The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain 3031218159, 9783031218156

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Howell G. M. Ed-

The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain

The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain

Howell G. M. Edwards

The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain

Howell G. M. Edwards Faculty of Life Sciences School of Chemistry and Biosciences, Chemical and Biological Sciences University of Bradford Bradford, UK

ISBN 978-3-031-21815-6 ISBN 978-3-031-21816-3 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors, and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover illustration: Deep dish, Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, Farnley Hall service, impressed mark NANT-GARW C.W., diameter 23.8 cm, depth 4.9 cm, with characteristic Nantgarw embossed verge moulding. Decorated in London with central bouquet of garden flowers and five vignettes, four depicting flowers and one of fruit. A butterfly is placed strategically to mask a small blemish in the porcelain. The artefact has the dentil edge gilding characteristic of the London ateliers. A bearded tulip is depicted in the central flower group which has been attributed to the decorator “de Junic” from Sevres. Courtesy of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq. of Farnley Hall. Photograph with permission of Dr. John Rhodes, Saltaire This Springer imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland

This book is dedicated by the author to the memory of his beloved late wife and lifelong companion, Gill,1 whose constant encouragement to the author was so material to its completion, and also to our daughter Kate, whose support was ever present. Without their participation in this enterprise, the outcome of many years’ research would not have been realised. Howell G. M. Edwards September 2022

1

Gillian Patricia Edwards: 21 November 1944—7 December 2019.

Acknowledgements

The author is deeply indebted to his colleagues and friends who have contributed to the generation of ideas and experiments and have participated in valuable discussions during his many years of research into William Billingsley and Welsh porcelains. In particular, he would like to recognise the special contributions of the following to this volume: Charles Fountain, Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust, Nantgarw, South Wales, UK. Kate Edwards, M.Sc. (Dunelm) C. Geol. FGS, Sheffield, UK. Dr. Morgan Denyer, B.Sc., Ph.D. (UCNW), Penrose Antiques, Bradford, UK. Rachel Denyer, B.A. (UCNW), M.A. (OU), Penrose Antiques, Bradford, UK. Bryan Bowden, Harrogate, North Yorkshire, UK. Prof. Philippe Colomban, Sorbonne University, Paris, France. Andrew Renton, B.A. (Oxon), Keeper of Art, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff. Dr. Alexander Surtees, B.Sc., Ph.D. (Bradford), University of Bradford, UK. For providing access to the subject of this book, the Farnley Hall Nantgarw porcelain service, the author is especially indebted to Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq. of Farnley Hall, without whose interest, patience and kind assistance the research into this unique Nantgarw service that has been described here would not have been possible. Thank you, Guy, most sincerely for facilitating this enterprise! Saltaire, UK September 2022

Howell G. M. Edwards

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Abstract The growth of European porcelain manufactories in response to the importation of vast quantities of Chinese porcelains in the 18th and 19th Centuries and the last two soft paste phosphatic foundations of Nantgarw and Swansea in the second decade of the 19th Century. The first discovery of a reference to the large Nantgarw porcelain service at Farnley Hall and the importance of its existence in ceramics history. Keywords Nantgarw porcelain · Farnley Hall · Porcelain services The appearance in Europe of Chinese porcelain in the fourteenth century and its importation in the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries by the British Honourable East India Company (HEIC), the Dutch East India Company (VOC), the Swedish East India Company (SOIC) and also by Portuguese carracks franchised through the British and Dutch East India Companies (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021) was a phenomenon that generated the foundation of many European porcelain manufactories in competition. Although initially the preserve of a very wealthy and aristocratic clientele, the finer European hard paste and soft paste porcelains eventually proved to be equally if not more desirable than their Chinese hard paste porcelain analogues in a wider society. By the early nineteenth century, English soft paste porcelains and bone china had assumed the industry standard and become available to a much broader community, but some still bore evidence of their distant Chinese ancestry. The famous Chinese blue and white “willow pattern” generic designs with their many variants of chinoiserie decoration for a Western taste had featured on porcelains and ceramic earthenwares for many years had and symbolised “china” in its many forms for everyday usage. Commander James Fitzjames, who was second-in-command to Sir John Franklin on HMS Erebus on the ill-fated Franklin Expedition to find the North-West Passage in 1845, when all crew members of the Erebus and her sister ship HMS Terror perished in the icy Arctic wastes, wrote of his earlier experiences as a lieutenant aboard the 74-gun, third-rate ship-of-the-line HMS Cornwallis at

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Shanghai during the First Opium War in 1842 (Palin, Erebus:The Story of a Ship, 2018; Lloyd-Jones, 2005) and included the apt and rather poetic comment: To the south of the town, where the Chinese take their tea And with grottoes and bridges, most curious to see Of a labyrinth form; in fact such a scene As appears on our English blue plates (when they are clean).

Two of the last soft paste highly phosphatic porcelain manufactories in the early nineteenth century were founded in South Wales, in Nantgarw and Swansea, the former by William Billingsley, William Weston Young and Samuel Walker and the latter by Lewis Weston Dillwyn FRS. By this time, most surviving English manufactories had already significantly converted their output to either a bone china or to a hybrid paste porcelain. One of the last of these, the Rockingham China Works, founded by John Wager Brameld at Swinton in Yorkshire in 1828, although highly phosphatic in chemical composition, is probably better categorised now as a bone china (Cox & Cox, Rockingham 1745–1842, 2001). Both the manufactories at Nantgarw and Swansea produced beautiful translucent porcelain of the highest quality in the period 1815–1820 until financial troubles forced their premature closure and their 200-year-old artefacts are very desirable acquisitions for collectors and museum curators today. The Nantgarw China Works was initially founded in 1813 but failed to achieve governmental financial support for their experimental soft paste porcelain production in September of that year and closed down very soon afterwards with the three partners going different ways (John, William Billingsley, 1968; Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). William Billingsley and Samuel Walker joined Lewis Weston Dillwyn to initiate porcelain synthesis at the Swansea China Works in November 1813 and William Weston Young returned to the resumption of his duties as an estates land surveyor based at his home in Nottage, Porthcawl (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young, 1776–1847, 2019). After successfully assisting Lewis Dillwyn in the manufacture of porcelain at his fledgling Swansea China Works early in 1814, in 1817 Billingsley, Walker and Young reformed their partnership to commence again the production of porcelain at Nantgarw and reinforced with financial input provided by Young personally and local supporters whom he called “The Ten True Men of Glamorgan”. This time the production of Nantgarw porcelain was attained successfully and immediately achieved the appreciation, approval and demand of an esteemed clientele, especially in London society (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948; Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw,1942). The major problem was that commercially the Nantgarw venture was doomed to be an economic failure because of the exceptionally high incidence during firing of the kiln wastage of > 90% of the biscuit porcelain artefacts, which has been attributed to ineffective kiln temperature control, meaning that effectively only one in ten of the

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porcelain pieces was deemed to be perfect after firing and suitable for their subsequent decoration and sale in the London ateliers. Demand for this wonderful new ceramic in London was huge, and the manufactory could not keep pace with the orders placed through John Mortlock of Oxford Street, their sole agent in the capital, who experienced a surge of business even with his attendant large premiums imposed on the sale of Nantgarw porcelain of up to 500%. As a result, the Nantgarw China Works faced closure due to bankruptcy in 1820—a limited production lifespan of effectively only three years was thereby achieved, which makes the surviving porcelain artefacts a rare commodity today and highly prized amongst collectors and ceramic historians (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017). The history of the Nantgarw China Works manufactory has been surveyed briefly by early ceramic historians such as Sir Arthur Church (Church, English Porcelain: A Handbook to the China Made in England During the 18th Century as Illustrated by Specimens Chiefly in the National Collection, 1885), Llewelyn Jewitt (Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from the Prehistoric Times Down to the Present Day, 1878), Simeon Shaw (Shaw, The Chemistry of the Several Natural and Artificial Heterogeneous Compounds Used in Manufacturing Porcelain, Glass and Pottery, 1837) and more specifically later by William Turner (Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of The Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon Etc.,1897), Ernest Morton Nance (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942) and more recently by Dr. William John (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948), Rowland Williams (Williams, Nantgarw Porcelain 1813– 1822, 1993), Fergus Gambon (Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain), 2016) and the present author (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017; Edwards Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective, 2018). This author, whilst perusing Dr. John’s book on Nantgarw Porcelain (1948, p. 81) for his research into Welsh porcelains, happened therein upon a reference to a particular Nantgarw service: …in addition,there are large combined dinner-dessert services such as the one at Farnley Hall in Yorkshire in which the number of plates may reach a hundred with a proportionately greater number of dishes and tureens.

It is intriguing that this significantly large Nantgarw service is not described at all further in the book and is not source referenced therein, unlike other porcelain artefacts and services in Dr. John’s book, which is otherwise noted for its accuracy of detail, and curiously has not been mentioned by any other writer on Nantgarw porcelain before or since that time. Of particular relevance is its omission from the earlier encyclopaedic work by Ernest Morton Nance on Nantgarw porcelain (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942). The Nantgarw China Works, unlike its contemporary Derby China Works (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002), did not maintain a detailed order book or pattern book for local commissions or for supplies to their London agent which would have facilitated some initial subsequent research into the documentation for this service to have been undertaken, or at least such a record has not survived to the

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present time. Likewise, the order books and records of John Mortlock in London, the sole Nantgarw agent, which would have listed the details of his client commissions for the porcelain, were archived in storage at the closure of their family china retail business in Oxford Street, London, in 1933 and thereafter were destroyed in the London Blitz bombing in the 1940s. It is intriguing, therefore, to speculate upon the origin of Dr. John’s assertion that this service existed, since it may be inferred from the absence of a descriptor in his text and the rather vague comment relating to its size (except that it was a very large service) that he never actually saw it personally, and there certainly was no record of it ever having appeared in the sale rooms, which would have given a provenance to its size and existence, as has been provided for many other such analogous named services and anonymous porcelain pieces over the past two centuries (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelains: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). The author, therefore, decided to search for the existence of this service and to describe it for the first time: the raison d’etre behind this project was that if this particular service did indeed exist at Farnley Hall and was still evident there from its original commission then it would indeed be a very rare example of a Nantgarw porcelain service that was still in the possession of its familial descendants. All “named” Nantgarw services that are known thus far, and there are some 53 of these that have been identified in an exhaustive literature search made by the author (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelains: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022) and which will be enumerated in Table 2.1 to follow in Chap. 2, have an associated nomenclature of identification in which they were acquired either directly through a commission placed with the Nantgarw China Works or its agent, John Mortlock, in London or by purchase at auction sales of the original owners’ effects, or through the dispersal of these effects after their inheritance by familial descendants. A similar state of affairs exists for the contemporary Swansea China Works, which also produced very high-quality phosphatic porcelains between 1817 and 1823 (John, Swansea Porcelain, 1958), and there is only one recorded named Swansea porcelain service, a 43 piece dessert service painted by Thomas Baxter and known as the Garden Scenery service, that was originally commissioned and recorded by Lewis Weston Dillwyn in 1817 and was retained by him for use at his homes in Sketty Hall, Swansea and at Penllergaer Hall, following his departure later that year from the Swansea China Works. This service was mentioned in legal papers as being in the possession of Lewis Dillwyn in the trial of Roby versus Dillwyn regarding the winding up of the Swansea China Works operations in 1821 that were initiated by Timothy and John Bevington over the valuation of the stock and premises that they were then leasing from Dillwyn. The Garden Scenery dessert service was beautifully painted by Thomas Baxter with garden flowers set against landscapes on the finest duck-egg porcelain and bears the Swansea stencil mark in red enamel on the reverse. This service is now in the possession of Lewis Dillwyn’s descendants and today still comprises 41 pieces, only two dessert plates from it having been dispersed over the last 200 years: one of these is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, donated by Mrs. Dillwyn in memory of John Dillwyn Llewelyn (1810–1882), and the other is in the National Museum of Wales, where it was acquired as a restored piece from the Sir

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Leslie Joseph Collection (Edwards, Private Communication, 2022: Renton, 2022). John Dillwyn Llewelyn is noted for being an early photographer, whose wife, Emma, daughter of Thomas Mansel Talbot of Margam Park, was a cousin of William Henry Fox Talbot of Lacock Abbey, the founder of photography. John Dillwyn Llewelyn invented the Oxymel process for the preservation of collodion on plates so that photographic plates could be prepared in advance, stored and then exposed when needed by the photographer, so avoiding the time-consuming task of preparation of the plates on the photographic assignment in situ in a dark room (Morris, Penllergare: A Victorian Paradise. A Short History of the Penllergare Estate and Its Creator John Dillwyn Llewelyn (1810–1882), 1999). Technically, if the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service that has been mentioned briefly and so tantalisingly in the literature only by Dr. William John can be located and is still at Farnley Hall, its original designated place of use, then this does make it truly unique amongst Welsh porcelain services and therefore deserving of a substantial research effort being made towards its discovery. In summary, it would be an early nineteenth century Welsh porcelain service that is still extant in its original home, which would then confer upon it a special status, be this from either the Nantgarw or Swansea China Works origin.

References Sir A.H. Church, English Porcelain A Handbook to the China Made in England: During the 18th Century as Illustrated by Specimens Chiefly in the National Collection, A South Kensington Museum Handbook (Chapman & Hall Ltd., London, 1885 and 1894) A. Cox, A. Cox, Rockingham Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide 1745–1842, Antique Collectors Club (Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2001) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2018) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young,1776– 1847 (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2019) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelains: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, (SpringerNature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2022) H.G.M. Edwards, Private Communication from the Descendants of Lewis Weston Dillwyn F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain) (Oriel Plas Glyn-yWeddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016) L. Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from the Prehistoric Times Down to the Present Day, vols. I and II (Virtue & Co. Ltd., Paternoster Row, London, 1878) W.D. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) W.D. John, Swansea Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1958) W.D. John, William Billingsley (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1968) R. Lloyd-Jones, The Men Who Sailed with Franklin. Polar Record 41, 311–318 (2005) R. Morris, Penllergare: A Victorian Paradise. A Short History of the Penllergare Estate and Its Creator John Dillwyn Llewelyn (1810–1882) (Friends of Penllergare Publishing, Swansea, 1919) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (Batsford, London, 1942) M. Palin, Erebus: The Story of a Ship (Arrow Books, Hutchinson/Penguin Random House UK, Vauxhall Bridge Road, London, 2018)

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A. Renton, National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Private Communication, 2022 S. Shaw, The Chemistry of the Several Natural and Artificial Heterogeneous Compounds Used in Manufacturing Porcelain, Glass and Pottery (Scott Greenwood & Son, London, 1837) (Reissued in its original form in 1900, 713 1900) W. Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of The Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon Etc. (Bemrose & Sons Ltd., The Old Bailey, London, 1897) J. Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848 (Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2002) R. Williams, Nantgarw Porcelain 1813–1822 (Published by the Friends of Nantgarw China Works Museum, Taffs Well, Rhondda–Cynon-Taff, 1993) W.W. Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 vols. (West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). https://arcgiveshub.jisc.sc.uk/data/gb216-d/dxch/ ddxch/i/hub

Contents

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition for the Manufacture of Nantgarw Porcelain . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain . . . . . . . . . . 2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain . . . . . . . . . . 2.2 The Raw Materials in Porcelain Synthesis: Their Sourcing, Mineralogy and Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.3 Mineral Formation Identified at the Kiln Temperatures . . . . . . . . . . . 2.4 Chemical Reactions that Occur in Raw Material Mixtures at Elevated Temperatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.5 Key Mineral Identification in High-Temperature Fired Ceramics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2.6 Recipes, Composition and Analysis of Nantgarw Porcelain . . . . . . . 2.6.1 The Nantgarw Glazes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall Nantgarw Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.1 An Estimate of the Original Farnley Hall Nantgarw Service Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3.2 The Farnley Hall Service Today . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

1 15 17 17 29 40 42 46 47 52 55 57 63 66 82

4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 4.1 The Nantgarw Brace Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90 4.3 The Enameller “de Junic” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105 4.4 The Identification of Artist Enamellers on Welsh Porcelain—“Characteristic Signatures” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108 4.5 What Comprises a Service? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

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4.5.1 What Defines a Service of Porcelain? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124 4.5.2 Cabinet Porcelains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126 References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131 5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1 Definition of the Nantgarw Embossed Beribboned Moulding . . . . . 5.1.1 Selected Swansea and Nantgarw Artefacts with an Embossed Moulding . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.1.2 Reduction upon Firing of Porcelain Formed from Moulds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2 Comparison of the Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport C-scroll Embossed Beribboned Mouldings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

133 136 143 151 154 160

6 Analysis of the Composition of the Farnley Hall Service . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.1 Analytical Deductions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6.2 The Presence of the “Bearded Tulip” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

163 164 169 171

7 Resume of the Research Undertaken on the Farnley Hall Nantgarw Porcelain Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.1 Topical Analogy with the Swansea China Works . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7.2 The Musgrave Ritual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

173 179 189 191

Appendix: The Rev. William Williams Service—A Nantgarw Service or Cabinet Set? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193 Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 213 Selected Biblography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

About the Author

Prof. Howell G. M. Edwards M.A., B.Sc., D.Phil., C.Chem., FRSC, born in Skewen, Neath, South Wales, is Prof. Emeritus of Molecular Spectroscopy at the University of Bradford. He read Chemistry at Jesus College in the University of Oxford, and after completing his B.A. and B.Sc. degrees, he studied for his doctorate in Raman spectroscopy at Oxford with Dr. Leonard Woodward and then became Research Fellow at Jesus College, University of Cambridge. He joined the University of Bradford as Lecturer in Structural and Inorganic Chemistry, becoming Head of the Department of Chemical and Forensic Sciences, and was awarded Personal Chair in Molecular Spectroscopy in 1996. He has received several international awards (Sir Harold Thompson Award; Charles Mann Award; Emanuel Boricky Medal; Norman Sheppard Award) in a spectroscopic career which has resulted in the publication of over 1350 research papers in Raman spectroscopy and the characterisation of materials, along with six books on the application of this analytical technique to art, archaeology and forensic science. He has had a lifelong interest in the porcelains of William Billingsley, especially those from the Derby, Nantgarw and Swansea factories. He has authored six major books on Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young, 1776–1847, 18th and 19th Century Porcelain Analysis: A Forensic Provenancing Assessment, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Provenancing of Ceramic Specimens and Welsh Armorial Porcelains: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, all published by Springer-Nature Publishing, Dordrecht, The Netherlands. He has also produced several monographs on these manufactories and people associated with them: William Billingsley—The Enigmatic Porcelain Artist, Decorator and Manufacturer; Nantgarw Porcelain—The Pursuit of Perfection, Swansea Porcelain—the Duck-Egg Translucent Vision of Lewis Dillwyn and Derby Porcelain: The Golden Years, 1780–1830. He has authored a text for publication in 2022 on Raman Spectroscopy in the Preservation of Cultural Heritage, for which porcelain artefacts will feature as artworks and a vital part of a nation’s cultural heritage, as does the industrial archaeology, excavation and the preservation

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About the Author

of early porcelain manufactory sites, many of which have now disappeared in urban expansion. Howell Edwards is Honorary Scientific Adviser to the de Brecy Trust on the scientific evaluation of their artworks and paintings.

