established in Allentown, Pa., and in Pittsburg, where decorated pottery
was made which resembled German manufactures, and which was often
ornamented with mottoes and legends in slip decoration.
From 1793 to 1800 John and William Norton made red ware in Bennington,
Vt.; since then stone-ware has been made in the same works. In 1847
Messrs. Lyman & Fenton started a pottery in Bennington, in which they
made both pottery and soft-paste porcelain. These works continued for
about twelve years. Specimens of their tortoise-shell wares are in the
Trumbull-Prime Collection. One in the shape of a lion is here shown.
They also made figures of men and animals in Parian wares, the first,
doubtless, produced in America. The impressed circular mark on some of
the enamelled pottery was “Lyman Fenton & Co. Fenton’s Enamel, patented
1849, Bennington, Vt.”
[Illustration: Bennington Ware.]
In the year 1837 by far the most important enterprise in the manufacture
of pottery and porcelain that had ever been organized in America was
started under the supervision of Mr. James Clews, who had been a potter
in Cobridge, England, from the years 1819 to 1829, and who was the
largest manufacturer of dark blue Staffordshire wares at that date. An
account of many pieces of his production in his English pottery, and of
the stamps and marks used by him, is given in Chapter XVII.
He emigrated to America, and went to what was then the Far West—to
Indiana; and with capitalists from Louisville, Ky.—Reuben Bates, Samuel
Cassiday, William Bell, James Anderson, Jr., Edward Bainbridge, Perly
Chamberlin, William Gerwin, John B. Bland, Willis Ranney, and James
Lewis—incorporated a company, under the name of The Indiana Pottery
Company, with a capital of $100,000 and power to increase to $200,000. A
special act of January 7, 1837 (see Indiana Local Laws, Twenty-first
Session, p. 7), states that these parties had “heretofore associated
themselves together for the purpose of manufacturing earthenware and
china in the State of Indiana, under the name and style of The Lewis
Pottery Company.”
The Indiana Pottery Company built its works in Troy, Perry County, thus
having means of easy transportation by the Ohio River to New Orleans and
other important points.
Mr. Clews had amassed much wealth in his Cobridge works, but he quickly
lost it in this new enterprise in the new land, which proved far from
successful. The chief difficulty lay in the hiring of proper workmen.
The English potters proved wholly unreliable in this country, and the
expense of importing fresh relays of workmen was too great to be
endured. Nearly three hundred potters were brought over from England.
The founders also found it impossible to make white ware with the clay
in the vicinity of Troy, and of the vast beds of fine kaolin which exist
in Indiana they were doubtless ignorant. The dark blue ware which they
manufactured proved far from satisfactory, and though so brilliantly
started by practical and wealthy men, this pottery was quickly closed,
after making a considerable quantity of yellow and Rockingham ware. In
1851 a firm named Sanders & Wilson leased the buildings, which were
burned in 1854, but were rebuilt. There are now two potteries in Troy.
In the early part of this century, probably in 1827, a china factory was
established in Jersey City, N. J., which made hard-paste porcelain.
Specimens of pure white with gilded vines are in the Trumbull-Prime
Collection. In 1829 the works became known as the American Pottery
Company, and pieces of their manufacture at that date bear that mark.
This pottery is still in existence, though known by another name. They
made from the year 1830 the embossed brown pottery pitcher with “hound
handle,” which was also such a favorite with English potters from the
time it was manufactured at Fulham. The design for these American
hound-handled pitchers was made by Daniel Greatbach, a prominent English
modeller, who came to this country many years ago. A specimen which I
possess is of mottled tortoise-shell, green, brown, and yellow, and
bears the design of a hunt around the body and grape-leaves on the top,
but more frequently the pitchers are simply colored brown. Some have a
mask of Bacchus on and under the nose, and one I own has the nose formed
by an American “spread eagle.” They were a favorite hot-water jug in the
early years of their manufacture, their size, strength, and shape making
them particularly suitable for such a purpose. They were sometimes
fitted with metal covers fastened to holes drilled through the pottery.
