the year 1300 the Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths of the City of
London has been charged by the British government with assaying gold and
silver wares and coins, and certifying that the metals are of required
fineness. Throughout most of this long period the hallmarking of English
silver articles has retained a basic continuity of tradition.
Disregarding certain modifications and accretions (some noted in the
caption above), every piece of sterling silver made in England since
1544 has borne four marks stamped on the back, bottom, or side.
[Illustration: _The hallmarks in the first line above and the
maker’s marks in the second line illustrate the variety of markings
used on English silver. The leopard’s head crowned (_A_) became the
mark of the City of London; _B_ and _E_ are date letters; _C_ is the
lion passant denoting silver of sterling fineness. During the
Britannia standard period (1697-1719), the lion’s head erased (_F_)
replaced the leopard’s head crowned, Britannia (_D_), still
optional, replaced the lion passant on London silver, and the
standard of fineness was raised from 92.50% to 95.83%. Also, the law
required the maker to use the first two letters of his last name,
for example (_G_), the mark of Paul de Lamerie. It was the custom
before and after this period for silversmiths to use initials. The
marks of George Wickes, John Tuite, and Dorothy Mills are shown
(_H_, _I_, and _J_) and examples of their work are in Colonial
Williamsburg’s collection of English and American silver. Some of
George Wickes’s tools may be among those currently used at the
Golden Ball and the Geddy Shop._]
One is the true hallmark, the symbol of the guildhall where it was
assayed. That of the guild of London goldsmiths is the head of a leopard
and has been in use for the nearly seven centuries since 1300. Assay
offices established later in a few other cities use other symbols.
Another is the maker’s mark, which has been required since 1363. This
mark is now always the maker’s initials, but once was more often his
trade symbol.
In 1478 a system was adopted of dating each piece assayed by stamping it
with one letter of the alphabet. For this purpose a twenty-letter
alphabet is used, the design of the letter or of the surrounding panel
being changed every twenty years.
Finally, the mark of English sterling standard fineness—a lion
passant—has been used (with one twenty-three-year interruption) since
1544 to certify that the metal is 92.5 per cent pure silver. English
silver rarely bears the word “sterling,” which is commonly found on
modern American silver and on that made in some other countries for sale
to Americans. Hallmarking of British goldware is somewhat different.
Colonial American silversmiths did not adopt the elaborate marking
tradition of the Old World. In the English colonies no legal
requirements existed for marking of any kind, the guild system was not
transplanted, and until 1814 there was not even an assay office. So
colonial smiths put only their own mark on their work. At first this was
composed of the maker’s initials only, but later became more often his
surname, with or without initial. Some smiths also used a symbol—John
Coney the figure of a rabbit, for example—but this was comparatively
rare. Of the Williamsburg silversmiths we have positive or presumed
maker’s marks of only two—James Geddy and Alexander Kerr.
_THE GEDDY SHOP AND THE GOLDEN BALL TODAY_
Two reconstructed silversmithing shops in Williamsburg once more stand
in the same spots occupied by similar establishments in the eighteenth
century. Both are operating craft shops where skilled workers in costume
produce articles of gold and silver using methods and tools like those
employed by James Craig, James Geddy, Jr., and other Williamsburg
silversmiths two centuries ago. For reasons important to
twentieth-century visitors, a partial division of functions has been
established: The making of jewelry and smaller silver items and
engraving are emphasized at the Golden Ball; the casting of silver (done
at the Geddy Foundry along with founding in other metals) and the making
of larger pieces, particularly hollow ware, are more prominent at the
Geddy Shop.
The original structure at the site of the Golden Ball, possibly built in
1724, remained standing until 1907, undergoing repairs and alterations
from time to time. Craig had his shop in the western portion for a
period before 1765, renting the space from James Carter, surgeon. In
that year he bought the western fifteen feet of the house and lot, and
the next year acquired the rest of it. After Craig’s death the building
served its succeeding owners as a residence. The recollections of
several old inhabitants of Williamsburg, a faded photograph, deeds, tax
records, insurance policies, and excavated colonial brick foundations
have all provided clues in reconstructing the building to its original
outward appearance and inward room arrangement.
As for the shop itself, it has been designed and equipped—insofar as
careful research and discerning imagination can make it—as it might have
been in James Craig’s day. Lacking any descriptive material on the
contents of the Golden Ball, the architects and curators have had to
draw on other sources. The forge, for example, was designed and built in
the image of forges described by Benvenuto Cellini and pictured in
Diderot’s _Encyclopedia_. Some of the wall cabinets were made in
imitation of those on display in European craft museums.
