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Maker "TE/GS"???

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Author	Topic: Maker "TE/GS"???
nihontochicken Posts: 289 Registered: May 2003	posted 02-09-2005 08:35 PM Might someone be able to identify the makers' mark "TE(over)GS" in an eight-lobed border (three on a side)? It is listed c.1763 in Wyler's but as unattributed. Since now well-known "SB(over)IB" (Sarah and John Blake) is also unattributed in Wyler, I'm hoping that, similarly, "TE/GS" may now also be known. The piece is a bottom marked Hanoverian pattern 11.2 cm teaspoon with fancy shell drop, with indicated makers' mark plus lion passant only. TIA! IP: Logged
PhilO Posts: 166 Registered: Jul 2004	posted 02-10-2005 02:08 AM Jacksons still lists this mark as "Unidentified" c1763-64. IP: Logged
nihontochicken Posts: 289 Registered: May 2003	posted 02-10-2005 12:37 PM Thanks, it wasn't listed in my pocket Jackson's. Guess I need to break down and buy the full version. IP: Logged
Clive E Taylor Posts: 450 Registered: Jul 2000	posted 02-10-2005 02:20 PM Pure speculation , but the mark, which also is recorded by Grimwade (No 3820) as untraced , may turn out to be an early partnership of George Smith II, with Smith as the junior partner. Merely a guess though! Clive IP: Logged
Silver Lyon Posts: 363 Registered: Oct 2004	posted 02-11-2005 05:58 AM This is the mark of: THOMAS EUSTACE & GEORGE SMITH before George Smith goes off on his own (1774) George Smith is Free of the Pewterer's Company in 1768 and first registers a maker's mark on his own in 1774. They were specialist spoonmakers. IP: Logged
Clive E Taylor Posts: 450 Registered: Jul 2000	posted 02-11-2005 02:28 PM Is this Thomas Eustace the Exeter smith ? He certainly made buckles and tongs, which were often related to spoonmaking. He had London connections as he had marks registered at Goldsmiths Hall in 1779 in addition to scipt marks registered at Exeter from 1773. Apprenticed to Richard Jenkins in 1766 he would be free only in 1773 so this must have been a mark used unofficially long before Eustace was "qualified" ( nor unknown) or maybe his father (totally unrecorded). Also the 1763 -1766 date given may be in error. Or I am on the wrong Eustace ? Clive IP: Logged
PhilO Posts: 166 Registered: Jul 2004	posted 02-12-2005 02:57 AM If Smith was not free of the Pewterer's Company until 1768 how could the mark of 1763 be his? In addition I believe that the Eustace & Smith mark is in a 4-lobed shape rather than the 8-lobed one shown by Jackson. Incidentally the George Smith in question is George Smith III. Phil IP: Logged
Clive E Taylor Posts: 450 Registered: Jul 2000	posted 02-12-2005 08:47 AM This gets more interesting by the day - great stuff ! But although TE/GS recorded by both Jackson and Grimwade , both cannot attrubute the mark. What source or evidence is ther of the partnership Thomas Eustace & George Smith please. Clive IP: Logged
swarter Moderator Posts: 2920 Registered: May 2003	posted 02-12-2005 12:05 PM In accordance with previously enunciated policy established in order to avoid unnecessary and confusing guesswork, a photograph of the marks in question is required in this Forum. Please post a picture. IP: Logged
nihontochicken Posts: 289 Registered: May 2003	posted 02-12-2005 12:49 PM Cheerfully done: IP: Logged
swarter Moderator Posts: 2920 Registered: May 2003	posted 02-12-2005 02:14 PM This mark is worn and distorted; it is difficult to tell how many lobes there are, as the mark is too large for a small teaspoon. The mark shown in Jackson and Grimwade has twelve lobes, and was also taken from teaspoons in which the shape of the punch might have been equally unclear. Grimwade gives no source and may have only taken this mark from Jackson. It appears that the S in this photograph may enclosed by only one lobe, so that this may actually be the four lobed mark mentioned above by PhilO. Has anyone a picture of the known Eustace and Smith mark that they could post? Or a clear picture of an actual twelve-lobed and/or four-lobed punch? [This message has been edited by swarter (edited 02-12-2005).] IP: Logged