I have seen them twenty inches in height, and at least three feet in
circumference. In some parts of the country they are known as “tavern
pitchers,” perhaps from power of association. Such is the one herewith
shown, now owned by Robert T. Van Deusen, esq., of Albany. Some were
doubtless from English potteries, but many are American. Glazed brown
“tobys” with the circular impressed mark “D. & J. Henderson, Jersey
City,” were also made, but the exact age of such pieces is unknown.
[Illustration: Hound-handled Pitcher.]
Of the later porcelain factories which have been established in America
I will not speak—the factories of Trenton, Baltimore, East Liverpool,
Long Island City—which now number over five hundred. Their story will
doubtless be written ere long by some historian of the ceramic art in
America, but hardly comes within the bounds of this work. Specimens of
their manufacture, especially of the truly artistic productions of the
Baltimore China Works, should, however, be secured by every china
collector, though they do not appeal so strongly to the china hunter, to
whom the pleasures of the chase often exceed the delight in the spoils,
and to whom old china, like old wine, is better than new.
V.
EARLIEST POTTERY WARES
The first rare pieces of porcelain owned by the American colonists were
India china; but Delft ware, salt-glazed ware, and the tortoise-shell or
“combed” wares were the earliest forms of pottery that were imported to
any great extent.
Many pieces of heavy blue and white Delft have been found in New
England, some being Dutch, some English. The shapes, decorations, and
pastes are so similar that it is impossible for even the most careful
observer definitely to judge of the place of manufacture, and there are
seldom guiding and aiding marks. In Connecticut much Delft is found,
sometimes with Dutch words and inscriptions. Doubtless the Connecticut
planters bargained and traded with the New York Dutch, who perhaps took
onions and notions from the canny Connecticut men in exchange for Delft.
In New York, along the Hudson River to Albany, much fine Delft is still
preserved in old Dutch families, especially in the old Dutch farm-houses
and manor-houses. At the Albany Bi-centennial Loan Collection, in 1886,
a fine showing was made of old Delft by representatives of the families
of the old patroons—of the Ten Eycks, Ten Broecks, Bleeckers, and Van
Rensselaers.
A few stray Delft wanderers may be found in Massachusetts and New
Hampshire—meat dishes and plates, pale and ugly, as if the journey
inland had faded them out. On Long Island, Delft is still kept and used
in Dutch families—it is not the oldest Delft, however, nor is it much
prized. The typical Delft vases, decorated in blue, yellow, and white,
once graced the high mantel or beaufet of many a low, comfortable Dutch
farm-house in Flatbush, New Utrecht, and Gravesend, and occasionally one
can still be found. A fine set is in the old “pirates’ house” at
Flatlands. The Dutch made many teapots, we are told, but I have never
found an old Delft one in America. I have seen a few dull blue and white
Delft flower-pots—possibly one hundred years old—clumsy, ugly things,
whether old or new. I wish I could drive through the old Dutch
settlements on Long Island—New Utrecht, and Flatlands, and New Lots, and
Gravesend—and ransack the great, spacious garret of every concave-roofed
story and a half farm-house I passed. I know I could bring many a piece
of Delft to light—forgotten and unheeded by its stolid owners.
That Delft was not very highly prized by the Dutch settlers, nor by
their descendants, may be proved by many inventories and lists, such as
this, of the estate of John Lefferts, of Flatbush, made in 1792:
£ s.
25 Pewter plates (1s. each) 1 5
37 Earthen plates 10
9 Pewter dishes 1 15
8 Earthen dishes 1
6 Sets china cups and saucers 3
27 Delft plates 13
Pewter was plainly much more valued than Delft, and India china was
still more highly prized.
[Illustration: Delft Tea-caddy.]
Old Delft tea-caddies are both curious and pretty. Here is one shown,
marked with the names “Aalta Evert and Gerrit Egben” and the date, 1793.
It was doubtless a wedding or betrothal gift. In this piece the dark
blue decoration is under the glaze, and the red and black quaint
Dutch-dressed figures and the inscription are over the glaze, and were
doubtless painted to order and fired when the piece was purchased for a
gift or token. This labor-saving device was brought to perfection by a
Dutch potter named Zachary Dextra, though the cunning Chinese and
Japanese had employed it when they held supremacy over the Dutch market.