List of Figures

Fig. 1.1

Fig. 1.2

Fig. 1.3

Fig. 1.4

“The Rose Painter”, artist unknown, believed to be William Billingsley as a young man at the Derby China Works, ca. 1790, aged approximately 32. Now in the Derby China Works Museum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Derby porcelain, Prince of Wales dessert service, 1786, dessert plate, diameter 23.3 cm, with fluted moulding, painted by William Billingsley with a single pink rose centrally and a spray of forget-me-nots enclosed in a circular ring of gold dots with a dawn pink edging and a tasteful gilding pattern applied by William Cooper, whose gilder’s number 3 appears underneath in puce enamel near the footrim. Marked with the Derby crown, crossed batons and six dots and the pattern number 65. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Derby porcelain, Prince of Wales dessert service, 1786, lozenge-shaped fruit comport, en suite with the dessert plate shown in Fig. 1.2, painted by William Billingsley; length 31.4 cm, width 24.7 cm, height 5.3 cm. Marked with the Derby crown, crossed batons and six dots and the pattern number 65, with the gilder’s mark of 8 for William Longden near the footrim. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Pinxton porcelain tea cup and saucer, ca. 1798, painted by William Billingsley with bouquets of garden flowers, diameter of cup 8.4 cm, height 5.8 cm, saucer diameter 13.8 cm, saucer depth 2.5 cm. Unmarked. This service was unique to the Pinxton manufactory in that it was completely ungilded, so the focus was directed to the exquisite flower painting. In a Private Collection . . . . . . .

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Fig. 1.5

Fig. 1.6

Fig. 1.7

Fig. 1.8

Fig. 1.9

List of Figures

Derby porcelain, shell dish from a dessert service, ca. 1780, length major axis 24.6 cm, width minor axis 23.9 cm, height 4.5 cm, decorated by Edward Withers then Head of the Derby China Works enamelling workshop and mentor to William Billingsley. Featuring single pink roses centrally and in eight vignettes at the verge in an oeuil-de-perdrix decorated ground. Two vignettes display two roses symmetrically placed either side of the major axis, whereas the central spray has three roses; all the other roses are single. In a Private Collection . . . . Royal Worcester porcelain, Barr, Flight and Barr, period, ca. 1809–10, deep saucer dish, diameter 19.9 cm, depth 3.0 cm, decorated by William Billingsley with groups of roses and rosebuds and single roses on a cerulean blue ground. Marked with an impressed crown and BFB with a puce enamelled stencilled transfer mark, BARR FLIGHT & BARR, Royal Porcelain Works, WORCESTER, London-House, No 1 Coventry Street. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain, small tea plate, Dillwyn’s finest duck-egg translucency, ca. 1815–1817, diameter 18.5 cm, decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses each sitting on a bed of golden seaweed and alternating with gold stars. Marked Swansea in a script red enamel in what has been identified as Billingsley’s characteristic handwriting. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain, dessert plate, diameter 20.2 cm, ca. 1817–1820, soaprock steatitic “trident” porcelain, decorated by David Evans with three groups of garden flowers. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate from the Phase II production operation, ca. 1817 diameter 21.0 cm, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., decorated with sprays of blue delphiniums and pinkish-orange roses and with a simple edge gilded band at the rim. Locally decorated it is attributed by connoisseurs to Lavinia Billingsley, who would have worked at the Nantgarw China Works only for some months in 1817 before she died in September of that year. This plate would not have been selected for despatch to John Mortlock for decoration and re-sale in London, despite his insistent demand for Nantgarw porcelain, because of the carbon particles which cause the visual blemishes on its surface, about 20 of which can be discerned in the photograph. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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10

12

List of Figures

Fig. 1.10

Fig. 2.1

Fig. 2.2

Fig. 2.3

Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, locally decorated by Thomas Pardoe, ca. 1821–1823, with an almost identical arrangement of roses and delphiniums in the flower groups to that shown in the plate in Fig. 1.9., which has been identified as being painted earlier in 1817 by Lavinia Billingsley. The absence of gilding is to be noted here. This plate featured in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019. Reproduced by courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa, Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, tea cup and saucer with heart-shaped handle from the Twyning tea and coffee service: made for Edward Edmunds, Pen-y-Rhos, Nantgarw, and landlord of the Nantgarw China Works site at Tyla Gwyn. Decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses and green foliage. Believed to have been presented to Edward Edmunds by William Billingsley in lieu of rent for the Nantgarw site. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, items from the Edwards tea and coffee service, comprising a teapot, stand, covered sucrier, milk jug, slop bowl, large plate and a tea cup, coffee cup and saucer trio with heart-shaped handles. Made for Edward Edmunds, Pen-y-Rhos, Nantgarw, and landlord of the Nantgarw China Works site at Tyla Gwyn, and decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses on a bed of gilt seaweed. Presented to Frances Edwards (nee Edmunds) by her father Edward Edmunds on the occasion of her marriage. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, tea pot and stand from the Duncombe tea and coffee service, made for Edward Edmunds, Pen-y-Rhos, Nantgarw, and landlord of the Nantgarw China Works site at Tyla Gwyn. Decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses alternating with gilt anthemions. Believed to have been presented to Edward Edmunds by William Billingsley in lieu of rent for the Nantgarw site. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London . . . . . .

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Fig. 2.4

Fig. 2.5

Fig. 2.6

Fig. 2.7

Fig. 3.1

Fig. 3.2 Fig. 3.3

List of Figures

Nantgarw porcelain, teabowl, unmarked, from the armorial service commissioned by John Homfray of Penllyne Castle, Cowbridge, decorated in gilt by William Billingsley locally at Nantgarw, ca. 1817–1819, with the Homfray crest of an embrued and speared otter. Reproduced by the courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, dessert plate, ca. 1817–1820, diameter, locally decorated and attributed to William Billingsley, with a border band of brown copper beech leaves and a simple gilt rim, diameter 21.8 cm. Marked NANT-GARW C.W. impressed. In a Private Collection . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, coffee cup with heart-shaped handle, unmarked, height 6.3 cm, diameter of cup at rim 7.3 cm, height to the top of handle 8.5 cm, from the Spence-Thomas breakfast service, locally decorated by Thomas Pardoe with a wreath of garden flowers, ca. 1820–1822. Reproduced by the courtesy of the Rev. Jim Dickinson, Chesterfield . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ternary elemental oxide diagram for Derby porcelain ca. 1790, simplified and adapted from Owen and Barkla (1997). The three apices represent alumina (A, Al2 O3 ), silica (S, SiO2 ) and tricalcium phosphate (C3 P, whitlockite, Ca3 (PO4 )2 ) and the melt phase is characterised by the region designated CaAl2 Si2 O8 (anorthite). The region designated Al2 Si2 O5 represents mullite and the SiO2 region comprises the minerals tridymite and cristobalite, the high temperature stable polymorphs of silica. The approximate composition of the porcelain melt phase here is determined as (Ca3 (PO4 )2 )30 (Al2 O3 )23 (SiO2 )47 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sketch of Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes MP, of Farnley Hall, Otley, Yorkshire by T. Woolnoth, 7, Fitzroy Square, London, and published in November 1825. Walter Fawkes died on October 24th 1825, aged 56, so this picture would have been intended for inclusion in an obituary appreciation notice. The age of Walter Fawkes at the time of this sketch is not stated. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Photograph of Farnley Old Hall and its Georgian annexe. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Farnley Hall Georgian annexe with bay window. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 3.4

Fig. 3.5

Fig. 3.6

Fig. 3.7

Fig. 3.8

The East Front (“Garden Front”) of Farnley Hall with the Flower Garden and Sundial, a watercolour painted in 1815 by J. M. W. Turner whilst resident as a visitor to Farnley Hall. Now in the Tate Gallery, London, and formerly in the Turner Collection of Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes at Farnley Hall. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . An oil painting by John R. Wildman of Farnley Hall, ca. 1820–24, with Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes and J. M. W Turner enjoying an open air walk in the foreground. Courtesy of the Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . An etching of Farnley Hall, ca., 1830, by J. P. Neale for his book entitled Gentlemen’s Seats: Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, H.W. Bond for Sherwood, Jones & Co., Paternoster Row, London, London, 1830. Public domain . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain small circular sauce tureen stand, diameter 18.3 cm, depth 2.6 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed NANT-GARW C.W. beneath an impressed 1, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one with an exotic bird on a branch with a central bouquet of garden flowers extending into the cavetto. One floral vignette also has an insect or a butterfly that has alighted upon it. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain small circular sauce tureen stand, en suite with that in Fig. 3.7, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., diameter 18.3 cm, depth 2.6 cm. Characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding and decorated with six vignettes comprising four of flowers, one of fruit and one with an exotic bird on a branch with a central bouquet of garden flowers extending into the cavetto. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 3.9

Fig. 3.10

Fig. 3.11

Fig. 3.12

List of Figures

Nantgarw porcelain small circular sauce tureen stand, en suite with that in Fig. 3.7, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., diameter 18.4 cm, depth 2.7 cm. Characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding and decorated with six vignettes comprising four of flowers, one of fruit and one with an exotic bird on a branch with a central bouquet of garden flowers extending into the cavetto. A butterfly is placed at the edge of the rim in the cavetto to mask a small blemish in the porcelain substrate. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.0 cm, depth 4.8 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers exhibiting a bearded tulip in orange pigment. A butterfly is placed in the cavetto but this seemingly is for decoration only as it does not mask a blemish in the substrate. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 23.8 cm, depth 4.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.1 cm, depth 4.8 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 3.13

Fig. 3.14

Fig. 3.15

Fig. 3.16

Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.1 cm, depth 4.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Two butterflies are strategically placed in this exemplar. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.1 cm, depth 4.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising five of flowers and none of fruit or birds with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, diameter 24.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising four of flowers, one of fruit and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. A butterfly has been placed on the foliage. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain large circular serving plate, diameter 31.8 cm, depth 3.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with a Fig. 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Has an insect placed on the foliage. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 3.17

Fig. 3.18

Fig. 3.19

Fig. 3.20

List of Figures

Nantgarw porcelain large circular serving plate, diameter 31.9 cm, depth 4.0 cm, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.16, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with a Fig. 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.5 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.2 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with a Fig. 3.7 on the left hand piece, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers, one of which is a prominent bearded tulip in orange enamel. This item is cracked centrally along the minor axis and is now in two pieces. The right hand piece has the NANT-GARW C.W. impressed mark. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.4 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.1 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.18, impressed with the Figs. 3.2 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.4 cm, width 21.9 cm and depth 3.1 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.18, impressed with the Figs. 3.2 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . .

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77

List of Figures

Fig. 3.21

Fig. 3.22

Fig. 3.23

Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.4 cm, width 21.9 cm and depth 3.2 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.18, impressed with the Figs. 3.2 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain medium oblong serving platter, length 32.6 cm, width 24.9 cm and depth 3.7 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with the Fig. 3.3, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Multicoloured moths are depicted in a group enamelled on the underside Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain medium oblong serving platter, length 32.5 cm, width 24.9 cm and depth 3.7 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.22, impressed with the Figs. 3.3 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Multicoloured moths are depicted in a group enamelled on the underside and an insect painted at the edge rim on the surface. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 3.24

Fig. 3.25

Fig. 3.26

Fig. 3.27

List of Figures

Nantgarw porcelain large oblong serving platter, length 36.5 cm, width 27.3 cm and depth 3.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with the Figs. 3.4 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. This piece is a possible candidate for the largest single piece of porcelain produced at the Nantgarw manufactory. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain large oblong serving platter, length 36.4 cm, width 27.3 cm and depth 3.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.24, impressed with the Fig. 3.4, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Multicoloured moths are depicted in a group on the underside. This piece is a possible candidate for the largest single piece of porcelain produced at the Nantgarw manufactory. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Close-up photograph of a group of three mosquitoes placed on the underside of the rim of a platter from the Farnley Hall service of Nantgarw porcelain. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Close-up photograph of a group of multicoloured moths placed on the underside of the rim of a large serving plate from the Farnley Hall service of Nantgarw porcelain. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 3.28

Fig. 4.1

Fig. 4.2

Fig. 4.3

An assemblage of the remaining surviving items comprising the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service set out on a mahogany mid-Victorian circular loo table set with eighteenth century dining chairs made by Gillows of Lancaster: two pieces of the service are missing from this photograph, namely a tureen stand and a deep dessert dish, as they were away for chemical analysis but their dimensions and description are included in Table 3.1. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, square dessert dish from the Brace service, marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with four vignettes comprising two of flowers, one of a bird on a branch and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, dessert plate from the Brace service, marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising three of flowers, one of a bird on a branch and two of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, Duchess of Richmond dessert service, of the generic Brace type, comprising two shell dishes, one central pedestal comport, two circular small sauce tureen stands, one oval dish, one large square dessert dish, three medium square dessert dishes, one small square dessert dish, and ten dessert plates, all with characteristic Nantgarw moulded border and dentil edge gilding. Decorated centrally with garden flowers and varying numbers of vignettes namely, four, five and six, with indefinable compositions of flowers, fruit and exotic birds . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 4.4

Fig. 4.5

Fig. 4.6

Fig. 4.7

Fig. 4.8

List of Figures

Nantgarw porcelain, dinner plate featuring “The Three Graces”, attributed to the three daughters of Sir Thomas Coutts, banker to King George III, painted by James Plant in John Sims’ atelier in Pimlico, London. Particularly fine gilding pattern with six symmetrically placed arcs of foliage and an inner gilding pattern around the cavetto. Reproduced with the permission of Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Collection at Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, featuring two Georgian dancers, one carrying a tambourine, which is clearly en suite with the plate featuring The Three Graces described in Fig. 4.4. The fine associated gilding exactly matches that shown in Fig. 4.4. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea duck-egg porcelain, dessert plate from the Burdett-Coutts service, commissioned by Sir Thomas Coutts, banker to King George III, upon the occasion of his marriage to the American actress Harriet Mellon in 1818. London-decorated by James Turner in John Sims’ atelier in Pimlico. Believed to be perhaps the largest service ever commissioned from the Swansea China Works, and estimated originally to exceed 300 pieces. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Dessert plate from the sumptuous Lord Ongley service, Derby porcelain, Bloor period, ca. 1820, with Nantgarw-style moulded C-scroll border and inspired by James Plant’s Nantgarw decoration at John Sims’ atelier, London, ca. 1817–1819, showing children playing at snowball and vignettes of birds, fruit, flowers and butterflies. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle . . . . . . . . . . . Dessert plate from the sumptuous Lord Ongley service, Derby porcelain, Bloor period, ca. 1820, with Nantgarw-style moulded C-scroll border and inspired by James Plant’s Nantgarw decoration at John Sims’ atelier, London, ca. 1817–1819, showing a naval scene with a man-o’-war in heavy seas and vignettes of birds, fruit, flowers and butterflies. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 4.9

Fig. 4.10

Fig. 4.11

Fig. 4.12

Bloor Derby red stencilled mark on the Lord Ongley service dessert plates; note the surface crazing of the glaze. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Detailed enlargement of the Nantgarw-type embossed border of the Lord Ongley dessert plate shown in Fig. 4.7; note the asymmetry of the floral embossment and C-scrolls. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle . . . . . . . . . . . A square dessert dish, Swansea duck-egg porcelain, Brace-type service with Nantgarw type embossed moulding, London-decorated with dentil edge gilding, ca. 1817–1822. Inscribed “The King of the Greater Birds of Paradise” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain dessert plate, with Nantgarw type moulding, en suite with the square dessert dish shown in Fig. 4.11, London-decorated with dentil edge gilding, ca. 1817–1822, superbly painted and retailed by Bradley and Co, No. 47 Pall Mall, London, as inscribed in red enamel script on the base. After ornithological specimens taken from George Edwards’ A Natural History of Uncommon Birds: And of Some Other Rare and Undescribed Animals, Quadrupeds, Fishes, Reptiles, Insects, &c., Exhibited in Two Hundred and Ten Copper-Plates, from Designs Copied Immediately from Nature and curiously Coloured After Life, 4 Volumes, published between 1743 and 1751: this plate was also inscribed “The Red Coot-Footed Tringa”. One of four dessert plates and a square dessert dish from the same service now in the Andrews Collection, Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Gwynedd. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 4.13

Fig. 4.14

Fig. 4.15

Fig. 4.16

Fig. 4.17

List of Figures

Another dessert plate from the same service shown in Fig. 4.11, Swansea porcelain. This plate shows two birds: inscribed “The Little Brown Humming Bird” and “The Long-tail’d Red Humming Bird” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A dessert plate from the same service shown in Fig. 4.11, Swansea porcelain. This plate has the inscription “The Brown and Spotted Indian Cuckow” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Another plate from the same service shown in Fig. 4.11, Swansea porcelain. This plate has the inscription “The Red Bird from Surinam” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, dessert plate from the Sir John and Lady Williams generic service, ca. 1817–1820, with embossed beribboned edge and profusely gilded in the French Empire baroque style with six vignettes, each containing a pink rose and rosebuds and a central group of garden flowers displaying a bearded tulip, which is a characteristic signature of the Swansea artist “de Junic”. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sauce tureen and cover, Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, with gilded spindle handles, displaying groups of garden flowers on a bright apple green ground which has been identified as being decorated in John Sims atelier in Pimlico, London. The large floral group facing the viewer on the side of the tureen clearly shows the “bearded tulip” extending outward from the group, which immediately suggests that de Junic was the artist decorator involved. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 4.18