Much the same may be said of the Geddy Shop. Whereas the two-story,
ell-shaped house dates to about 1750, the two shops of one and a half
storys extending to the east of the house are reconstructed on original
foundations still in the ground. James Geddy, Jr., probably worked on
the premises before 1760, when he bought the house and lot from his
mother. He rented out the easternmost shop but continued to practice
silversmithing—presumably in the middle shop—until 1777 when he moved
away and sold the property.
Since no records survive as to the interior arrangement or contents of
the shop, the architects and curators have again had to use their best
judgment and the most appropriate precedents and parallels in designing
and furnishing the shop. While none of the silversmithing tools now used
in either of the two shops are those of James Craig or James Geddy, Jr.,
some of them may have belonged to an English silversmith of the
eighteenth century by the name of George Wickes. One particular tool, a
square “stake” or anvil, displayed in the Geddy Shop, once belonged to
Paul Revere. It was given to Colonial Williamsburg by Mrs. Francis P.
Garvan, whose husband’s outstanding collection of American silver is
housed at Yale University.
[Illustration: _Advertisement appearing in Purdie and Dixon’s
VIRGINIA GAZETTE on July 14, 1774._]
JAMES CRAIG,
AT THE GOLDEN BALL,
WILLIAMSBURG,
BEGS leave to inform the public that he has just got an eminent hand
in the WATCH AND CLOCK MAKING BUSINESS, who served a regular
apprenticeship to the same in _Great Britain_, and will be obliged to
those who favour him with their commands. He makes and repairs
REPEATING, HORIZONTAL, and STOP WATCHES, in the neatest and best
manner. JEWELLERY, GOLD, and SILVERWORK, as usual, made at the above
shop, for READY MONEY only.
James Geddy repaired watches, advertising that “he still continues to
clean and repair Watches, and repairs his own work that fails in a
reasonable time, without any expense to the purchaser.” Rough castings
in brass for spandrels to decorate the faces of clocks and many
fragments of watch crystals have been found in the course of
archaeological excavation of the Geddy property. On several occasions
James Craig advertised that his customers could have “All Kinds of
CLOCKS and WATCHES cleaned and repaired” in his shop, and twice
announced that he had “just got an eminent Hand, in the WATCH and CLOCK
MAKING BUSINESS, who served a regular Apprenticeship to the same in
Great Britain.”
In cabinets of rooms adjoining both shops the visitor may examine a
collection of silver, cutlery, jewelry, and similar articles made in
England and in the colonies during the eighteenth century. Of particular
interest are the black enameled “mourning rings” so popular at that
time. It was the custom for a man of wealth to provide in his will for
the purchase of rings to be worn by members of his family and close
friends. All Williamsburg silversmiths and jewelers advertised that they
made mourning rings “on the shortest Notice.”
The contemporary silversmiths at the Geddy Shop and the Golden Ball do
not make mourning rings—there is not much call for them these days. They
do, however, make and sell a number of other articles of silver of true
eighteenth-century design. For obvious reasons their supply of raw
material comes from commercial refineries rather than from melted coins
or plate. But they cast the silver, forge it, raise, seam, and solder
it, and decorate the finished products just as did their predecessors.
Above all, today’s silversmith and his co-workers still hammer the
lustrous metal with the same love of beauty that a sculptor might have.
Indeed, the hammer is the silversmith’s most useful and in many ways his
most delicate tool. With it he can produce effects in the metal that
cannot be achieved in any other way. In fact, a fine silversmith must be
able to wield a hammer much as an artist uses his brush—as if it were a
natural extension of his arm.
_WILLIAMSBURG SILVERSMITHS BEFORE THE REVOLUTION_
_Patrick Beech._ Advertised himself as a silversmith and jeweler on one
occasion in 1774. Nothing more is known of him.
_John Brodnax_ (or Broadnax, 1668-1719). First silversmith to practice
the craft in Williamsburg, from about 1694 until his death.
_John Bryan._ Mentioned in several legal documents of the 1740s as a
silversmith in Williamsburg.
_John Coke_ (1704-1767). Worked at silversmithing in Williamsburg from
about 1724 until his death, and also, after 1755, kept a tavern in
the present Coke-Garrett House near the Capitol.
_Samuel Coke_ (died 1773). Son of John Coke; jeweler and possibly a
silversmith in his father’s shop and later for himself.
_James Craig_ (died 1794). Arrived from London about 1745 as a jeweler;
added silversmithing and was established at the Golden Ball by
1765.
_Jacob Flournoy_ (born 1663). Came to Williamsburg about 1700 from
Switzerland, where his family were watchmakers and jewelers;
referred to as a “goldsmith” in a deed of 1712.