If a skilled painter painted under the glaze, an inferior workman could
easily do the finishing touches over the glaze.
The Delft apothecary jars are the rarest and most curious pieces seen,
and form a charming posy-holder. They are eight or ten inches in height,
and are lettered with the abbreviated names of drugs. “Succ: E. Spin:
C.,” “U. Althae,” and “C: Rosar: E.” are on three of my jars. They
frequently have a spout on one side, and are then usually globose in
shape, with a spreading base. Some have handles. When the Dutch used
these jars, a century or more ago, they covered the open top with
tightly-tied oil-skin and poured the medicinal or chemical contents from
the spout, which, at other times, was kept carefully corked. These jars
are identical in shape with the old “sirroop-pots” of Dutch museums; for
instance, the one made by Haarles, the eminent _plateelbakker_, in 1795,
as a “proof of his skill,” and now preserved in the archives at Delft.
The most familiar and universal decoration on Delft plates and meat
dishes is the conventionalized “peacock” design. It sometimes takes
rather a ludicrous appearance, often forming a comical caricature of a
ballet-dancer. A coarsely-drawn basket of flowers is also common. I have
also seen in America specimens of the “musical plates” of Delft. These
bear designs of musical instruments, scores of song or dance music, or
simply a staff with a few notes, a motif, accompanied usually by
inscriptions, mottoes, or couplets, sometimes in Dutch, sometimes in
French, the latter showing usually so decided a touch of extreme
opera-bouffe _équivoque_ that such “musical plates” would scarcely be in
demand for family use, and make us turn to the Dutch-lettered pieces as
being more desirable simply because the language of their decoration is
less widely known and comprehended. Even these cannot be positively
classed as Dutch, for the early English potters copied servilely the
Dutch designs. The vases often have figures of men and animals and Dutch
landscapes. A fine collection of Delft plates and placques and vases may
be seen in the Trumbull-Prime Collection.
[Illustration: Delft Vase.]
“Fine Holland Tile” was advertised in the _Boston News Letter_ of June
11, 1716—the first announcement of the sale of Delft in America, though
not in the form of table-ware—and in the same paper, under date of
August 10, 1719, we find a notice of “Dutch Tile for Chimney.” From that
date, all through the century, in the various newspapers, we find
constantly recurring advertisements of Delft chimney tiles on the
arrival of every foreign ship. They must have been imported in vast
numbers, and were not expensive; “9 dozen Dutch tiles, £1 10s., 10 dozen
Dutch tiles, £2 10s.,” were the values assigned. In spite of these facts
I have found them very rare in New England—they have wholly disappeared.
In historical rooms, in museums, they may be seen, but seldom in old
houses. The Robinson House in old Narraganset has a fine set; in a few
old houses in the Connecticut valley I have seen sets of the coarsely
painted “scripture tiles” so disparaged by Benjamin Franklin, but they
are rare. Even on Long Island and on the banks of the Hudson they are
now seldom found. Storytellers of New England life usually place blue
and white tiles around their Yankee fireplaces, but they are more
plentiful in the imagination of such narrators than in reality. With the
various changes in the manner of heating New England dwellings, the
chimney tiles have all vanished, even when the houses still stand, and
nearly all the old city houses have been entirely removed to make way
for more modern business structures. English potters made tiles in such
close imitation of the Dutch that it is impossible to distinguish
between them. Doubtless many of the “blue and white chimney tile” so
largely advertised were English manufactures imported under the name of
Dutch tiles, while still others were not chimney, but roof tiles.
There have been found in New England, in numbers which seem rather
surprising when we consider their age, ale-jugs of gray and blue
stone-ware which are universally known as Fulham jugs. They resemble in
quality and coloring the German stone-ware or our common crocks, being
of the same gray ware with a lead glaze. They are decorated with rich
blue like the German wares, and have an incised design of leaves and
scrolls, circles or simple flowers. I have seen a number which bore in
the front an oval medallion with the incised initials G. R., sometimes
also a crown. These are said to refer to Georgius Rex, the first of the
English Georges. I know of one G. R. mug which has an additional
interest in the form of a bullet of the Revolution imbedded in its tough
and uncracked side. Some of these Fulham jugs have apparently had silver
or pewter lids attached to them. They are what are known as
bottle-shaped, round and protuberant, narrowing to a small neck and
base; others are more slender, almost cylindrical. There are no marks to
prove them to be Fulham jugs, but as such they are known.