Fig. 4.19

Fig. 4.20

Fig. 4.21

Fig. 4.22

Fig. 4.23

Nantgarw porcelain cylindrical spill vase, locally decorated by “Kitty”, as signed in red enamel script on the base. Pardoe/Young period, ca. 1820–1823, and it is recorded that an artist called Kitty was taught by Thomas Pardoe at the Nantgarw China Works site. This specimen featured in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of the finest Nantgarw porcelain held between July and September 2019 to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the foundation of the Nantgarw China Works, held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw. Private Collection and reproduced with the courtesy of Charles Fountain, Director of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, violeteer, with pierced lid, attributed to Thomas Pardoe stylistically. Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, violeteer, with pierced lid, attributed to Henry Morris stylistically. Similar to that shown in Fig. 4.19. The gilt curlicues on the pierced lid are a special signature of Thomas Baxter so there could be cause for a re-assessment of the attribution of the painter here. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw cylindrical spill vase, ca. 1821–1823, with mask heads and simple edge gilding, depicting two male goldfinches on a tree branch in a landscape and attributed to Thomas Pardoe. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, ca. 1821–1823, with groups of flowers around a central gilt Garter Star motif which is a signature of Thomas Pardoe that he used in his days in the Cambrian Pottery from about 1800. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain plate, ca. 1821–1823, with a central feature of exotic birds in a chinoiserie landscape and six baroque vignettes each containing two exotic birds and a further six elliptical vignettes in the cavetto each containing a stylised ten petalled chrysanthemum flower in red enamel all with a gilt cailloute ground in semblance of pebbles, often termed “marbled” and a characteristic of Thomas Pardoe. A similar plate in Nantgarw porcelain is recorded with Pardoe’s signature on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 4.24

Fig. 4.25

Fig. 4.26

List of Figures

Swansea creamware jug from the Cambrian Pottery, ca. 1805, with an urban landscape scene with figures in a gilded vignette and a spout with a gilded cailloute ground adjacent to a geometric gilt pattern of elliptical ovoids each containing three gilt dots, another characteristic border used by Thomas Pardoe. Reproduced by courtesy of Fergus Gambon, Bonhams Auctioneers, Bond Street, London . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea duck-egg porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, dessert dish of cruciform pattern made especially for Lewis Weston Dillwyn and decorated by William Weston Young with botanical subjects, here with the red enamelled script “Cypripedium calceolus” on the underside in Young’s hand, more commonly known as the Lady’s Slipper Orchid. William Weston Young, an accomplished botanical draughtsman, had been engaged by Lewis Weston Dillwyn to act as botanical illustrator for his book on the British Confervae between 1803 and 1806, for which Dillwyn was a awarded an FRS. Young’s botanical work is much more frequently found on Swansea Cambrian pottery creamwares and pearlwares. Reproduced from Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) with permission from D. Brown & Sons, Publishers, Cowbridge, Mid-Glamorgan . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, plate from the London decorated Mackintosh service which was painted by Thomas Randall of the Robins & Randall atelier in Spa Fields, Islington, London, ca. 1817–1820. It was commissioned by E. Priest Richards, of Plas Newydd, Cowbridge, land agent of the Marquess of Bute, and would have been ordered through John Mortlock of Oxford Street, London. It was presented to Priest Richards’ daughter, Arabella, in 1880, on the occasion of her marriage to The Mackintosh of Mackintosh, Head of Clan Mackintosh of Moy, Inverness. There are several Nantgarw services of generic Mackintosh type known each differing in subtle gilding patterns but all containing vignettes of flowers and an exotic bird centrally painted by Thomas Randall, who excelled in his ornithological work: the attribution has been made by comparison with sketches and paintings that were retained in the Randall family archives. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 4.27

Fig. 4.28

Fig. 4.29

Fig. 4.30

Nantgarw porcelain coffee cup and saucer, ca. 1817–1820, London decorated with dentil edge gilding by Moses Webster in the atelier of Robins & Randall, Spa Fields, Islington, with groupings of three pink roses and rosebuds and scattered insects and moths. The cup has the characteristic Nantgarw heart-shaped handle and the saucer a plain unglazed base with no footrim. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, ca. 1817–1820, with beribboned border moulding and a central painting of Cupid with an arrow playing in the clouds; London-decorated and attributed to Robert Bix Gray, nephew of Thomas Randall, at the atelier of Robins & Randall, Spa Fields, Islington. The decoration of the border is unusual in that the vignettes are left blank but the moulding is enamelled in green and puce and the piece is otherwise devoid of gilding. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain cabinet cup saucer, ca. 1817–1820, decorated locally by George Beddow with a mountainous landscape, a bridge over a river, a house and figures. Richly gilded on a cerulean blue ground. Inscribed in enamel on the back of the saucer in Beddow’s hand “In Wales”. Reproduced from Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) with permission from D. Brown & Sons, Publishers, Cowbridge, Mid-Glamorgan . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, ca. 1821–1823, simply decorated in a naïve style and using a chocolate brown enamel as edging in place of gilding, which was adopted by Young and Pardoe during their period at the Nantgarw China Works to economise on the decorating costs of simpler pieces. Although originally attributed to Thomas Pardoe, these simpler pieces are now believed to have been decorated by William Henry Pardoe—other examples of this type include a man riding on an elephant and a carp swimming amongst reeds and flowers. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 4.31

Fig. 4.32

Fig. 4.33

List of Figures

Swansea porcelain cylindrical spill vase with slightly flared rim, ca. 1817–1820, with a square vignette of a gazelle in a landscape on a pale blue ground with assorted motifs and floral groupings. Inscribed on the base, M.M. Swansea 1819, which identifies the artist as Mary Moggridge, a painter at the Swansea China Works. Reproduced from Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain : Shapes and Decoration, 1988) with permission from D. Brown & Sons, Publishers, Cowbridge, Mid-Glamorgan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1820–1822, dessert plate with beribboned moulding and simple edge gilding decorated locally by William Weston Young with a landscape scene showing Melincourt Waterfall, Vale of Neath. Young was particularly taken with scenes from the Vale of Neath and prior to his becoming a resident decorator at the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea, he lived with his wife Elizabeth at the watermill house, Aberdulais Falls, on the outskirts of Neath, which he especially loved as noted in his Diaries. This plate featured in the Gartre’n Ol exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019. Reproduced by courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and in a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1820–1822, dessert plate with plain edge border and simple edge gilding but also with a gilding pattern of swags and foliage, decorated locally by William Weston Young with an unspecified landscape scene of a church and tower. Apparently, part of a service that was commissioned by the Rev. William Williams this plate featured in the Gartre’n Ol exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019. Reproduced by courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 4.34

Fig. 4.35

Fig. 4.36

Fig. 4.37

Porcelain coffee cup and saucer, ca. 1830–1840, competently painted with floral groups and having the enamelled inscription on the base of the saucer, Pardoe, Cardiff . The style of the piece indicates a Staffordshire porcelain factory origin, probably Coalport, Ridgway or Mintons, and the inscription confirms that William Henry Pardoe, despite having set up as a potter manufacturing salt glazed and brown glazed earthenwares and clay pipes in the Old Nantgarw China Works at the Nantgarw site in 1833 still decorated porcelain bought in for other places “in the white” using a muffle furnace at his residence in Laurel Grove, Cardiff. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, cabinet plate, ca. 1820–1823, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe with central landscape, a stream and two Welsh brown and white setters. Attractively gilded with a plain edge gilding and full gilding to the cavetto with a geometric pattern and six typical gold border motifs. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain cabinet plate, ca. 1817–1820, decorated in London with a brace of pheasants at the centre surrounded by a circle of pink roses. The C-scroll border is painted with blue swags and clusters of fruit. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw Porcelain cabinet cup, ca. 1820–1823, on three claw feet, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe showing a goldfinch and garden flowers. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 4.38

Fig. 4.39

Fig. 5.1

Fig. 5.2

Fig. 5.3

List of Figures

Nantgarw Porcelain cabinet cup, ca. 1820–1823, on three claw feet, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe showing two finches on a tree branch with hollyhocks and garden flowers. The reverse side to the item shown in Fig. 4.37. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, cabinet cup and saucer, London decorated with a central wreath of garden flowers on a geometric gilding pattern. Attractively moulded with two gryphon-headed handles in gilt. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sketch by Isaac Williams of the embossed border of a Nantgarw plate, from Figure 14 of his monograph on the archaeological site excavation of the Nantgarw China Works in 1931 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Sketch by Isaac Williams of a shard with an embossed border excavated from the waste pit of the Nantgarw China Works in 1931 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A collection of shards with the embossed border presented to the author for chemical analysis by the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, excavated from the waste pit at level 6, depth 1 m, representing the Billingsley/Walker era. Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 5.4

Fig. 5.5

Fig. 5.6

Fig. 5.7

Fig. 5.8

Nantgarw dinner plate from the Baron Phipps, Viscount Normanby, service, ca. 1817–1819, impressed mark NANT-GARW C.W., demonstrating the beauty of Nantgarw porcelain translucency at its very best with a simple gilt armorial crest decoration at the verge between embossed moulded scrolls of foliage and florets and otherwise undecorated. Only two Nantgarw services are known of this type displaying just a crest and being otherwise completely undecorated with no enamelling, the other exemplar being the plain, unmoulded Homfray tea and coffee service of Penllyne Castle (Crest: an otter, pierced by an arrow in gold), Henry Phipps was Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, created Baron Mulgrave of York in 1794 and Viscount Normanby, Earl of Mulgrave, in 1812. Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W. His crest comprises a demi-lion rampant or holding in both paws a palm branch vert. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Highlighted differences between the Nantgarw and Swansea beribboned moulding patterns: taken from Figure 25, page 15 of Rowland Williams’ monograph, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1813–1822, 1993. Reproduced with the permission of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw dessert plate, ca. 1820–1822, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe which apparently possesses the non-standard Nantgarw moulding: reference Rowland Williams’ monograph, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1813–1822, 1993, Figure 26, page 16. Reproduced with the permission of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Dinner plate from the Lady Seaton service of Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1819. The association of this service with Lady Seaton of Bosahan Manor, Cornwall, is unknown. Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W., underglaze cobalt blue hand-enamelled pattern, London decorated through John Mortlock’s, Oxford Street, with the characteristic dentil gold edging. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea porcelain dessert plate with embossed edge moulding and gilt C-scrolls accentuating the C-scroll moulding, ca., 1817–1820, decorated locally by Henry Morris with six vignettes containing groups of flowers and a central bouquet of garden flowers. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 5.9

Fig. 5.10

Fig. 5.11

Fig. 5.12

Fig. 5.13

Fig. 5.14

Fig. 5.15

List of Figures

Swansea deep dish with embossed beribboned edge moulding, duck-egg porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, decorated by William Pollard locally with five vignettes containing exotic birds perched on branches and a central geometrically gilded star motif. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . The underside of the Swansea deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, showing the red stencilled SWANSEA mark on its base when viewed by transmitted light—the characteristic duck-egg colouration of the highest quality Swansea porcelain is also clearly seen here. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A Swansea oval dessert dish with an embossed beribboned moulded border en suite with the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, duck-egg porcelain, and similarly decorated locally by William Pollard with six vignettes, each containing an exotic bird perched in a tree, and with an identical central geometric gilded star motif. Red enamelled stencilled mark SWANSEA on its base. Courtesy of Dr and Mrs Morgan Denyer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea duck-egg porcelain square dessert dish locally decorated by William Pollard with four vignettes containing exotic birds and en suite with the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9 and the oval dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.11. Reproduced with permission of Gwyn Jones, John Andrews Collection, Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Swansea duck-egg porcelain dessert plate locally decorated by William Pollard with six vignettes containing exotic birds and en suite with the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, the oval dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.11 and the square dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.13. Reproduced with permission of Gwyn Jones, John Andrews Collection, Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd . . . . . . . . Coalport porcelain, dessert plate, ca. 1820, decorated with a cobalt blue border and an embossed edge with gilding and white pigment highlights. The vignettes are not decorated. Exquisitely painted central flower bouquet. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Coalport porcelain, dessert plate, ca. 1820, decorated with a brown-beige border and an embossed edge, profusely gilded, with a central landscape scene. Contains five vignettes each containing sprays of garden flowers. Note that the C-scroll border is devoid of ribbons and florets. Courtesy of Dr and Mrs Morgan Denyer . . . . . . . . .

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List of Figures

Fig. 5.16

Fig. 5.17

Fig. 6.1

Fig. 7.1

Fig. 7.2

Montage of the C-scroll borders manifest on Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport plates, enlarged for clarity from specimens shown in previous Figs. 4.7, 5.4, 5.8, 5.11 and 5.14; from the top, Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby, Coalport brown-beige border, Coalport cobalt blue border . . . . . Analytical protocol for the differentiation between C-scrolled embossed borders on Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport porcelains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, 1818, diameter 25.0 cm; London decorated by James Plant at Robins and Randall’s atelier for Mortlock’s of Oxford Street; commissioned by George, the Prince Regent, as a wedding present for his younger brother, Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge on his marriage in June, 1818, at Buckingham Palace to Princess Augusta Wilhelmina Louise, Landgravine of Hesse-Cassel. Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W. This specimen plate was selected for display at the Special 200th Anniversary Exhibition of exquisite Nantgarw Porcelain entitled, Gartre’n Ol, “Coming Home”, Exhibition, and held at Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019, in the residence of William Billingsley on the actual Nantgarw China Works Site. In a Private Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Oil Painting entitled Grouse Shooting on Beamsley Beacon, 1816, by J.M.W. Turner, painted whilst he was staying at Farnley Hall, Yorkshire, with Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, who is depicted in the painting as the figure on the far right. Public domain . . . . Left hand piece of cracked small oblong serving platter from the Farnley Hall service illustrated together with its accompanying right hand section in Fig. 3.18: overall length 28.5 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.2 cm. This section has the dimensions of length 14.8 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.2 cm and is impressed with a Figure 7 near the footrim on the major axis and shows the characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Three vignettes are shown, one with an exotic bird on a branch and two of flowers, one with a bearded tulip. The central bouquet of garden flowers is disrupted but clearly shows a large bearded tulip and a passiflora. The retention of this badly damaged piece of porcelain for the information it provides to the researcher and analyst is noteworthy. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. 7.3

Fig. 7.4

Fig. 7.5

Fig. 7.6

Fig. 7.7

Fig. 7.8

Fig. 7.9

List of Figures

Nantgarw porcelain coffee cup and slop bowl from the large Hensol Castle breakfast service, simply decorated with cobalt blue flowers and berries and gilt sprigs with a plain gilt edging band. The service was probably commissioned by Benjamin Hall Sr, an ironmaster, who was resident at Hensol Castle between 1815 and 1824, after which the estate passed to the Crawshay dynasty of Merthyr ironmasters (Benjamin Hall was married to Charlotte Crawshay in 1800), who occupied it briefly before moving to Cyfarthfa Castle, Merthyr. Benjamin Hall’s son, Benjamin Hall Jr (1801–1862), is noted for giving his name allegedly to “Big Ben”, the 14-ton bell in the clock tower at Westminster. In a Private Collection . . . . . A Masonic beaker displaying the square and compasses symbol, Nantgarw porcelain, attributed to William Billingsley’s decoration; an order/invoice is extant which was placed for six beakers of this type placed with the Nantgarw China Works in December 1819, probably the last personal work carried out by Billingsley before he departed Nantgarw for Coalport in early 1820. Illustrated in Ernest Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, Batsford, London 1942: Plate CLXC). Reproduced with permission from the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Teabowl from an early experimental Swansea glassy porcelain tea service depicting “Newark Castle”, cursive Swansea script mark, No. 4. Decorated by William Billingsley. In a Private collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Base of teabowl shown in Fig. 7.5, with Swansea script mark in William Billingsley’s hand and “Newark Castle”. In a Private collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Teapot stand from an early experimental Swansea glassy porcelain tea service depicting a “View at Waltham, Hertfordshire”, impressed SWANSEA mark, No. 17. Decorated by William Billingsley. In a Private collection . . . . . Base of teapot stand shown in Fig. 7.7, showing “View at Waltham, Hertfordshire”, impressed SWANSEA mark. In a Private collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Teabowl from an early experimental Swansea glassy porcelain tea service depicting “Langollen Vale”, No. 11. In a Private collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

178

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182

183

184

184

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List of Figures

Fig. 7.10

Fig. 7.11

Fig. A.1

Fig. A.2

Swansea porcelain dessert plate from the 43-piece Garden Scenery dessert service which was commissioned by Lewis Weston Dillwyn, proprietor of the Swansea China Works between 1817–1819 for use at his residences in Penllergaer House and Sketty Hall. Decorated by Thomas Baxter at Swansea with flowers in a landscape and gilded with a curlicue pattern and plain gilt edging. It featured in the court case in 1820 when the assets and stock of the Swansea China Works were examined before transfer of the lease was made to Timothy and John Bevington. The service has passed through inheritance to descendants of Lewis Dillwyn who still retain 41 pieces; the plate illustrated was damaged and then acquired by Sir Leslie Joseph and after restoration it now resides in the National Museum of Wales Collection, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff. Reproduced with permission from Andrew Renton, The National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Cover of The Strand Magazine, issue containing the short Sherlock Holmes story of The Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Volume 5, no. 29, May 1893, ed. Herbert Greenhough Smith, published by George Newnes Ltd., Southampton Street and Exeter Street, London WC, with illustrations by Sidney Paget. The Strand Magazine collectively published the whole literary canon of Conan Doyle comprising 121 short stories, 70 articles, 9 novels, 2 interviews and 1 poem between 1891 and 1930. These have been collated by the Conan Doyle Encyclopaedia Team headed by Alexis Barquin . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31413. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “The Church of St Mary Hill”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31414. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “The Free School, Cowbridge”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Fig. A.3

Fig. A.4

Fig. A.5

Fig. A.6

Fig. A.7

Fig. A.8

Fig. A.9 Fig. A.10 Fig. A.11 Fig. A.12

List of Figures

NMW A 31415. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Dolgellau”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31416. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Cadair Idris”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31417. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “ Llandaff Cathedral”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31418. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with an unidentified landscape scene of a church. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31419. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with an unidentified landscape scene of a church. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . NMW A 31420. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Cowbridge Church”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . St Catwg’s Church, Pentyrch. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . St Mellons Church with Llanedeyrn. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . St Teilo’s Church, Llantilio Grosseny with Penrhos. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jesus College, Oxford, Second Quadrangle. The College was founded by Queen Elizabeth I in 1571. Public domain . . . .