_James Galt_ (1741-1800). Born in Williamsburg, where his father was a
silversmith; had his own shop in Richmond and later in
Williamsburg; became the first superintendent of the hospital for
the insane in the latter place; brother of John Minson Galt, the
physician, and son of:
_Samuel Galt_ (c. 1700-1761). A watchmaker who also did gold and silver
work in Williamsburg from about 1750 until his death; keeper of
the Public Gaol, 1759-1760.
_James Geddy, Jr._ (1731-1807). Williamsburg’s most accomplished
silversmith until, about 1778, he moved to Dinwiddie and thence to
Petersburg.
_Alexander Kerr_ (died 1738). Arrived in Williamsburg in 1717. Jeweler
and silversmith in Williamsburg for several years before his
death.
_Blovet Pasteur._ Apparently born and died in Williamsburg, dates not
known; a silversmith there at least from 1759 to 1778.
_James Patterson_ (died 1773). A watchmaker who probably arrived in
Williamsburg about 1760, and by 1771 was also making jewelry and
silver.
_William Rowsay._ Was an apprentice to James Craig in 1771; combined his
jewelry and silver work with his brother John’s general
merchandise business in 1774.
_Anthony Singleton_ (1750-1795). Opened a jewelry and silversmith shop
in Williamsburg in 1771; moved to Richmond probably in 1787.
_William Waddill._ Engraver and silversmith; worked at one time in the
shop of James Geddy, Jr., who is presumed to have been his
brother-in-law; moved to Richmond about 1782 and thence, it is
believed, to Petersburg.
_SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING_
Carl Bridenbaugh, _The Colonial Craftsman_. New York: New York
University Press, 1950.
Kathryn C. Buhler, _American Silver_. Cleveland: World Publishing Co.,
1950.
E. Milby Burton, _South Carolina Silversmiths, 1690-1860_. Charleston:
Charleston Museum, 1942.
George Barton Cutten, _The Silversmiths of North Carolina_. Raleigh:
State Department of Archives and History, 1948.
——, _The Silversmiths of Georgia, Together with Watchmakers and
Jewelers_. Savannah: Pigeonhole Press, 1958.
——, _The Silversmiths of Virginia from 1694 to 1850_. Richmond: Dietz
Press, 1952.
Martha Gandy Fales, _Early American Silver_. New York: E. P. Dutton,
1973.
——, _Joseph Richardson & Family: Philadelphia Silversmiths_. Middletown,
Conn.: Wesleyan University Press, 1974.
Leonard Everett Fisher, _The Silversmiths_. New York: Franklin Watts,
1964.
Jennifer F. Goldsborough, _Eighteenth & Nineteenth Century Maryland
Silver in the Collection of the Baltimore Museum of Art_.
Baltimore: Baltimore Museum of Art, 1975.
High Museum of Art, _Georgia Collects American Silver, 1780-1870_.
Atlanta: High Museum of Art, 1970.
Hugh Honour, _Goldsmiths & Silversmiths_. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons,
1971.
Graham Hood, _American Silver, A History of Style, 1650-1900_. New York:
Praeger Publishers, 1971.
Houston Museum of Fine Arts, _Southern Silver: An Exhibition of Silver
Made in the South prior to 1860_. Houston: Houston Museum of Fine
Arts, 1968.
Henry J. Kauffman, _The Colonial Silversmith, His Techniques and His
Products_. Camden, N. J.: J. Nelson, 1969.
Metropolitan Museum of Art, _Early American Silver: A Picture Book_. New
York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1955.
Charles F. Montgomery and Catherine H. Maxwell, _Early American Silver:
Collectors, Collections, Exhibitions, Writings_. Portland, Me.:
Anthoensen Press, 1969.
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, _Colonial Silversmiths, Masters &
Apprentices_. Boston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1956.
Ivor Noël Hume, _James Geddy and Sons, Colonial Craftsmen_.
Williamsburg: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 1970.
John Marshall Phillips, _American Silver_. London: M. Parrish, 1949.
Millicent Stow, _American Silver_. New York: Barrows Co., 1950.
Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, _Masterpieces of American Silver_.
Richmond: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 1960.
_The Silversmith in Eighteenth-Century Williamsburg_ was first published
in 1956. Written by Thomas K. Ford, editor, now retired, it is based
largely on an unpublished monograph by Thomas K. Bullock, formerly of
the Department of Research. It was reprinted in 1966, revised in 1972,
and reprinted in 1976.
Transcriber’s Notes
—Retained publication information from the printed edition: this eBook
is public-domain in the country of publication.
—Silently corrected a few palpable typos.
—In the text versions only, text in italics is delimited by
_underscores_.
End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Silversmith in Eighteenth-Century
Williamsburg, by Thomas K. Ford
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