Other Fulham jugs are found of brownish mottled stone-ware with hound
handle and raised decoration in the body of figures of the chase, and
with mask of Bacchus forming the nose. These have been frequently
reproduced in American potteries and when unmarked, it is difficult to
determine which are English.
[Illustration: Fulham G. R. Jug.]
Pieces of salt-glazed ware have been found in country homes by many
china hunters, and are among the most pleasing articles to be obtained.
The date of their manufacture was from 1680 to 1780. An interesting
story is told of the discovery of the process of glazing this ware. A
servant maid having, in the year 1680, allowed a pot of brine to boil
over, the dull earthen pot containing the brine became red hot, and when
cold was covered with a bright glaze. A sharp potter perceiving it, at
once utilized the hint. The story is pretty, but it can scarcely be
true, for such a glaze could not be formed in an open place. But
salt-glaze there is, and in America too, of the very earliest
manufacture—Crouch-ware, or, as it is incorrectly and inappropriately
called, Elizabethan-ware. Crouch is the name neither of a person nor of
a place, but of the white Derbyshire clay. The paste made from this clay
is very dense, and is of a greenish tint. The Elers-ware of buff ground
with simple raised scrolls and rosettes of white are also of early date.
Some of the salt-glazed pieces were shaped by pressing the moist paste
into metal moulds, other pieces were “cast” in moulds of plaster of
Paris, the slip or liquid paste being introduced to line the mould, and
allowed to set, and this operation being repeated until the piece was of
required thickness. As the taste for light delicate wares increased,
some were made as light and thin as paper. If the piece were “cast” the
handles, nose, and feet (if it possessed any) were moulded and placed on
separately. The moulds used were frequently the worn-out moulds that had
been used for casting silverware; hence pieces of salt-glazed ware
usually resemble in shape the pieces of silver of the same date.
The characteristic feature of salt-glazed ware—the quality from which it
derives its name—is its glaze. This is easily recognized. It does not
run and spread like other glazes, but seems to form into minute
coagulated drops or granulations resembling somewhat the surface of
orange-peel. The glaze is often unequal, being higher on some portions
of the piece than others, the vapor of soda (through which the glaze was
made) not penetrating with equal power to every point. Thus one side of
a piece may be dull and the other highly glazed.
The largest and finest example of salt-glazed ware which I have seen in
America is the exact duplicate of the best specimen in the Museum of
Practical Geology, in Jermyn Street, London, numbered G. 111. It is thus
described in the catalogue of that museum: “Large oval soup-tureen,
cover, and stand. Height, ten inches; greatest diameter, fourteen and
one-half inches. Body decorated with pressed ornaments, including
scroll-work and diaper and basket pattern; the tureen mounted on three
lion’s claws with masks.” This tureen is dated 1763. The beautiful and
delicate specimen found in America is absolutely perfect. It bore the
difficult process of making and firing (specially difficult in so large
a piece), crossed the water to the new land of Virginia, passed through
generations of use and the devastations of the Revolutionary and civil
wars, was gathered in by a travelling dealer, brought in safety by rail
to New York, and ignominiously sold for a dollar and a half to its
present proud possessor. It was doubtless cast in the same mould as the
one in the museum. Another similar piece is in the well-known English
collection of Lady Charlotte Schreiber.
A large number of smaller pieces of salt-glazed ware have been found,
including salt-boxes, creamers, and one beautiful teapot which is so
graceful and unique in design that it has been honored by being borrowed
by a prominent china-manufacturer in England to reproduce in his modern
ware. Thus this frail waif from the middle of the last century has
thrice crossed the ocean in safety.
[Illustration: Sportive Innocence Pitcher.]
[Illustration: Farmer Pitcher.]