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203 204 204 205 206

List of Figures

Fig. A.13

Jesus College, Oxford, First Quadrangle, in Memorials of Oxford by James Ingram DD, 3 Volumes, Published by J. H. Parker, H. Slatter and W. Graham, Charles Tilt, London, 1837. Engraved by John Le Keux from a drawing by Frederick Mackenzie, 1837. Public domain . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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List of Tables

Table 2.1 Table 2.2 Table 2.3 Table 3.1 Table 4.1 Table 4.2 Table 5.1 Table 5.2

Nantgarw porcelain named services and their commission origins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Clays, their categories, divisions and chemical formulae . . . . . . Minerals found in fired ceramics with their molecular spectroscopic identifiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Surviving porcelain comprising the Farnley Hall Nantgarw porcelain service in 2022 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Nantgarw generic Brace type service pieces and their characteristics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The characteristic signatures of enamellers of Welsh porcelains . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Embossed mouldings on Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains exemplars . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Embossed C-scroll border analysis on Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport plates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

22 31 48 68 86 114 145 155

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Chapter 1

William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition for the Manufacture of Nantgarw Porcelain

Abstract The career of the enigmatic William Billingsley is reviewed from his apprenticeship at the Derby China Works in 1776 and his establishment as the prime rose painter there in the 1780 and 1790s, through his moves via Pinxton, Mansfield, Brampton-in-Torksey, Worcester to Nantgarw, where he failed to secure government funding in September 1813 to manufacture porcelain. Lewis Weston Dillwyn engaged him at Swansea, where he stayed until 1817, before starting up again at Nantgarw with Samuel Walker and William Weston Young: this time the venture was successful, but the Nantgarw China Works could not supply enough porcelain to satisfy the demand in London because of uneconomically high kiln losses due to ineffective kiln temperature control and was closed in bankruptcy in 1820. Billingsley and Walker moved to the Coalport China Works and William Weston Young attempted to revive the fortunes at Nantgarw by bringing in Thomas Pardoe to decorate the remaining porcelain stocks. Young departed from Nantgarw in 1822 and Pardoe died in 1823, and thereby the Nantgarw China Works existence in porcelain manufacture and decoration ended. Keywords William Billingsley · Lewis Weston Dillwyn · Samuel Walker · William Weston Young · Nantgarw porcelain · Swansea porcelain · Derby porcelain The Nantgarw China Works was the brainchild of William Billingsley who, along with Samuel Walker and William Weston Young, established the porcelain manufactory at Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, in 1813 adjacent to the Glamorgan Canal, which linked the commercial and heavy industrial mining and ironworking centres of Rhondda and Merthyr Tydfil to the deep-water port of Cardiff, some 24 miles away. Although many contemporary porcelain manufactories in England evolved from potteries which had been established at neighbouring sites historically and thereby were able to access and acquire relevant skills from a ceramically trained local workforce, such as Coalport, Caughley, Derby, Rockingham and Worcester, this was not the case at Nantgarw (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021), one of the two Welsh porcelain manufactories that were established in the early nineteenth Century at Nantgarw and Swansea. At Swansea, in contrast, the Cambrian Pottery had been established by William Coles of Neath in © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_1

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1767 for the production of earthenwares and creamwares and this had been running successfully for over 40 years prior to Lewis Weston Dillwyn’s vision of creating the Swansea China Works to produce porcelain at an adjacent site in the town after his father had earlier acquired the lease of the Cambrian Pottery from the Duke of Beaufort, the local landowner. William Billingsley, born in Derby in 1758, trained as an apprentice porcelain decorator to William Duesbury at the Derby China Works in 1774 under the mentorship of Edward Withers and he excelled in flower painting, especially of roses, for which he was justifiably famed (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). Billingsley’s painting of full-blown roses using a washed-out brushwork technique, with their attendant rosebuds and lifelike foliage and stems, was much admired for its novelty and accuracy of natural depiction and he soon acquired the unofficial but well-deserved title of “master rose painter” at Derby. A painting believed to be of William Billingsley, entitled The Rose-Painter, is now in the Derby China Works Museum and depicts an ascetic young man with a purposeful stare (Fig. 1.1). His first major recorded commission at the Derby China Works was the porcelain dessert service commissioned by HRH George, the Prince of Wales, in 1786, each piece of which featured a single pink rose enclosed centrally in a circlet of gilt dots with a dawn pink edging and a tastefully executed gilding pattern at the rim. Examples of a dessert plate and lozenge-shaped comport from this service of originally 42 pieces are shown in Figs. 1.2 and 1.3, respectively (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017) and the adoption of the washing-out brushwork technique on the central pink rose is clearly demonstrated. As a contemporary example of William Billingsley’s mentor’s work, a Derby porcelain shell dish, ca. 1780, with an oeil-de-perdrix ground pattern verge and scattered pink roses painted by Edward Withers is shown in Fig. 1.4. A comparison with the rose painting of William Billingsley shown in Figs. 1.2 and 1.3 immediately demonstrates the extraordinary lifelike, free-flowing, three-dimensional painting of Billingsley’s roses compared with the flatter and perhaps rather more stilted rose painting of Withers, which was still very well executed and critically acclaimed in contemporary circles. At Derby, William Billingsley became the chief decorator of the enamelling workshop in a natural succession to Edward Withers in 1790 and his reputation for flower painting increased thereby with a discerning clientele and he soon acquired a devoted following: he also was adept at painting landscapes and in gilding, for which he was accorded the official Derby China Works gilder’s list number of “7” (Denyer, Denyer and Edwards, The Pendock-Barry Porcelain Service: A Forensic Evaluation, 2023; Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). Billingsley realised that, although Derby porcelain and its decoration was highly valued and esteemed by its clients, the rather poor translucency of its porcelain body substrate was nevertheless not to his satisfaction and his ambition was to strive to create the world’s most translucent porcelain which would provide a suitable vehicle and an appropriate canvas for his exquisite ceramic painting: to this end, he departed Derby in 1795 at the invitation of John Coke to establish porcelain manufacture at nearby Pinxton in Derbyshire. An example of Billingsley’s flower painting on Pinxton porcelain, which is rather rarely found nowadays, is shown in Fig. 1.5, namely a tea-cup and

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

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Fig. 1.1 “The Rose Painter”, artist unknown, believed to be William Billingsley as a young man at the Derby China Works, ca. 1790, aged approximately 32. Now in the Derby China Works Museum

saucer which is unusually completely ungilded, dating from ca. 1795–99, and shows the superb and free-flowing Billingsley flower group painting without any distraction to the observer that may ensue from any gilt patterned surroundings. However, Billingsley was still not entirely satisfied with the Pinxton porcelain body as a vehicle for his artistic work and he left Pinxton in 1799 to set up a business for the decoration of porcelain specimens that he purchased privately from a variety of source manufactories at Mansfield and thereafter at Brampton-in-Torksey around 1803, where he met with Samuel Walker, a neighbouring farmer’s son and engineer who had experience in kiln construction and design. This re-fuelled once again Billingsley’s ardent desire to manufacture porcelain of the highest quality and translucency which he commenced experiments to undertake at Brampton to supplement the continuation of the business of purchasing porcelain in the white from other factories for decoration there. The defining catalyst for advancing William Billingsley’s achievement in porcelain synthesis came when Martin Barr of the Barr, Flight & Barr, Royal Worcester China Works, engaged with him and Samuel Walker to transfer to Worcester in 1808 and help make some new experimental porcelain there using a novel design of high temperature reverberatory kiln which Walker duly constructed at Worcester for that purpose. These experimental trials were carried out rather clandestinely at Worcester, often under the cover of darkness, and were overseen and encouraged personally by Martin Barr. William Billingsley did also undertake day-to-day supervisory duties in the decorating workshop at the Royal Worcester China Works and also accomplished a very limited amount of enamelling decoration there personally, whereas Samuel

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1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

Fig. 1.2 Derby porcelain, Prince of Wales dessert service, 1786, dessert plate, diameter 23.3 cm, with fluted moulding, painted by William Billingsley with a single pink rose centrally and a spray of forget-me-nots enclosed in a circular ring of gold dots with a dawn pink edging and a tasteful gilding pattern applied by William Cooper, whose gilder’s number 3 appears underneath in puce enamel near the footrim. Marked with the Derby crown, crossed batons and six dots and the pattern number 65. In a Private Collection

Fig. 1.3 Derby porcelain, Prince of Wales dessert service, 1786, lozenge-shaped fruit comport, en suite with the dessert plate shown in Fig. 1.2, painted by William Billingsley; length 31.4 cm, width 24.7 cm, height 5.3 cm. Marked with the Derby crown, crossed batons and six dots and the pattern number 65, with the gilder’s mark of 8 for William Longden near the footrim. In a Private Collection

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

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Fig. 1.4 Pinxton porcelain tea cup and saucer, ca. 1798, painted by William Billingsley with bouquets of garden flowers, diameter of cup 8.4 cm, height 5.8 cm, saucer diameter 13.8 cm, saucer depth 2.5 cm. Unmarked. This service was unique to the Pinxton manufactory in that it was completely ungilded, so the focus was directed to the exquisite flower painting. In a Private Collection

Walker was responsible mainly for the new kiln control and firing processes. A fine example of Billingsley’s enamelling work at Worcester, displaying his characteristic washed-out pink roses and foliage on an attractive cerulean blue ground is shown on the saucer dish in Fig. 1.6, which is fully marked on the reverse with Barr, Flight and Barr’s enamelled and stencilled Worcester stamp and also impressed with a crown and BFB mark. Billingsley and Walker carried out a series of empirical experiments at Worcester with the full encouragement of Martin Barr in the synthesis of new porcelains involving some firing experiments with the new reverberatory high temperature kiln. It is hence believed by the author that the prototype Nantgarw body formulation was first seriously developed there at that time but it was never put into production at Worcester as Martin Barr (1757–1813), who had joined the Royal Worcester China Works in 1792 as a partner with Thomas Flight (1726–1800), died in early 1813. The Worcester China Works had already achieved a Royal Warrant from King George III in 1788 and there followed two more of these awarded from the Prince and Princess of Wales, HRH George and HRH Caroline, in 1807 and 1808. The successors to Martin Barr’s proprietorship at Worcester, namely Joseph Flight (1762–1838) and Martin Barr’s sons, Martin Barr Jr. (1784–1848) and George Barr, who traded under the name, Messrs. Flight, Barr & Barr, did not wish to embark upon a change to their existing successful hybrid porcelain body production for which they already had a devoted clientele. It is interesting to perhaps speculate on what may have ensued historically if Martin Barr had survived and had agreed to sponsor Billingsley and Walker’s new phosphatic and highly translucent porcelain body production, which

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1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

Fig. 1.5 Derby porcelain, shell dish from a dessert service, ca. 1780, length major axis 24.6 cm, width minor axis 23.9 cm, height 4.5 cm, decorated by Edward Withers then Head of the Derby China Works enamelling workshop and mentor to William Billingsley. Featuring single pink roses centrally and in eight vignettes at the verge in an oeuil-de-perdrix decorated ground. Two vignettes display two roses symmetrically placed either side of the major axis, whereas the central spray has three roses; all the other roses are single. In a Private Collection

was totally dissimilar in formulation to the Worcester hybrid porcelain body, using the experimental new reverberatory high-temperature kiln they had constructed at Worcester; would this perhaps have seen a variant of the highly phosphatic Nantgarw soft paste porcelain body being trialled in production at the Royal Worcester China Works several years before it was actually made in Nantgarw? Billingsley, Walker and William Billingsley’s daughters Sarah, who had married Samuel Walker in 1810 at Worcester, and Lavinia, then left Worcester after the death of Martin Barr for Nantgarw by way of Bristol, whence they sailed across the Bristol Channel to Cardiff and established their manufactory there in 1813, requesting financial support on the 5th September 1813 for their foundation enterprise (now often referred to as Nantgarw Phase I), which was signed by the three partners Samuel Walker, William Beeley and William Weston Young, from the British government in the form of a Memorial application. Much has been made of this abbreviation of Billingsley’s name and its contraction from Billingsley to Beeley on the Memorial application by some historians, who have inferred that he was trying to disguise his previous achievements and have implied some secrecy and hidden agenda that was in operation which Billingsley was trying to hide, one suggestion being perhaps there was even a bigamous marriage (?). However, as has been pointed out by this author (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021), it is fairly common to use diminutives for long surnames in the

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

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Fig. 1.6 Royal Worcester porcelain, Barr, Flight and Barr, period, ca. 1809–10, deep saucer dish, diameter 19.9 cm, depth 3.0 cm, decorated by William Billingsley with groups of roses and rosebuds and single roses on a cerulean blue ground. Marked with an impressed crown and BFB with a puce enamelled stencilled transfer mark, BARR FLIGHT & BARR, Royal Porcelain Works, WORCESTER, London-House, No 1 Coventry Street. In a Private Collection

English language and in the Memorial the three authors refer at the start of their application to their considerable practical experience in porcelain manufacture, which surely would negate any attempt to involve the self-imposed secrecy of one particular individual through a change of his name? Funding support was not forthcoming from this application (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942), despite it being sponsored by the influential Sir John Nicholls of Merthyrmawr, but Sir Joseph Banks, President of the Lords of the Council for the Committee for Trade and Plantations that reviewed their application, was nevertheless greatly impressed by the quality of the porcelain specimens that had been submitted physically in support of their Memorial application by Billingsley, Walker and Young. Through the Royal Society of London, of which they were both Fellows, and knowing already of Lewis Dillwyn’s desire to establish porcelain production at Swansea, Sir Joseph Banks alerted Dillwyn to their needing financial support and to the obvious quality of the ceramic work that had already been carried out at Nantgarw. William Weston Young, who knew Lewis Dillwyn from his previous employment at the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea, was then able to arrange that Lewis Dillwyn first met personally with William Billingsley and Samuel Walker at Margam Park, the seat of Thomas Mansel-Talbot, in late September 1813 (William Weston Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN; Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The

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1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young, 1776–1847, 2019) about three weeks after the result of their failed application of September 5th was announced. After a follow-up visit made to the Nantgarw China Works site in October 1813 to view the kilns and discuss their operation there, Lewis Dillwyn engaged Billingsley and Walker to join with him in the production of porcelain at Swansea, which they did soon thereafter in November 1813. According to William Weston Young, Lewis Dillwyn questioned Samuel Walker particularly about the operation of the porcelain kiln at Nantgarw and drew attention to the unusually high quantity of waste, fired porcelain shards, that was evident on the Nantgarw China Works site, which Walker attributed incorrectly to the small size of the biscuit porcelain kiln. By late 1813/early 1814, Billingsley and Walker had joined Dillwyn at Swansea, new kilns had been erected at the fledgling Swansea China Works with funding from Lewis Dillwyn and the porcelain production was commenced there. Firstly, this comprised a glassy, rather thickly potted china then, during Dillwyn’s experiments with his porcelain body composition between August 1815 and 1817, his esteemed highly translucent duck-egg porcelain was put into full and successful production at this time. Billingsley appreciated very much this fine highly translucent porcelain with its characteristic duck-egg blue-green colour in transmitted light, some of which he painted personally at Swansea as well as supervising the decorating workshop there. An example of Billingsley’s work on Swansea duck-egg porcelain is shown in Fig. 1.7, namely, a small tea-plate with his signature rose on a bed of gilt seaweed and bearing his verified handwritten script Swansea mark in red enamel on the reverse (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017; Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988). There has been some conjecture and critical argument in the literature but it is thought that some of the earliest porcelain produced at the Swansea China Works may actually have been of the Nantgarw formulation from the first phase of operations (Nantgarw Phase I), which was it is thought was first developed at Worcester. This perhaps initiated the written threat of impending legal action against Dillwyn, Billingsley and Walker from Messrs. Flight Barr and Barr at Worcester if its production was undertaken at Swansea, as this would have clearly been in breach of the conditions of departure from Worcester of Billingsley and Walker and of their legal termination of contract there (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942). The convoluted legal arguments on this theme have been explored in detail by Ernest Morton Nance, who was by profession a lawyer; it is concluded that little porcelain of a potential Nantgarw formulation would have been produced at Swansea in these earliest trials, although several possible pieces from this era do occasionally surface that would clearly fit into this category and some detailed scientific chemical analysis is clearly required of these exemplars to assess their formulation and composition in comparison with the later Nantgarw porcelain formulations and perhaps answer some questions as to their origin. In an attempt to improve the robustness of his porcelain, Lewis Dillwyn then decided to reduce the percentage of calcined bone ash as a raw material component

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

9

Fig. 1.7 Swansea porcelain, small tea plate, Dillwyn’s finest duck-egg translucency, ca. 1815– 1817, diameter 18.5 cm, decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses each sitting on a bed of golden seaweed and alternating with gold stars. Marked Swansea in a script red enamel in what has been identified as Billingsley’s characteristic handwriting. In a Private Collection

in his esteemed fine duck-egg porcelain and he substituted this with steatite (soapstone or soaprock), a magnesium silicate. Whilst achieving his objective successfully in making a stronger magnesian china based on this new soaprock formulation, Dillwyn unfortunately incurred the wrath and departure of his clientele at this point who perceived that this new “trident” porcelain was somewhat inferior to the duckegg porcelain they had come to expect from Swansea: the soaprock or “trident” body texture, termed as such from the impressed trident mark on its underside, was rather grainy and comparable to pigskin in texture and its peach-like translucency was also visually poorer than that of its esteemed duck-egg porcelain precursor. Although the quality of the local flower painting decoration on the trident porcelain was still excellent and an example of this is shown in Fig. 1.8, which was painted by David Evans locally at the Swansea China Works, Dillwyn’s clientele deserted him. He eventually had to cease production of porcelain at Swansea in 1817 and he then leased the manufactory site to Timothy and John Bevington, who wished to manufacture earthenwares on the Swansea China Works site which was adjacent to the operational Cambrian Pottery site that they had already been leasing from Dillwyn. The Bevingtons, who had no aspirations to manufacture porcelain at Swansea but only required the site of the Swansea China Works for the physical expansion of their earthenware business and for stock storage purposes, then proceeded to decorate the remnant glazed china stocks in the white at the Swansea China Works using their local work force of enamellers and disposed of this residual decorated Swansea