PhilO Posts: 166 Registered: Jul 2004	posted 02-12-2005 03:16 PM Not a wonderful picture I'm afraid, but this is the later, 4-lobed mark: IP: Logged
swarter Moderator Posts: 2920 Registered: May 2003	posted 02-12-2005 04:12 PM quote: If Smith was not free of the Pewterer's Company until 1768 how could the mark of 1763 be his? In addition I believe that the Eustace & Smith mark is in a 4-lobed shape rather than the 8-lobed one shown by Jackson. Since the mark in Jackson is taken from teaspoons that would have had no date letter, the date may have been a guess(says "circa," when other dates in the table do not); there may be no 1763 mark. In fact, if no one can come up with an actual example of a twelve-lobed mark, that shape may also have been a guess, based on distorted or incomplete four-lobed punch marks no clearer than that in the present photo. IP: Logged
Silver Lyon Posts: 363 Registered: Oct 2004	posted 02-14-2005 06:50 AM The answer Clive's query as to the source... I think that they are mentioned in the 1773 Parliamentary Report. (More of this in due course if anybody is interested!) I am away from home now, but will confirm when I return. I guess that the 1763 may have been a proof-reading error for 1768?? IP: Logged
Clive E Taylor Posts: 450 Registered: Jul 2000	posted 02-14-2005 02:16 PM Many thanks. I do not have a copy of the PR 1773- pity no-one has it on the Web, and would be very glad to have confirmation, although I do not remember it from my last reading. I find Silver Forum ideal for the odd tit-bits of information like this which helps a lot. Thanks again. And have a good break ! The mark in Grimwade is taken from the 1921 edition of Jackson (only the black lettered marks in this section are from the Brocklehurst /Grimwade notebooks) so the c.1764/64 date is quite possibly suspect and could well be 1768. My wife has two pairs of caste pierced tongs of similar unusual form in her collection, one pair by George Smith and the other by Thomas Eustace of Exeter so it does seem possible they were linked at some stage. The late, and greatly missed, Michael Reinhold had a considerable amount of material on the Exeter Eustace but I do not know where his records are now. As both guys made or marked buckles I am naturally intrigued. George Smith II (I believe II not III) was a leading light of the buckle trade, being described in a court case as "one of the greatest bucklemakers in London" and was the Chairman of the committee for the petition to the Prince of Wales in Jan 1792 on behalf of the London buckle trades. The other George Smith was not,according to the bucklemaking Smith, involved in the buckle trade. Wise man! Clive. IP: Logged
Silver Lyon Posts: 363 Registered: Oct 2004	posted 02-25-2005 05:53 PM Clive, why do you think that so many spoon makers were also buckle makers? (or is it vice-a versa?) - I take it that most buckles are castings, whereas spoons are wrought... IP: Logged
Clive E Taylor Posts: 450 Registered: Jul 2000	posted 02-26-2005 07:58 AM A very large number of TONGS Makers were also buckle makers, probably because the earlier scissor shaped tongs (which we now called NIPS) were also castings, a process also used for the cast "U" shaped tongs which largely replaced them in the 1770's. The link probably continued when the wrought wrought tongs began to replace the cast ones . Quite a few early spoonmakers (1690 -1710)did make buckles, usually as the simpler buckles were spoon bowls with a hole cut in the middle and a single stud chape added.!!!! Why several spoonmakers in the George III period were also bucklemakers seems more uncertain. Both trades were smallworkers, but usually on a large scale by this period. Spoonmakers also made the later 1780 onwards tongs so another link exists. By 1790 most buckles were at least half made from pressings by machinery , so I would suggest another link with the spoonmaking industry. I do not think the link with buckles and spoonmakers was as widespread as that with the cast tongs but several examples exist - ADAMS and ELEY being two prominent examples. IP: Logged

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