The pitchers shown are of salt-glazed ware and may be Crouch-ware,
though they are apparently of rather later date. The first bears in a
heart-shaped medallion a design of high-colored children at awkward
play, and is labelled “Sportive Innocence.” Similar ones are frequently
found in America. I know of at least a dozen. Some bear on the reverse
side a different design with the same children entitled “Mischievous
Sport.” In this the boy is frightening the little girl with an ugly
mask. Other pitchers of precisely the same shape and borderdecorations
in orange, green, and blue have different designs in the medallion, a
peacock being frequently seen. The farmer’s pitcher has the motto
“Success to Trade,” and is surely older as well as gayer in color than
the “Sportive Innocence” pitcher.
There were imported to America in great quantities, as is shown by many
eighteenth-century advertisements, “tortoise-shell” and “combed pattern”
wares, also the pretty cauliflower, melon, and pineapple wares that have
been reproduced in our own day. These were manufactured chiefly at
Little Fenton by Thomas Whieldon, a man who influenced much the potters’
art in England from the year 1740 to 1780, during five of which years he
was a partner with Wedgwood. There are only two specimens of these wares
in the Museum of Practical Geology, and Mr. Jewitt wrote in 1873: “These
wares are now very scarce and are highly and deservedly prized by
collectors.” At the time he wrote he could have gathered in America
scores, even hundreds, of pieces of the Whieldon wares for English
collections. Dr. Irving Lyon, of Hartford, has a fine collection of them
which he picked up in the cottages of the Connecticut Valley—a
collection which any English china-lover would envy.
Whieldon was a man of great energy, with a practical knowledge of his
art, and he spent much time in his works perfecting his patterns and
processes. He compounded the bright green glaze so admirable in his
ware, shown so beautifully in the cauliflower and melon patterns,
through the contrast with the cream color. He also was a modeller, and
from the imitation of leaves, and fruits, and vegetables derived his
best-known and most successful patterns, and the novelty and ingenuity
of many of them charm us even in the present day. The bird and animal
shapes being grotesque rather than useful, seldom came to America. I
have seen here, however, several tortoise-shell cows and one combed
bird. The tail of the cow forms the handle of the pitcher, the liquid
being poured from the nose. Reproductions of these are now made at
Jeffords Pottery in Philadelphia. Little cradles and posy-holders, too,
are found, sometimes with dates. Whieldon’s two-handled “parting-cups,”
ornamented with raised grapes, leaves, and tendrils and a head of
Bacchus, are much more scarce than the melon and cauliflower teapots,
mugs, and dishes; and his perforated ware I have never seen in America.
Some of the pieces of his manufacture are stamped and afterward shaped
somewhat by hand, others are cast, others pressed in moulds. The “cast”
pieces are considered to be of earlier date, and may be known by their
being thinner and more delicate than the moulded ones. The mottled
browns, greens, and yellows of the tortoise-shell and combed wares, like
all of Whieldon’s decorations, are under the glaze, and are very rich in
tone, forming a delightful bit of color in cupboard or cabinet.
Occasionally a purple mottle is seen. The colors were sponged, floured,
or blown on, painting and printing on pottery being then unknown. These
pieces of Whieldon’s are all unmarked, and doubtless many specimens in
America came from the Wedgwood factory, for similar wares were made
there.
I hardly know how to account for the fact that I have found so few,
comparatively few, pieces of undoubted Wedgwood ware in old houses in
New England. That vast quantities came to America we cannot doubt.
Wedgwood says so himself in his letter quoted on page 88. In other
letters he refers again and again to consignments made to the American
market, “the green and white wares,” “the Queen’s wares,” “the cream
wares,” etc. That these consignments were sent largely to the various
points supplied from the Charleston and Philadelphia markets is known,
and in those regions the black basalts-ware, at least, is more plentiful
than in New England. Much Wedgwood ware must have come also to the ports
of Boston, Newport, and New Haven. These wares may have been plentiful
in the Connecticut Valley, but I have seen little in other parts of New
England. A good opportunity of studying the various productions of the
Wedgwood factory is given through the specimens in the Trumbull-Prime
Collection. There are at least one hundred “lots” of Wedgwood there
shown, and the cameos and intaglios, the jasper-wares, the basalts, the
queensware, the painted wares are all illustrated by choice and varied
pieces.