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1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

Fig. 1.8 Swansea porcelain, dessert plate, diameter 20.2 cm, ca. 1817–1820, soaprock steatitic “trident” porcelain, decorated by David Evans with three groups of garden flowers. In a Private Collection

porcelain later at auction. Meanwhile, William Billingsley apparently had reached a disagreement with Lewis Dillwyn, the reason for which has not been specified hitherto in documentation, but it is believed this could well have arisen over Dillwyn’s intention to replace the production of the high-quality duck-egg porcelain at Swansea with the supposedly inferior trident ware. Certainly, Billingsley’s painting is not to be found on the trident Swansea magnesian porcelain. Billingsley departed Swansea with his daughter Lavinia in late 1816/early 1817 and returned to his old residence at Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, on the site of the Nantgarw China Works. Meanwhile, Sarah Walker, Billingsley’s elder daughter, had died at Swansea in January 1817 and Samuel Walker followed Billingsley to Nantgarw later in 1817 at the conclusion of Dillwyn’s trial experiments in which he had participated throughout as the kiln manager, supervising closely the kiln firing operations. With a hiatus in 1816, the re-opening of the Nantgarw China Works now commenced later in 1817 after the arrival of Samuel Walker from Swansea, called Nantgarw Phase II, with William Weston Young again providing the necessary financial support personally with his own investment of £1100 and seeking a further investment of £1000 from “Ten True Men of Glamorgan” whom he had persuaded to invest £100 each in the venture. The three original partners in the Nantgarw China Works were now together once more. Nantgarw porcelain production commenced immediately and John Mortlock, who ran a china retail shop at 47, Oxford Street, London, regarded by many as the premier source of china being retailed in the capital, then undertook to take almost all the output of perfect Nantgarw porcelain, which

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

11

was estimated to be well in excess of 90% of the perfect porcelain artefacts then being produced at the Nantgarw China Works. Mortlock’s retail china agency in London was inundated by a clientele who wished to acquire Nantgarw porcelain and he could not supply this demand, even with the imposition of his financially advantageous premiums of up to 500%! He therefore sought to acquire even more Nantgarw porcelain output from Billingsley and Walker, which they were unfortunately unable to provide because of their significantly large kiln losses and resultant wastage in biscuit porcelain production. Relatively little Nantgarw porcelain would have been available, therefore, for local decoration at this time and it is assumed that some of this would perhaps have been labelled of a “seconds” category, namely, pieces whose shapes had become slightly distorted in the biscuit kiln firing or which bore unsightly blemishes or bubbles in the glaze which could not be masked with strategic decoration. An example of such a Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate simply decorated by a local artist, which some connoisseurs have attributed to Lavinia Billingsley, with sprays of blue delphiniums, green foliage and pinkish-orange roses with a simple edge gilding band and some black carbon blemishes, approximately 20 in all over the plate’s surface including a relatively large underglaze bubble, is shown in Fig. 1.9. Although an attractive example of locally decorated Nantgarw porcelain from the Nantgarw Phase II operations and having the white Billingsley/Walker glaze, this plate would not have been acceptable to John Mortlock for decoration and retail sale in London because of its visually blemished surface, yet it would certainly be desirable today by collectors who want what they would regard as 100% Nantgarw porcelain—namely, the phosphatic porcelain made, glazed and decorated locally in the Nantgarw China Works (ostensibly by Lavinia Billingsley in 1817) and later sold there locally. It is very interesting that a similarly decorated dessert plate exists in the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, where it has been attributed to the later local decoration of Thomas Pardoe and this featured in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain in 2019 (Gartre’n 2019): on close inspection the decoration on these two plates is extremely similar indeed, even to the placement and composition of the four floral groups in terms of the visual aspect of the flowers, the number of flower buds and the siting of the foliage leaves (Fig. 1.10). This cannot surely be coincidental and the plate attributed to Lavinia Billingsley, which must therefore date to earlier in 1817 as she died at Nantgarw in the September of that year, perhaps would have been used as a model for his decoration by Thomas Pardoe between 1821 and 1823. The only other difference observable between the two plates is that the later Pardoe example is completely ungilded, which was quite common at that time for economic reasons, and the roses have a more definite pink colouration. The idea that the Lavinia Billingsley plate was a model for the later Pardoe version presumes that the earlier plate still existed at the Nantgarw China Works for such copying to take place and it could be suggested that this plate therefore could have been preserved there perhaps as a relic of Lavinia’s work, which itself supports the idea that it must have been completed just before she died at Nantgarw in September 1817. It has been estimated from ternary oxide composition component diagrams (see Chap. 2) that the Nantgarw kiln firing temperature would have needed to have been

12

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

Fig. 1.9 Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate from the Phase II production operation, ca. 1817 diameter 21.0 cm, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., decorated with sprays of blue delphiniums and pinkishorange roses and with a simple edge gilded band at the rim. Locally decorated it is attributed by connoisseurs to Lavinia Billingsley, who would have worked at the Nantgarw China Works only for some months in 1817 before she died in September of that year. This plate would not have been selected for despatch to John Mortlock for decoration and re-sale in London, despite his insistent demand for Nantgarw porcelain, because of the carbon particles which cause the visual blemishes on its surface, about 20 of which can be discerned in the photograph. In a Private Collection

maintained in the narrow temperature range between 1400 and 1420 °C for about four days or more to maintain the essential liquidus regime (Owen et al. 1998; Owen and Morrison 1999) otherwise significant sagging or incomplete fusion of the pieces being fired would have occurred outside this temperature range. Isaac Williams, who first excavated archaeologically the site of the Nantgarw China Works in 1931 and who discovered the waste pit of fragments and porcelain shards there, estimated that a typical production run would have comprised about 25 dozen prototype porcelain items in a kiln charge, which therefore occupied one week’s work at Nantgarw, of which we can estimate now from kiln losses that perhaps only some 30–40 perfect pieces would have been considered fit for glazing and later sale to John Mortlock (Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site, 1932). Most of this loss would have occurred at the biscuit porcelain first-firing stage as Isaac Williams found no wasters in the waste pit at Level 6 corresponding to the Billingsley/Walker era that had been glazed or enamelled. Recently, some rare shards of Nantgarw porcelain from this waste pit have been analysed by the author and colleagues which were enamelled and glazed, indicating that further losses had also occurred at these later stages of kiln firing (Colomban et al. 2020).

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

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Fig. 1.10 Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, locally decorated by Thomas Pardoe, ca. 1821–1823, with an almost identical arrangement of roses and delphiniums in the flower groups to that shown in the plate in Fig. 1.9., which has been identified as being painted earlier in 1817 by Lavinia Billingsley. The absence of gilding is to be noted here. This plate featured in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019. Reproduced by courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa, Cymru, Cardiff

Eventually, Billingsley and Walker decided that the Nantgarw China Works was financially compromised and was clearly not viable economically anymore and they left it in a bankrupt state in 1820, moving to join John Rose at the Coalport China Works in April of that year. William Weston Young now stepped in with an attempt to rescue the Nantgarw China Works from bankruptcy and he engaged the assistance of Thomas Pardoe, an old friend and artistic colleague from their days in the decorating workshop in the first decade of the 19th Century at the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea, where they had shared lodgings and worked together on decorating Cambrian pottery and creamwares. Pardoe had joined the Cambrian Pottery under the proprietorship of George Haynes in 1795 and he was joined there by William Weston Young around 1802. Between 1802 and 1806, William Weston Young was engaged as a botanical draughtsman by Lewis Weston Dillwyn, the new proprietor of the Cambrian Pottery, in the preparation of his magnum opus on the British Confervae (Dillwyn, British Confervae, 1809) and this diverted his activities somewhat from his decoration of the ceramics at the

14

1 William Billingsley at Derby, Pinxton and Worcester and His Ambition …

Cambrian Pottery. Hence, it appears that Pardoe was responsible almost entirely for the botanical specimen subjects at the Cambrian Pottery, which it is alleged he believed stilted the development of his floral artistic accomplishments, and he left Swansea in 1809 to set up a successful ceramics decorating business in Bristol with his wife Sarah and family. Pardoe left his ceramics decorating business in Bristol and joined Young in Nantgarw in January 1821, with his son William Henry Pardoe, to decorate the remnant stocks of Nantgarw porcelain that were left in the white for the future sale at auction or through local commissions received. It is now believed that Young did also experiment with the idea of re-manufacturing porcelain at Nantgarw and there is archaeological evidence for this (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847), 2019; Young, William Weston, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). However, Young did not possess the precise formulation recipe of raw materials and components for the original Nantgarw porcelain, particularly in respect of the vital calcined bone ash component, which Billingsley had kept strictly secret throughout their operations there, and he could only produce a hard paste body version of Nantgarw porcelain, which was undoubtedly of a good translucency, but this was shunned by a clientele who wanted and expected the original properties of the Nantgarw highly soft paste phosphatic formulation product (Colomban et al. 2020). A glazed shard from the Nantgarw waste pit lowest level analysed as a highly siliceous hard paste porcelain with over 81% silica and zero P2 O5 phosphatic component which was totally atypical of the Nantgarw Billingsley/Walker soft paste porcelain formulation exhibited by other shards from this level. This is credited with Young’s attempt at the manufacture of porcelain at Nantgarw. Young left Nantgarw in a clearly disillusioned frame of mind in late 1822 after the last auction sale in October of that year, but Pardoe stayed on decorating the remnant porcelain until he died some months later in July 1823. After the lapse of a few years his son, William Henry Pardoe, returned to the Nantgarw China Works site to manufacture earthenwares and clay pipes in the 1830s and this was carried on after his death by his surviving wife and family until the invention of cigarette rolling machines sounded the death knell of clay pipes in the 1880 and 1890s. Percival Pardoe, the surviving son of William Henry Pardoe, still continued to manufacture glazed earthenwares at the Nantgarw site into the 1930s (Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site, 1932), upon which the residence of Tyla Gwyn, after the departure of the Pardoe family, became the home of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust who are currently excavating the site archaeologically and restoring the kilns and potting sheds as well as mounting a permanent display of Nantgarw porcelain there in the residence formerly occupied by William Billingsley.

References

15

References P. Colomban, H.G.M. Edwards, C. Fountain, Raman spectroscopic and SEM/EDAXS analyses of highly translucent Nantgarw soft-paste porcelain. J. Eur. Ceram. Soc. 40, 4664–4675 (2020) R.L. Denyer, M.C.T. Denyer, H.G.M. Edwards, The Pendock-Barry Porcelain Service: A Forensic Evaluation (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2023) L.W. Dillwyn, British Confervae: or Coloured Figures and Descriptions of the British Plants Referred by Botanists to the Genus Confervae (W. Phillips, George Yard, Lombard Street, London, 1809) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Re-Appraisal (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847) (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2019) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) Gartre’n Ol, Coming Home: Exhibition to Celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the Nantgarw China Works Foundation (Nantgarw China Works Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, 2019) A.E. Jones (Jimmy), S.L. Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration (D. Brown, Cowbridge, UK, 1988) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (B.T. Batsford, London, 1942) J.V. Owen, J.O. Wilstead, R.W. Williams, T.E. Day, A tale of two cities: compositional characteristics of some Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains and their implications for Kiln Wastage. J. Archaeol. Sci. 25, 359–375 (1998) J.V. Owen, M.L. Morrison, Sagged phosphatic Nantgarw porcelain (ca. 1813–1820): casualty of overfiring or a fertile paste? Geoarchaeology 14, 313–332 (1999) J. Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848 (The Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2002) I.J. Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site (The National Museum of Wales/Press Board of the University of Wales, Amgueddfa Genedlaethol Cymru, Cardiff, 1932) W.W. Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847(1802–1843), vol 30 (West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea), SA1 3SN. https://archiveshub.jisc.sc.uk/data/gb216-d/dxch/ ddxch/i/hub

Chapter 2

The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

Abstract Some 53 Nantgarw porcelain services have been categorised as “named” services, wherein either their original provenance or later possession by a purchaser or inheritor is known. A detailed analysis reveals that half of these have been decorated in London ateliers through the agency of John Mortlock of Oxford Street and the rest locally at the Nantgarw China Works by William Billingsley, Thomas Pardoe and William Weston Young. Few ceramic artists in the London ateliers of Robins & Randall and John Sims have been identified. Some criteria for identifying a London sourced decoration on Nantgarw porcelain are advanced. Keywords London decoration · Local decoration · William Billingsley · Thomas Pardoe · John Mortlock · Dentil-edge gilding · French Empire gilding

2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain It was stated in Chap. 1 that the majority of the Nantgarw porcelain output that was deemed to be perfect was sent to John Mortlock’s agency in London in the white, i.e. as glazed biscuit porcelain but undecorated, whence it would be decorated according to the commissions received from Mortlock’s clients at either of his two preferred London ateliers of Thomas Robbins & Martin Randall in Islington or John Sims in Pimlico. It is possible that Mortlock also used other ateliers in London, presumably when the Robins & Randall and Sims’ ateliers were too busy, and examples of Nantgarw porcelain decorated at Bradley’s of Pall Mall and Powell’s of Wimpole Street are also known which bear their script marks (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). It would perhaps be anticipated, therefore, that most of the larger client commissions such as dinner, tea, breakfast and dessert services would have been sourced in London between 1817 and 1819: this is not absolutely definitive, of course, and certainly some services of this type are known to have been decorated locally during the Billingsley and Walker era, examples being the Twyning, Duncombe and Edwards tea services and the Homfray armorial tea and coffee service (Figs. 2.1, 2.2, 2.3 and 2.4 respectively) and probably too the large Hensol Castle breakfast-dessert service which has been attributed to the decoration of Thomas Pardoe. Some of these were decorated at Nantgarw by William © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_2

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Billingsley personally: the first three were believed presented by William Billingsley to Edward Edmunds, the landlord of his Tyla Gwyn residence and the Nantgarw China Works site in lieu of rent for the premises. These tea services are simply decorated and gilded and consist of Billingsley’s single pink rose blooms randomly scattered over the surface of the porcelain and they derive their nomenclature from being passed on either as wedding presents and through inheritance to the daughters of Edward Edmunds. The Homfray of Penllyne Castle service is one of only seven known armorial Nantgarw services and displays the speared embrued otter crest of Homfray in gilt with a simple gold band at the edge: it can be inferred, with the supportive designation of Billingsley’s gilding (at the Derby China Works he was in addition to being an accomplished enameller he was a noted gilder who bore the works number of “7”), therefore, that the service was commissioned locally from the Nantgarw China Works, as Penllyne Castle is only 19 miles distant from the manufactory site at Nantgarw. An alternative and equally credible proposal would be that this particular commission could have been placed for the Nantgarw China Works directly through William Weston Young, who as partner and investor in the Nantgarw China Works venture was also an estates land surveyor who travelled around South Wales visiting the homes and estates of landed gentry whilst living at Nottage, Porthcawl, less than 10 miles away from Penllyne Castle. During the tenure of the Nantgarw China Works by Young and Pardoe, the remnant porcelain specimens from the Billingsley and Walker era, some of which were glazed and some left as biscuit porcelain to be later glazed by Young and Pardoe, were decorated for sale at auction and for local commissions. The author has identified 53 named services of Nantgarw porcelain from the literature and there are, of course, many other services which do not possess this nomenclature label and are therefore rendered “anonymous” under this classification. Of the named Nantgarw services it is possible to categorise those which are definitively London-decorated and others which are locally decorated either during the Billingsley/Walker period or the Young/Pardoe period. These named Nantgarw services are listed in Table 2.1. A noted breakfast service that was decorated by Thomas Pardoe locally from remnant porcelain stocks was the SpenceThomas service, described by Dr William John et al. (John et al., The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, 1975) as supplied to the Spence-Thomas family, whom he said lived locally to the Nantgarw China Works. Another example of William Billingsley’s attributed decorating work at Nantgarw is the simply decorated dessert plate shown in Fig. 2.5, with a band of copper beech leaves painted in brown enamel at the verge and a simple gilt edging with a gilt circle at the centre, ca. 1817–1819; this plate has the characteristic white Billingsley glaze (the so-called Nantgarw No. 1 glaze) which can be contrasted with the creamier and thinner Young/Pardoe glaze (the so-called Nantgarw No. 2 glaze) that was adopted later on the Spence-Thomas service coffee cup and decorated with a floral band by Thomas Pardoe in the post-Billingsley era ca. 1820–1822 (Fig. 2.6) (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776– 1847), 2019; Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021).

2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain

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Fig. 2.1 Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, tea cup and saucer with heart-shaped handle from the Twyning tea and coffee service: made for Edward Edmunds, Pen-y-Rhos, Nantgarw, and landlord of the Nantgarw China Works site at Tyla Gwyn. Decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses and green foliage. Believed to have been presented to Edward Edmunds by William Billingsley in lieu of rent for the Nantgarw site. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London

Analysis of the data presented in Table 2.1 reveals some interesting information about the Nantgarw porcelain services listed there: • Of the 53 named Nantgarw services, 26 can be unequivocally assigned to a London sourcing and decoration through the agency of John Mortlock in Oxford Street. A further 27 can be assigned to local decoration at the Nantgarw China Works. It is perhaps surprising at first that so many services of Nantgarw porcelain were provided locally in view of the statement that John Mortlock had acquired most of the output of the Nantgarw China Works for decoration at London but there are many more “anonymous” London-decorated services that surely would have made it into this category if Mortlock’s archived business records had survived their destruction during the London Blitz of World War II for their inspection by modern historians. • The London decorated porcelains are generally much more exotically enamelled with extensive gilding in the French Empire and baroque revived rococo styles that was much in vogue in Georgian England towards the end of the second decade of the 19th Century. • In comparison, the locally decorated services are generally now appreciated for their excellent floral decoration and minimal gilding; this is especially true of the locally decorated services of the Young/Pardoe period between 1820 and 1823, which generally had a simple and plain edge gilding during Billingsley and

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2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

Fig. 2.2 Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, items from the Edwards tea and coffee service, comprising a teapot, stand, covered sucrier, milk jug, slop bowl, large plate and a tea cup, coffee cup and saucer trio with heart-shaped handles. Made for Edward Edmunds, Pen-y-Rhos, Nantgarw, and landlord of the Nantgarw China Works site at Tyla Gwyn, and decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses on a bed of gilt seaweed. Presented to Frances Edwards (nee Edmunds) by her father Edward Edmunds on the occasion of her marriage. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London

Walker’s time, which was often replaced with an enamelled band in chocolate brown, green or blue colour by Young and Pardoe to minimise the cost of production. The quality of the decoration and minimal gilding on the local artefacts generally reinforce the beauty of the Nantgarw porcelain. A notable exception to this statement is provided by the Rev William Williams service, which will be discussed below and in Appendix A, which was decorated locally by William Weston Young. • The responsibility for the decoration of the locally identified service commissions in Table 2.1 can be described as follows: Thomas Pardoe (14), William Billingsley (7) and William Weston Young (1), therefore leaving 5 services yet to be attributed for local decoration, these being the Hensol Castle service, the socalled Miss Booker of Southerndown service and three services for the Marquess of Bute, one of which was the unique, Nantgarw service which he commissioned undecorated and ungilded to best exhibit the Nantgarw translucency (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021; Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). Of the two named services labelled in the Local (?) category, these can be considered to have probably been commissioned locally as one of the clients was local to the manufactory (Henry Wyndham-Quin of Dunraven Castle,

2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain

21

Fig. 2.3 Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, tea pot and stand from the Duncombe tea and coffee service, made for Edward Edmunds, Pen-y-Rhos, Nantgarw, and landlord of the Nantgarw China Works site at Tyla Gwyn. Decorated by William Billingsley with single pink roses alternating with gilt anthemions. Believed to have been presented to Edward Edmunds by William Billingsley in lieu of rent for the Nantgarw site. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London

Fig. 2.4 Nantgarw porcelain, teabowl, unmarked, from the armorial service commissioned by John Homfray of Penllyne Castle, Cowbridge, decorated in gilt by William Billingsley locally at Nantgarw, ca. 1817–1819, with the Homfray crest of an embrued and speared otter. Reproduced by the courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan

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Table 2.1 Nantgarw porcelain named services and their commission originsa Service name

Original commission/association

Type

Reference

Viscount Weymouth

Lord Thomas Thynne, Longleat House, Bathb

Dinner-dessert

John et al. (1975) London

Wyndham

Henry Wyndham-Quin, Dunraven Castleb

Dinner-dessert

Gambon (2016)

Local?

Ramsay of Straloch 1

Col. John Ramsay of Straloch & Barrab

Dinner-dessert

Morton Nance (1942)

London

Ramsay of Straloch 2

Col. John Ramsay of Straloch & Barrab

Dinner-dessert

Bonhamsc

Local

Pardoe

Jeffreys of Brecon

Nicholas Jeffreys, Brecon Prioryb

Dinner-dessert

Gambon (2016)

Local

Pardoe

Homfray of Penllyne

John Homfray, Penllyne Castleb

Tea and coffee

Morton Nance (1942)

Local

Billingsley

Baron Phipps of Normanby

Constantine Henry Phipps, 1st Earl of Mulgrave, Whitby, Yorkshireb

Dinner-dessert

Edwards (2017)

Local?

Billingsley?

Wyndham Lewis 1 Wyndham Lewis MP, Greenmeadow, Llantrisant

Dinner-dessert

John (1948)

Local

Pardoe

Wyndham Lewis 2 Wyndham Lewis MP, Greenmeadow, Llantrisant

Dinner-dessert

John (1948)

Local

Pardoe

Mackintosh 1

E. Priest Dessert Richards/Harriet Diana Richards/Plas Newydd, Cardiff/Alfred, The 28th Mackintosh of Mackintosh of Moy

Origin

John (1948), London John et al. (1975)

Decorator

Pardoe?

Muss

Mackintosh 2

?

Dessert

John (1948)

London

Muss

Mackintosh 3

William Legge, 4th Earl of Dartmouth, Blakelea House, Marsden, Yorkshire

Tea and coffee

John (1948)

London

Muss

Wilde

W.T. Wilde MP

Tea and coffee

Edwards (2017), John (1948)

London

Misses Booker

Southerndownd

Dessert

John (1948)

Local

Edmunds 1

Edward Edmunds/Edwards, Nantgarw

Tea and coffee

John (1948)

Local

Billingsley

Edmunds 2

Edward Edmunds/Twyning, Nantgarw

Tea and coffee

John (1948), Hillis (2005)

Local

Billingsley

(continued)

2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain

23

Table 2.1 (continued) Service name

Original commission/association

Type

Reference

Edmunds 3

Edward Edmunds/Duncombe, Nantgarw

Tea and coffee

John (1948), Local John et al. (1975)

Billingsley

Edmunds 4

Edward Edmunds, Nantgarw

Tea and coffee

Renton (2003), John (1948)

Local

Billingsley

Sir John Williams

Sir John & Lady Williams, Aberystwyth

Dessert

Edwards (2017)

London

de Junic

Brace

William Brace MP, Risca

Dessert

Edwards (2017)

London

Farnley Hall

William Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, Otley

Dinner-dessert

Edwards (2017)

London

Cardiff Castle

John Crichton-Stuart, Marquess of Bute, Cardiff Castle

Dinner-dessert

John (1948), London John et al. (1975)

Origin

Spence-Thomas

Spence-Thomas family

Breakfast

John et al. (1975) Local

Lady Seaton

?

Dinner-dessert

Edwards (2017)

London

George, Prince Regent

Ernest Augustus, Duke of Cumberland

Tea and coffee

John (1948), Jewitt (1878), Turner (1897)

Local

Duke of Cambridge

Prince Regent/Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge

Dinner-dessert

John et al. (1975), Edwards (2017)

London

Duke of Gloucester

Prince Regent/William, Duke of Gloucester

Tea and coffee

John et al. (1975), Edwards (2017)

London

Lord Kenyon 1

George, 2nd Baron Kenyon of Gredington

Tea and coffee

Edwards (2017), London John et al. (1975)

Lord Kenyon 2

George, 2nd Baron Kenyon of Gredington

Dinner-dessert

John (1948), Bonhamsc

Theodore Ellis

Theodore & Mary Ellis, Worcester, USA

Dinner-dessert

John et al. (1975) London

Duchess of Richmond

Charles Gordon Lennox, Dessert 5th Duke of Richmond, Goodwood House, Chichester

Edwards (2017)

London

Marquess of Bute 1

John Crichton Stuart, Marquess of Bute Cardiff Castle

Dessert

Morton Nance (1942)

Local

Marquess of Bute 2

John Crichton Stuart, Marquess of Bute Cardiff Castle

Dinner-dessert

Morton Nance (1942)

Local

Decorator

de Junic

Pardoe Billingsley

London

(continued)

24

2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

Table 2.1 (continued) Service name

Original commission/association

Type

Reference

Origin

Marquess of Bute 3

John Crichton Stuart, Marquess of Bute Cardiff Castle

Dinner-dessert

Morton Nance (1942), Turner (1897)

Local

Duke of Norfolk 1

Henry Charles Howard, 13th Duke of Norfolk, Earl of Surrey, Arundel Castle

Dinner-dessert

Morton Nance (1942)

London

Duke of Norfolk 2

Henry Charles Howard, 13th Duke of Norfolk, Earl of Surrey, Arundel Castle

Dinner-dessert

Morton Nance (1942)

London

Duke of Newcastle Henry Pelham-Clinton, 4th Duke of Newcastle-under Lyme, Clumber Park, Nottingham

Dinner-dessert

Morton Nance (1942)

London

Earl Spencer

George Spencer-Churchill, 5th Duke of Marlborough, Althorp House, Northants

Dinner-dessert

John et al. (1975) London

Ferguson

?

Dinner-dessert

Edwards (2017), John et al. (1975), Renton (2003)

Local

Princess Charlotte

Charlotte, Princess Royal, London

Cabaret

Morton Nance (1942)

London

Hensol Castle

William Talbot, 1st Earl Talbot/Benjamin Hall

Breakfast

Morton Nance (1942)

Local

Usk Priory

E Priest Richards

Dessert

John et al. (1975) Local

Pardoe

Ewenny Priory 1

Richard Turbervill Picton/Turbervill

Dessert

Edwards (2017)

Local

Pardoe

Ewenny Priory 2

Richard Turbervill Picton/Turbervill

Dessert

Edwards (2017)

Local

Pardoe

Young

William Weston Young, Preswylfa, Neath

Tea and coffee

John et al. (1975) Local

Young

Marquess of Anglesey Henry Paget, Marquess of Anglesey

Tea and coffee

John et al. (1975) London

Earl of Jersey

George Villiers, 5th Earl Dessert of Jersey, Briton Ferry

John (1948), London John et al. (1975)

Mortlock 1

King George IV/John Mortlock, London

Morton Nance (1942)

Dinner-dessert

Decorator

Pardoe

London (continued)

2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain

25

Table 2.1 (continued) Service name

Original commission/association

Type

Reference

Origin

Mortlock 2

John Mortlock, London

Dinner-dessert

Turner (1897), Morton Nance (1942)

London

Llangattock

John Rolls, The Hendre, Tea and coffee Monmouth

Edwards (2017)

Local

Pardoe

Aberpergwm 1

William Williams, Aberpergwm House, Neath

Dessert

John (1948)

Local

Pardoe

Aberpergwm 2

Marie Jane Williams, Aberpergwm House, Neath

Dessert

John (1948)

Local

Pardoe

William Williams

Rev. William Williams, ?e Cowbridge and Llandaff

Gartre’n Ol (2019)

Local

Young

Decorator

a The assignment of the origin of the commission of the service listed here is based upon the designated recipient

or family: for the most part the originator is not precisely known in the absence of manufactory records and most named services, therefore, have acquired their nomenclature from the dispersal of family effects upon an inheritance or their sale afterwards. Very few services still remain in their original family ownership and that of descendants: a rare example is the Farnley Hall dinner-dessert service of Nantgarw porcelain at Farnley Hall, Otley, Yorkshire (G. Horton -Fawkes Esq.) b This superscript signifies an armorial service which displays one or more heraldic symbols enabling the identification of the individual arms-bearing member of the family who commissioned the service originally to be accomplished potentially more rigidly. There are 7 armorial services known for Nantgarw c According to the background information supplied at sale by Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, New Bond Street, London (courtesy of Fergus Gambon, Director of British Ceramics). d A rather mysterious entry in Dr John’s book (Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) refers to the Misses Booker of Southerndown who possessed “several Nantgarw services”. A diligent search by the author has failed to uncover the identity of the Misses Booker, although they are reported as being active in local community affairs in Southerndown in the early part of the twentieth century. However, Richard Blakemore (1775–1855) was cited by William Weston Young as a supporter of the Nantgarw China Works in his Diaries (WW Young, Diaries, 1830; Edwards 2019). Initially, Francis Homfray developed a water/corn mill at Melingriffith in 1749 and started the manufacture of tinplate there with Messrs. Harford & Partridge. Richard Blakemore acquired the Melingriffith Ironworks on the Glamorgan Canal at Taffs Well, just some three miles from Nantgarw, in 1810 and it prospered rapidly under his direction into the largest tinplate works in the world, producing some 100,000 tons per annum, and he then diversified into sheet iron production at Pentyrch Forge, building tramways between the two sites. His home was Velindre House, overlooking the Glamorgan Canal and the Nantgarw China Works and he also had a seat at The Leys in Monmouthshire. He became High Sheriff of Glamorgan in 1826. His sister, Ann, married the Rev. Luke Booker, Chaplain to the Prince Regent, and he adopted his nephew, Thomas Booker (1801–1858), who inherited the Melingriffith estate until his death in 1858. Thomas Booker’s son, also Thomas, acquired the estate in the name of Thomas Booker-Blakemore and in 1872, there were then 12 tinplate and sheet iron mills operating there, trading as T.W. Booker and Co. It is clear that Richard Blakemore would have had ample opportunity to acquire some of the Nantgarw porcelain being manufactured literally in his sight from Velindre and that this would probably have been passed on to the Misses Booker descendants—it seems therefore that the Nantgarw services possessed by the Misses Booker would most probably have originated with their ancestor Richard Blakemore, a confirmed Nantgarw China Works supporter, and it is sad that these have now lost their provenance and have become anonymous

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2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

Table 2.1 (continued) There are 53 named services in Nantgarw porcelain. Of these, 7 are armorials, which represent 14% of the named Nantgarw services. Some 11 named Nantgarw services (20%) have no basis in documentary history for ascribing their original attribution and they exist in this list because previous ceramics historians have mentioned them in the literature or because they have been recorded at some time later as being in the possession of their named owners at that time; of these, the Mackintosh 2, Brace, Spence-Thomas, Lady Seaton(Nantgarw), Kenyon and Ferguson services are well-known from their characteristic patterns. One should also be aware that any armorial or heraldic emblem borne by a named service might not actually be truly representative of that particular arms-bearing family unless it has passed through a formal inheritance, otherwise the armorial may not be truly representative of the nominated owner who may have acquired the service later and it has then really become an associated named service (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022) The services marked? signifies that the original commission is unknown, e.g. the Lady Seaton service. Some three named services are placed in this category, namely, the Mackintosh 2, the Lady Seaton and the Ferguson services e The Rev. William Williams, Master of the Free School at Cowbridge in 1797, Rector of St Mary Hill and Prebendary at Llandaff Cathedral form 1810, commissioned a set of plates bearing local scenes and others of importance to him in Nantgarw porcelain and decorated by William Weston Young; eight of these are in the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, with scenes of The Church of St Mary Hill Coychurch, The Free School Cowbridge, Dolgellau, Cadair Idris, Llandaff Cathedral, an unidentified church, an unidentified church, and Cowbridge Church (Andrew Renton, personal communication to the author). It is not known if these plates comprise a specific set of commissioned cabinet plates or the survivors of a service

Southerndown) and the other, the Baron Phipps of Normanby service, so resembles the simple quality gilding and execution of its crested armorial congener, the Homfray of Penllyne Castle service, that it could well have been accomplished locally by William Billingsley locally also. It is now believed that the Hensol Castle service was also decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe. • The distribution of service type from Table 2.1 is as follows: tea and coffee 13, comprising 8 locally and 5 London decorated, with 36 combined dinner-dessert and dessert services (16 locally decorated and 20 London decorated), 2 breakfast services ( both locally decorated); another was designated a cabaret service commissioned by Princess Charlotte, presumably from Mortlock’s in London, and a further service, possibly better classified as a cabinet service that may have been designated for display rather than household usage, was commissioned by the Rev, William Williams of Cowbridge and Llandaff, decorated with scenes by William Weston Young (see Chap. 4 and Appendix A). • The 27 named Nantgarw services that have been identified as being locally decorated cover dinner-dessert, breakfast and tea and coffee services: 23 of these can be attributed to a local artist and these comprise 6 tea and coffee and 1 dinner-dessert services that have been attributed to William Billingsley’s decoration, 1 tea and coffee service to William Weston Young who also decorated the dessert/cabinet service of the Rev William Williams, and 14 to Thomas Pardoe (11 dinner-dessert services, 1 tea service and 1 breakfast service), including the Hensol Castle service.

2.1 The Decoration and Enamelling of Nantgarw Porcelain

27

Fig. 2.5 Nantgarw porcelain, dessert plate, ca. 1817–1820, diameter, locally decorated and attributed to William Billingsley, with a border band of brown copper beech leaves and a simple gilt rim, diameter 21.8 cm. Marked NANT-GARW C.W. impressed. In a Private Collection

• The London decorated services comprise 20 dinner-dessert services and 5 tea and coffee services with 1 cabaret/boudoir service for Princess Charlotte as mentioned above. • The 2 services marked in the table with a Local (?) symbol comprise those that have been illustrated in the literature, namely the Henry Wyndham and Baron Phipps but about which there is a paucity of information about their sourcing, and one other that has been referred to by Dr William John (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) but without a description or an illustration, namely the Miss/Mrs Booker of Southerndown service, which is most likely to be attributed geographically to a locally decorated service. As discussed above, the similarity in execution and quality of gilding of the Baron Phipps of Normanby armorial service to the Homfray of Penllyne Castle service certainly marks it as a very serious contender for being potentially the work of William Billingsley. The detailed analysis of the distribution of the named services in Table 2.1 belies the earlier comment that most (> 90%) of the Nantgarw production was intended for the London retail salerooms of John Mortlock with the ratio of London decorated to locally decorated named services standing at 26:27 including the Baron Phipps and Wyndham services as being locally decorated. The remaining named “service” is the cabaret set designated for Princess Charlotte. The implication is that, excluding the named service commissions received directly at the Nantgarw China Works and decorated locally there by William Billingsley much of the local decoration in this category (about 50%) can be attributed to Thomas Pardoe, numerically 13 from 27 of

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2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

Fig. 2.6 Nantgarw porcelain, coffee cup with heart-shaped handle, unmarked, height 6.3 cm, diameter of cup at rim 7.3 cm, height to the top of handle 8.5 cm, from the Spence-Thomas breakfast service, locally decorated by Thomas Pardoe with a wreath of garden flowers, ca. 1820–1822. Reproduced by the courtesy of the Rev. Jim Dickinson, Chesterfield

the definitive examples. This means that the remnant stocks of Nantgarw porcelain that were available for decoration after the departure of Billingsley and Walker for Coalport in 1820 must have been considerable: we know from William Weston Young’s Diaries that Pardoe was working right up to the auction sale dates to decorate the remnant porcelain (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847), 2019; Young, William Weston, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). Even after the departure of William Weston Young from Nantgarw in 1822, it is recorded that Thomas Pardoe, assisted by his son, William Henry Pardoe, continued to decorate the porcelain stock remaining until Thomas Pardoe died in July of 1823. Presumably this last portion of decorated and undecorated porcelain stock was then disposed of locally, but there is no record of a further auction sale at this point (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942). This survey of Nantgarw porcelain decoration is material for the correct placement of the detailed research that has been undertaken into the Farnley Hall service which will now follow and will be instrumental in the attempt to assign it to local decoration or to a London decorating atelier (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). However, it is also very relevant here to consider the materials used in the production of Nantgarw porcelain and the complex reactions that are undergone in the kiln under high temperature firing; the losses incurred at Nantgarw during the manufacturing process certainly contributed to its scarcity in

2.2 The Raw Materials in Porcelain Synthesis: Their Sourcing, Mineralogy …

29

the early 1800s and to its rarity today and to a large extent these can be back-tracked to the chemical changes that occurred in the kiln.

2.2 The Raw Materials in Porcelain Synthesis: Their Sourcing, Mineralogy and Composition The raw materials that have been used to manufacture porcelain historically seem to be straightforward to understand at first but the area is actually a minefield which is compromised by the incorrect usage of descriptors and by an often rather loose terminology which compounds the problem of identification for later researchers (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021). For example, Lewis Dillwyn FRS, proprietor of the Swansea China Works, recognised the ambiguous terminology of the descriptor for alabaster that seemingly was applied indiscriminately to both calcium sulfate dihydrate and to calcite components by ceramics manufacturers with often woeful results for their production process. The most difficult concept for early ceramics manufacturers to understand was the nature of the thermal reactions that were undergone by their raw materials in the kiln upon reaching the elevated operating temperatures: the manufacturers certainly had the correct idea that they should use starting materials of the highest purity available to them at that time but they were unable to control other key factors, some of which would have been recognised by them empirically through the practical knowledge acquired by their predecessors. A brief coverage of the commonly used raw materials in porcelain synthesis at Nantgarw will now follow and some of the pitfalls that exist in the interpretation of the recipes that were used will be highlighted. Clays: The term “clay” is geologically very indefinite and is an excellent example of a general terminology which covers many possibilities from the basic primary clays (formed by the in situ geological degradation of feldspars) and secondary clays (formed as sediments after their transportation and eventual geological deposition some distance from their source) which themselves differ in their chemical composition depending upon their geographical and geological sources. Clays do possess apparently well-defined descriptors found in the general ceramics literature, such as ball clay, china clay and kaolin but these can actually hide several possibilities. All clays are hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates and some have precise chemical formulations whereas others are of an indefinite composition because of their ability to intercalate other metallic ions from their surrounding geological environments such as Mg2+ , Ca2+ , Fe2+ , Fe3+ , Na+ and K+ and many others too, such as Ti4+ , Ni2+ and Mn4+ , which can be detected using modern analytical equipment. Primary clays are generally formed geologically from the degradation of volcanic ash and basalts upon exposure to marine environments and primarily are formed through the hydrothermal weathering of basalts emerging from undersea volcanic vents. In contrast, secondary

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2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

clays are formed geologically from the terrestrial hydrothermal weathering of granite and feldspars. Professor Victor Owen in an excellent article (Owen 2002) has summarised this structural situation in particular for clays, wherein he has indicated that clays can actually be divided into five distinct groups of minerals, namely, kandites (e.g. kaolinite, bentonite), illites (e.g. illite, celadonite), smectites (e.g. montmorillonite, saponite), palygorskites (e.g. sepiolite) and vermiculite. In other more geologically themed articles, vermiculite is defined as a smectite and not as a separate entity. Another way of defining clays is based upon the tertiary structural assembly of their sheets of silicate (Si–O) and aluminate (Al–O) components: the prime structural feature of a clay involves the linking of sheets of tetrahedral SiO4 units to sheets of octahedral AlO6 units through strong O…H–O hydrogen bonded entities or more weakly bonding H2 O molecules that are intercalated between the individual sheets. Generally, at room temperature the weakly bonded H2 O molecules permit an easy slippage to occur between the sheets of silica and alumina, which gives the clay its plasticity when wet: after being fired, however, the weakly bound water molecules have been removed and the stronger interlayer hydrogen bonds then take over, which gives the fired clay its rigidity and strength. There are three different physico-chemical descriptions of the intersheet layer structures in clays, namely, silica:alumina in 1:1 and 2:1 symmetric arrangements and also in a random arrangement. Primary clays such as kaolinite have a symmetric 1:1 silica:alumina layer structure which is often paraphrased as T–O (Tetrahedral–Octahedral, see above), whereas secondary clays such as illite, montmorillonite and talc have a 2:1 symmetric arrangement written as T–O–T, where T refers to the tetrahedral structure within the layer and O is the octahedral intralayer structure. The third type of clay structure is the random asymmetric arrangement of tetrahedral and octahedral layer arrangements exemplified by groups of clays known as the allophanes, which have a general formulation of Al2 O3 .2SiO2 .H2 O or less specifically as Al2 O3 (SiO2 )1.3-2 .2.5-3H2 O. A fourth type of clay structure actually exists in terms of the arrangement of adjacent layers and is exemplified by chlorite, which is represented formulaically as (MgFe)3 (SiAl)4 O10 (OH)2 (MgFe)3 (OH)6 , which has a 2:2 arrangement wherein an Mg2+ and Fe2+ octahedral layer is interspersed between two silica tetrahedral layers and an alumina octahedral layer. Chlorite is normally found to occur along with brucite, which supplies the magnesium hydroxide in an octahedral form suitable for its structural incorporation into the clay structure. A list of these clay types and their classification is provided in Table 2.2. Many clays have metal ions which have been incorporated into their host silica and alumina layer matrices from their surrounding environments: for example, vermiculite has taken Mg2+ and Fe2+ in substitution for Al3+ , montmorillonite has Mg2+ replacing Al3+ , biedellite has Al3+ replacing Si4+ , nontronite has Fe3+ replacing Al3+ , and saponite has Al 3+ and K+ replacing Si4+ . Often these ionic substitutions result in a charge imbalance in the clay and this affords the take-up and absorption of further ions from the environment: this property gave rise to the common practice adopted by porcelain manufacturers of washing their clays thoroughly before use as raw materials to leach out some of these adsorbed ions that it was recognised could interfere with the outcome of the firing process, particularly for the removal of

2.2 The Raw Materials in Porcelain Synthesis: Their Sourcing, Mineralogy …

31

Table 2.2 Clays, their categories, divisions and chemical formulae Clay

Alternative name

Type

Division

Chemical formula

Kaolinite

Kaolin China clay

Primary

Kandite

Al2 Si2 O5 (OH)4

Primary

Kandite

Al2 Na2 Si4 O12 .H2 O

Bentonite Illite

Mica Sericite

Secondary Illite

KAl(AlMgFe)2 (SiAl)4 O10 (OH)2 .H2 O

Muscovite

Isinglass Mica

Secondary Illite

K2 (Al2 O3 )3 (SiO2 )6 .H2 O

Talc

Kyanite

Secondary Smectite

Mg3 Si4 O10 (OH)2

Pyrophillite

Secondary Smectite

Al2 Si4 O10 (OH)2

Paragonite

Secondary Smectite

NaAl2 (AlSi3 O10 )(OH)2

Celadonite

Secondary

KMgx FeII 1−x FeIII y Al1−y Si4 O10 (OH)2

Saponite

Secondary

Ca0.25 (MgFe)3 SiAl4 O10 (OH)2 .2H2 O

Nontronite

Secondary

(CaNaO0.5 )0.3 FeIII 2 (SiAl)4 O10 (OH)2 .nH2 O

Sepiolite

Meerschaum Secondary Smectite Ecume de mer Aphrodite

Mg4 Si6 O15 (OH)2 .6H2 O

(MgFeII FeIII )3 (AlSi4 O10 )(OH)2 .4H2 O

Vermiculite

Secondary Vermiculite

Palygorskite Fuller’s earth Allapulgite

Secondary Palygorskite (MgAl)2 Si4 O10 (OH).4H2 O

Biedellite

Secondary Smectite

NaAl4 Si7 Al7 O20 (OH)4 .nH2 O

Chlorite

Secondary Smectite

(MgFe)3 (SiAl)4 O10 (OH)2 (MgFe)3 (OH)6

Allophane

Secondary Smectite

Al2 O3 (SiO2 )1.3–2 .2.5-3H2 O

Halloysite

Secondary Smectite

Al2 Si2 O3 (OH)4

Chamosite

Secondary Smectite

(FeMg)5 Al(Si3 Al)O10 (OH)8

excess iron deposits which might colour the resulting ceramic substrate upon firing. In particular, ball clays can comprise many different types of clay and their uptake of metal ions can be reflected in a wide range of colours: the blue clays used in English porcelain manufacture were ball clays from Dorset which were prized for their incorporation in admixture along with kaolinite to confer a desirable plasticity on the porcelain paste for its moulding into artefacts. Often, a mixture of primary and secondary (ball) clays was adopted by manufacturers to facilitate a greater plasticity in the throwing of the pottery or moulding of the porcelain paste. This combination of clays was critical and the use of kaolin (china clay) was beneficial for porcelains, although the earliest European porcelains did not use kaolin per se until it was discovered to be present in the imported Chinese hard paste porcelains through the activity of Pere Xavier d’Entrecolles SJ of the Peking mission who in 1717 and later in 1722 informed the Jesuits in Paris of the Chinese use of kaolin and petuntse, a type of Chinese feldspathic stone. The discovery of

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2 The Manufacture and Decoration of Nantgarw Porcelain

local European sources of high quality kaolin clays soon followed at St Austell in Cornwall, England, St Yrieux near Limoges, France and at Ebengebirge in Saxony. This proved to be critical for the growth of European porcelain manufactories in competition with China. Again, it would have been almost impossible for ceramics manufacturers to predict the composition of their clays before the advent of chemical analysis, which after all are natural geological mixtures of raw materials, but they got around this obvious problem by using the same mines wherever possible for their source of clays. When the particular mining operation ceased to function or when the deposits became worked out it generally proved to be a disaster for the ceramics industry concerned and a noted case of this occurred at Limehouse when its source of ball clay from Kynance Cove in Cornwall dried up in mid-1747 and by early 1748 the manufactory had closed down (Ramsay et al., The Limehouse Porcelain Factory: Its Output, Antecedents and the Influence of the Royal Society of London on the Evolution of English Porcelain Based on Composition and Technology, 2013). An interesting tale emerges around the person of Andrew Duche, who noticed in the early years of the 18th Century that the Cherokee Indians in the vicinity of Charleston, South Carolina, where he was based, had adopted the use of a very fine quality local white clay for making their pottery. He investigated and was impressed by what he saw of their earthenware manufacturing process, eventually acquiring specimens of the Cherokee clay and bringing them to London, where it is alleged that he managed to interest the founding proprietors of the Bow porcelain manufactory, Edward Heylyn and Thomas Frye, in its use for their manufacture of Bow porcelain (Ramsay and Ramsay 2008). They immediately took out a patent for this Cherokee clay, called unaker, which was not duly credited by several modern observers until Ross and Gael Ramsay went to the Carolinas personally and sought out the source of this ephemeral clay, which indeed does exist and analyses as a very high quality kaolin! So, this tale illustrates that even before the days of analytical chemical science, the appearance and sourcing of a fine white “potter’s clay” could be appreciated by the ceramics connoisseur and erstwhile founders of porcelain manufactories. Sand: Generally, porcelain manufacturers would seek to use the finest white river sand which was low in its iron oxide content, Fe2 O3 , as this would confer a yellowish cast upon the fired porcelain. Others would add a small quantity of smalt, a synthetic cobalt oxide glass, which is blue in colour and often represented as Co2 O3 .nSiO2 , which reflects its variable chemical composition; the blue smalt would effectively remove the appearance of a yellow cast colour from fired porcelains attributed to the presence of iron (III) oxide. Note that smalt is a term which is often used interchangeably and incorrectly with another synthetic blue glass, Bristol blue, which is a cobalt aluminosilicate, represented as Co2 AlO4 .nSiO2 (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021). Smalt could comprise a compositional range which varied between 10 and 15% of cobalt oxide. River sand was the preferential choice for a raw material as it is already finely divided and could be used directly in the preparation of an initial frit for porcelains: the transportation of fine white river sand to a manufactory site over some considerable distance was often undertaken. For example, William Duesbury of the Derby

2.2 The Raw Materials in Porcelain Synthesis: Their Sourcing, Mineralogy …

33

China Works and William Billingsley of the Nantgarw China Works both imported selectively their river sand from East Anglia and flints from either the Isle of Wight or East Anglia (Anderson 1991, 2000). The manufacture of earthenware did not impose such a stringent requirement upon the raw materials and the characteristic terracotta red colour of earthenwares was due to iron oxide in the local sand sources used. Stonewares, on the other hand, fall between porcelain and terracottas in this respect and generally higher quality river sands were used in their manufacture. Bone ash: In the mid-18th Century a new ingredient found its way into English soft-paste porcelain synthesis in the form of bone ash: it is believed that as bones conferred some rigidity and strength to the human or animal skeleton then they would similarly assist in making porcelain more robust. The preferred bone for this purpose was that of an ox or cow, followed by horse, and their ready availability from slaughterhouses was seen as an advantage (Anderson 1991, 2000). Of chemical formulation Ca5 (PO4 )3 OH, bone ash is described as calcium hydroxyapatite or pentacalcium triphosphate hydroxide. Its pre-preparation for use in porcelain synthesis is critical and both William Duesbury at Derby and William Billingsley at Nantgarw placed great importance upon its calcination at temperatures in excess of 1000 °C to volatilise any organic matter followed by its very fine pulverisation and grinding afterwards to facilitate its composition in the recipe for the production of porcelain paste. After thermal calcination, it is better formulated chemically as tricalcium orthophosphate, Ca3 (PO4 )2 , also known as the mineral whitlockite. It is recorded that William Billingsley regarded the incorporation of very finely ground bone ash into his Nantgarw porcelain as an essential and highly secret ingredient: he personally supervised his local miller David Jones in this process and mixed the raw material porcelain paste himself in the basement of his home at Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, behind locked doors. Bone ash was incorporated into the synthesis of most English soft paste porcelains in the late 18th and early 19th Centuries and Josiah Spode claimed to be the first manufacturer of English bone china, taking out this patent in 1790, this soon becoming the “industry standard” and displacing soft paste phosphatic porcelains in England by the end of the first quarter of the nineteenth century. Soft paste phosphatic porcelains often contained bone ash as a significant component and Nantgarw, one of the last manufactories of highly phosphatic soft paste porcelain in the second decade of the 19th Century, contained about 40–45% of calcined bone ash as a raw material component. The requirement that a bone china must have at least 40% of calcined bone ash has caused some confusion in the generic classification of highly phosphatic soft paste porcelains, which also may contain 40% or more bone ash, synonymously as “bone china”, but the true distinction between the two is one of processing rather than of raw material content: soft paste porcelain production is a two-stage process whereby the first stage involves the thermal preparation of several raw materials in a mixture, including the calcined bone ash, into a frit which is then ground, fired and mixed with more raw materials to form the porcelain paste for the second kiln or biscuit firing. In contrast, bone china is made using just a single firing process, as was the “true” hard paste Chinese porcelain, which does not contain bone ash: the chemical reactions in the second

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firing of soft paste porcelain and the sole firing of bone china are essentially therefore very different from those of the original Chinese hard paste porcelain, where the calcium phosphate is not present at all at elevated temperatures to react with the other raw material components, for which the alkaline flux materials are also absent in the Chinese porcelain firing (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021). It is interesting that Owen and Barkla (1997) maintain from their analyses that after 1810 the Derby China Works moved over to a bone china for utilitarian wares, whilst still maintaining a phosphatic soft paste body for their figures. This shift in body classification may not have necessitated a fundamental change in raw materials composition as both needed a significantly large proportion of bone ash but certainly a major change in processing conditions would have been essential. This can therefore be correlated with the statement that has been propounded in the literature that Robert Bloor, upon assuming the proprietorship of the Derby China Works in the early 19th Century, did not amend the body composition of his porcelain paste, yet connoisseurs have noted that Derby porcelain from about 1810 or so has a manifestly different glaze-substrate appearance resulting in a craquelure effect which suggests that a mismatch is occurring between the glaze and body (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). A similar situation prevails for the Nantgarw porcelain stock remnants that were decorated and glazed by William Weston Young and Thomas Pardoe after the departure of William Billingsley and Samuel Walker in 1820, since Young and Pardoe were unaware of Billingsley’s glaze composition (the so-called Nantgarw No. 1 glaze) and the glaze used by them from 1820 (the Nantgarw No. 2 glaze) can be clearly recognised now for its creamier appearance and different, thinner texture. Analytically, it has recently been shown that the Nantgarw No. 1 glaze and the Nantgarw No. 2 glaze can be differentiated non-destructively from their molecular spectral signatures (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021), which can be used to reinforce the expert opinion scientifically regarding the sourcing of the glaze. Flints: The use of flints or chalcedony, a highly pure form of silica, was advocated in many manufactories and again the Lynn gravel beds of East Anglia and sources in the Isle of Wight were particularly favoured by William Billingsley as a source of his flint raw material for porcelain synthesis. Alkaline flux: The addition of an alkaline component to promote fusibility at high temperature was well known. The inclusion of calcite, dolomite or dolomitic limestone as a raw material component to provide a local contribution of alkaline calcia or magnesia upon heating in the kiln was used by some manufacturers but was deplored by others, such as Lewis Weston Dillwyn at Swansea, on account of the generation of gas bubbles of carbon dioxide that were released in the thermal chemical decomposition of the minerals in the kiln which would detract from the translucency of the resulting ceramic—and this decrease in visual light transmission was critical for the appearance of the fired products in porcelain synthesis. Hence, most porcelain manufacturers used lime or magnesia as their alkaline additive to aid fusibility, thereby avoiding the generation of bubbles in their body paste in the firing process. Most

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manufacturers also added an alkaline flux in the form of soda ash and/or potash, which were obtained from the thermal decomposition of terrestrial or marine plant and vegetable matter or seaweed. The ash formed from the burning of terrestrial plants is potassium rich whereas that obtained from the burning of kelp or seaweed is sodium rich: the soda ash and potash component derivatives for porcelain raw materials are, therefore, of rather indefinite composition and were very dependent upon the source of the calcined ash, although both contained soda and potash in varying relative amounts. At Nantgarw, analysis of the body paste indicates that the ratio of potash to soda ash is about 5:1, significantly different from that found at the neighbouring Swansea China Works, and points to a predominantly terrestrial source of their alkaline ash. Although potash chemically is written as potassium carbonate, K2 CO3 , and soda ash as the sodium analogue sodium carbonate, Na2 CO3 , these are idealised formulations of a very intractable raw material. Analytically, there was no means in the 18th or early 19th Centuries for manufacturers to control the chemical composition of this raw material, in common with many other components they had to use in their ceramic syntheses. We should also be aware that several alternative names were used for these raw materials at that time, for example, for potassium carbonate the alternative names of carbonate of potash, salts of tartar, pearl ash and muriate of potash were used, the latter also contained a significant proportion of potassium chloride, KCl. For sodium carbonate, also known as washing soda and simply soda crystals, there was a natural mineral alternative in trona or natron, which was obtained from saline lake deposits as a crystalline mineral formulated as Na2 CO3 .NaHCO3 .2H2 O for trona, also known as sodium sesquicarbonate; for example, this was mined as natron in ancient times by the Egyptians and Romans at Wadi El Natrun in the Western Desert in Egypt and used prolifically in their manufacture of glass and also as a desiccant in their mummification rituals. Natron is not as precisely formulated chemically as trona and contains about 83% Na2 CO3 .10H2 O (washing soda) and 17% NaHCO3 (baking soda), with small amounts of sodium chloride and sodium sulfate present. Another mineral that was occasionally used in place of soda ash was gaylussite, formulated as CaNa2 (CO3 )2 .5H2 O, which is effectively an equimolar mixture of calcium and sodium carbonates. Finally, soda ash actually contains sodium carbonate in several degrees of hydration, namely, Na2 CO3 .H2 O, Na2 CO3 .7H2 O and Na2 CO3 .10H2 O, which are all converted to the anhydrous sodium carbonate, Na2 CO3 , upon heating in the thermal kiln cycle to between 150 and 200 °C. The preferred alternative to the use of calcite as a flux was the addition of lime which had been prepared commercially using pulverised limestone CaCO3 , aragonite CaCO3 or dolomite CaMg(CO3 )2 , which had been heated to around 900 °C, whereby the carbonates decomposed thermally to calcia or magnesia, CaO or MgO, or a mixture of the two. Lime manufacture was an important production of an industrialised society as it had several uses as an agricultural additive to acid soils, as a component of mortar and cements and in combination with chlorine as a bleach for textiles. The major problem was one of transportation as lime slowly absorbs water from the atmosphere exothermally to form slaked lime which then absorbs atmospheric carbon dioxide to reconvert it into the carbonate. Depending upon the

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time elapsed between its manufacture and use in the ceramics industry and especially considering its storage and transportation in wet weather, the amount of the active alkaline principle, either CaO or MgO, in the raw material could be very variable indeed and the amount of the carbonates formed in the stored lime before usage could build up to a significant level that would be detrimental to the integrity of the prototype ceramic in the kiln charge. Glass Frit: Another common additive for early high quality porcelains was glass frit, or cullet, which was purchased as “end-of-day glass” from glass manufactories nearby: although ostensibly providing a source of silica, its purity was inaccessible to manufacturers especially when the glass mixture could contain variable amounts of crown glass (soda and potash glass) and the highly refractive lead oxide rich flint glass. Analysts now find evidence of this variability in their interpretation of the lead content of early porcelains and glazes and its potential attribution arising from a deliberate addition of lead oxide (litharge PbO, or red lead, minium, Pb3 O4 ) to the porcelain paste or to the inadvertent addition of flint glass as ground cullet, or both! Tite and Bimson (1991) recognised this particular difficulty when attempting to correlate the elemental determination of lead in a porcelain body or glaze with the amount of glass frit raw material used and Dr Michael Tite and Dr Mavis Bimson have estimated a median figure of 30% lead oxide as a component for such a glass. Grog: The other raw material of note that provided an additive for most stonewares and china was grog: again, this is an example of an additive of indeterminate composition in the 18th and 19th Centuries and it comprised porcelain shards and fragments of broken china or stonewares from other factories, usually purchased in ton quantities and transported by wagon to their new site. The reason for its use is somewhat of a mystery outside of it providing a cheap raw material but in a powdered, finely milled form it did provide a source of raw material components that had been once-fired or twice-fired ceramically, becoming wasters and then being discarded and sold on elsewhere. The major problem is that the manufacturers who were using grog from other ceramic sites literally had no idea of its composition relative to their own wares and modern analysts need to be aware of its incorporation into the specimens they are investigating. For example, the incorporation through the grog component assimilation of key elements such as Mg, P, or Pb as oxides into ceramics where their normal manufactory usage did not comply in standard recipes can cause some ambiguities when the presence in the analytical data of such elements is being discussed and compared with recipes from known examples of the genre for the same manufactory which did not perhaps incorporate grog or these elements into their formulations. It is perhaps significant that William Billingsley is not recorded as having used grog at Nantgarw and that shards or fragments of interloper porcelains, often providing archaeological evidence of their incorporation and usage in a manufactory, have not been found at the Nantgarw China Works site. Manufacturers who utilised grog in their syntheses generally recorded this fact in their recipes. Feldspar/Steatite: Finally, the inclusion of steatite and feldspar in paste formulations would provide a highly siliceous basis for the body composition: steatite (soaprock,

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soapstone, talc) is a magnesium silicate and generally the presence of magnesium oxide in an analytical determination is sufficient to suggest that steatite has been incorporated into the mixture to give a magnesian porcelain which is more robust and texturally very different from the highly phosphatic porcelains that it replaced. Feldspar on the other hand resembles the petuntse used in the Chinese hard paste porcelain formulations: although petuntse is not found in the West it is a feldspathic rock which is close formulaically to the china stone of Cornwall and other feldspars in chemical composition. There is no doubt that the discovery of kaolin clay and china stone feldspar in close proximity to each other at St Austell in Cornwall, which has been attributed to William Cookworthy, founder of the Plymouth hard paste porcelain manufactory in 1768, gave a major boost to English porcelain synthesis in the mid-18th Century (Church, English Porcelain: A Handbook to the China Made in England During the Eighteenth Century as Illustrated by Specimens Found Chiefly in the National Collections, 1894; Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from the Prehistoric Times Down to the Present Day, Vols. I and II, 1878). Ramsay and Ramsay (2008) give an excellent account of the differentiation between petuntse and the alternative forms of china stone used in porcelain synthesis and their importance in the first syntheses of English hard paste porcelains in simulation of the Chinese imports. Minor additives: Other minor additives were often invoked to increase the plasticity of the paste, to reinforce the alkalinity of the pre-fired body mixture or to ensure that excess iron (III) oxide in the sand used as a raw material did not materially affect the colour of the resultant fired porcelain or stonewares. These additives include borax, Na2 B4 O7 .10H2 O, white arsenic, As2 O3 and smalt, a potassium cobalt silicate glass of indefinite chemical composition and containing up to 18% cobalt oxide in a 70% silicaceous matrix. Again, although a common practice at contemporary English manufactories and used by Lewis Dillwyn at the neighbouring Swansea China Works there is no record of these ever having been used at Nantgarw according to the accepted recipe that was revealed later. There is no doubt that the empiricism engendered by the trials and experiments that were undertaken by the manufactory proprietors did work well practically for their porcelain syntheses despite their lack of knowledge about what reactions were taking place at the high kiln temperatures. These are now understood in terms of the ternary elemental oxide diagrams constructed by technologists and solid state ceramic scientists which have identified the critical liquidus regions which have to be attained with precise compositions and kiln temperature controls, both of which were outside the required precision operating in the 18th and early 19th Centuries. As an example, the ternary elemental oxide diagram drawn by Professor Victor Owen and Robin Barkla in their studies of Derby porcelain (Owen and Barkla 1997) is reproduced here in modified form in Fig. 2.7, from which some important deductions can be made which reflect on the potentially heavy kiln losses experienced by William Duesbury in the late 18th Century. This was the period when Billingsley was apprenticed to Duesbury at the Derby China Works, and then latterly chief decorator at Derby, and also later by William Billingsley and Samuel Walker between

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Fig. 2.7 Ternary elemental oxide diagram for Derby porcelain ca. 1790, simplified and adapted from Owen and Barkla (1997). The three apices represent alumina (A, Al2 O3 ), silica (S, SiO2 ) and tricalcium phosphate (C3 P, whitlockite, Ca3 (PO4 )2 ) and the melt phase is characterised by the region designated CaAl2 Si2 O8 (anorthite). The region designated Al2 Si2 O5 represents mullite and the SiO2 region comprises the minerals tridymite and cristobalite, the high temperature stable polymorphs of silica. The approximate composition of the porcelain melt phase here is determined as (Ca3 (PO4 )2 )30 (Al2 O3 )23 (SiO2 )47

1817 and 1820, which eventually contributed to the closure and bankruptcy of their Nantgarw China Works in 1820 (Owen et al. 1998; Owen and Morrison 1999). The three apices of the ternary phase diagram in Fig. 2.7 represent alumina (A, Al2 O3 ), silica (S, SiO2 ) and tricalcium phosphate (C3 P, whitlockite, Ca3 (PO4 )2 ) and the melt phase is characterised by the region designated CaAl2 Si2 O8 (anorthite). The region designated Al2 Si2 O5 represents the mineral mullite and the SiO2 region comprises the minerals tridymite and cristobalite, the high temperature stable polymorphs of silica. The approximate composition of the porcelain melt phase here at the eutectic is determined as (Ca3 (PO4 )2 )30 (Al2 O3 )23 (SiO2 )47 . The corresponding ternary phase diagram for Nantgarw porcelain with the three nodes for anorthite (CaAl2 Si2 O8 ), silica (SiO2 ) and tricalcium phosphate (Ca3 (PO4 )2 ) is shown in Owen and Morrison (1999), which has been derived from the work of St Pierre (1954, 1955). This ternary diagram is more complex than the one discussed for Derby porcelain as it really represents a quaternary diagram with a fourth apex of temperature. In Owen and Morrison’s work the Nantgarw shard compositions appear as circles, crosses, squares and triangles, the former representing the analytical data obtained from fragments of sagged porcelain or overfired shards. All are grouped within a general elemental oxide composition of silica (43–45%), calcia (21–23%), phosphorus pentoxide (16–18%) and alumina (12–13%) with minor potash (2–3%) and traces of soda (< 0.5%). The kiln losses at Nantgarw have been

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estimated from contemporary observers to be in excess of 90%, which rendered the production process uneconomical, whereby only one in every ten pieces fired is fit for sale. The crux of the matter it is now realised was centred on the kiln temperature control to preserve the liquidus region in the ternary phase diagram, outside of which the prototype porcelain paste is incompletely fused and under-fired, or alternatively over-fired and sagged, in which the pieces lose their integrity of moulding and become misshapen. Kiln control is absolutely critical for high-temperature fired porcelains and stonewares: not only must the high temperature be achieved and maintained within narrow temperature limits for approximately four days, but the temperature ramp (measured in degrees C per minute) in the heating and cooling regimes of the thermal cycle over a two day period for each process is also critical. The positioning of the artefacts in the kiln is also critically important: even with the centuries-long kiln firing experience of the Chinese potters, it was recognised that porcelain qualities after firing could be affected by compositional and kiln positional changes: the Emperor Kangxi recorded that the finest quality porcelains made at Jingdezhen were in a compositional ratio of kaolin:petuntse of 1:1, whereas the less fine porcelains adopted ratios of kaolin:petuntse of 1:2 and 1:3. It can also be appreciated that with a typical dragon kiln charge at Jingdezhen of 25,000 pieces then the range of temperatures experienced within different parts of the kiln would be a critical factor in the product quality outcome. Despite the Chinese experience of porcelain manufacture, contemporary visitors to the Imperial porcelain manufactory at Jingdezhen in the 18th Century noted the large piles of waste fragments and damaged porcelain at the site which were ascribed to kiln wastage. For both the Derby and Nantgarw phosphatic porcelain bodies, the ternary phase diagrams for the Ca3 (PO4 )2 –Al2 O3 –SiO2 composition system, which are based upon the earlier work of St Pierre (1954, 1955), indicate that the phosphatic porcelain shards are grouped mid-way between the tricalcium phosphate and silica nodes and approximately three-quarters of the way along the alumina and silica axis. The analytical compositional data for modern bone china shards occupy an area near the eutectic region in the Derby phase diagram, which is rather closer to the alumina node on the alumina-silica axis but is located in a similar tricalcium phosphate-silica regime. Owen and Barkla (1997) also noted the appearance of “blebs”, small blisters found on the ceramic surface of the Derby porcelain shards, which have an enriched silicaceous composition that is significantly deficient in tricalcium phosphate and alumina. In a similar study of Nantgarw porcelains a more complex phase diagram is used wherein the three apices represent alumina (A, Al2 O3 ), silica (S, SiO2 ) and tricalcium phosphate (C3 P, whitlockite, Ca3 (PO4 )2 ) wherein the melt phase is still characterised by the region designated CaAl2 Si2 O8 (anorthite) but a fourth axis is now temperature. Because of the highly phosphatic composition of the Nantgarw porcelain body at high temperatures the formation of a calcic plagioclase phase, namely anorthite, Ca2 Al2 Si2 O8 , is a critical feature of the kiln firing and strictly this component should also form another node in a tetrahedral three-dimensional phase diagram but it was substituted for the alumina node. In their papers on Nantgarw porcelains, Owen et al. (1998) and Owen and Morrison (1999) have used ternary phase diagrams with nodes of tricalcium phosphate, silica and anorthite to account for this and have included

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a fourth dimensional diagrammatic feature of temperature, from which they were able to derive novel information about the maximum kiln temperatures that needed to be achieved for the different paste compositions and to better define the role of the effect of excessive kiln temperatures upon the sagging and loss of shape of the Nantgarw porcelain artefacts. They were thus able to determine that the preferential melt phase temperature for Nantgarw porcelain was achieved in the range 1380– 1400 °C and that hypereutectic melting produced sagged artefacts at a temperature greater than 1430 °C, which is believed to be the maximum achievable temperature of the Nantgarw biscuit kiln. The composition of the Nantgarw porcelain body in the melt phase at the eutectic form the ternary phase diagram was determined to be (Ca3 (PO4 )2 )30 (Al2 O3 )23 (SiO2 )47 .

2.3 Mineral Formation Identified at the Kiln Temperatures The first thing that comes to the attention of researchers of ceramics manufacture is that the chemical composition of the raw materials used in the paste formulations for earthenwares, stonewares and porcelains bears little resemblance to the final mineralogical composition of the fired ceramic. This is to be expected because of the complexity of the chemical reactions that occur at high temperature which are undergone at the highest kiln temperature and these will be dependent upon several factors: these factors will include the length of time taken to achieve the final kiln temperature, the time that the piece being fired is being maintained at the final elevated temperature and the composition of the micro domains that comprise the heterogeneous mixture held at that temperature, which themselves depend upon the effectiveness of the original grinding efficiency of the component raw materials— basically, the finer the ground frit used in the paste manufacture then the better the resulting homogeneity that ensues for the chemical reactions to take place at the high kiln temperatures. In most thermal chemical reactions conducted in the laboratory an essential component of the procedure is stirring, which enables fresh materials to come together to react and in cases where the efficient stirring or agitation of the reaction mixture is not possible then regions of the reaction mixture can undergo specific and localised reactions to form unusual products where one or more components may then be in an artificial excess. Such is found in cases of living polymerisation reactants in viscous solutions, for example, where the increased viscosity of the reaction mixture prevents the homogeneity of mixing that would be otherwise be preferred to produce the desired reaction product: particularly troublesome in this case is the effect of the reaction mixture being in contact with the material walls of the vessel containing it or the stirrer blades and undergoing unpredictable side reactions which eventually will cause pollution of the main reaction mixture. The stirring speed is also critical in such experiments to continually expose fresh materials to come into contact with each other for reaction to take place. This is not unlike the conditions which are experienced in a ceramic firing kiln, which are exacerbated further by the necessary inability to stir the paste mixture which has now been compounded

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into a protype artefact, when really the fineness of grinding and the efficiency of the original paste mixing that took place in the manufactory pre-paste preparation now actually dictate the availability of the raw materials to come together effectively and react. In the analytical scientific characterisation of ceramics and glazes, the major techniques that have been used thus far have been the key quantitative elemental oxide determinations for the major components (SEM/EDAXS) plus the detection of trace elements (XRF) on the one hand and the qualitative identification of the mineralogy (XRD and Raman spectroscopy) on the other. It would seem at first sight that the analytical data which can be derived from these techniques is mutually incompatible but, nevertheless, the separate information from both types of technique can be correlated to give an interpretation of the practices that were operating in ceramics manufactories, with sometimes surprising results. The first point to be recognised is that the raw materials generally do not each give precise individual signatures that can be assimilated directly into a quantitative comparison with the published information regarding the composition of the recipe or formulation used in the manufactory. For example, the percentage of silica that is indicated from an EDAXS quantitative elemental oxide measurement does not correlate solely with the amount of silica sand that was added in the recipe: contributions to this analytical parameter will be afforded from the sand, flint, feldspar, steatite and glass frit (cullet) components, all of which chemically contain the entity SiO2 . Likewise, the elemental oxide calcia, CaO, is found in several raw material components including lime, glass and calcined bone ash (tricalcium phosphate, Ca3 (PO4 )2 ). However, some elemental oxides do have a particular and unique association with identifiable raw material components, such as phosphorus pentoxide, P2 O5 , with calcined bone ash, PbO with flint glass cullet, and MgO with steatite, Mg3 (Si4 O10 )(OH)2 . The amounts of potash and soda, K2 O and Na2 O, also reflect several contributions from raw material components and not only from their alkaline ash component used, although the ratios of the potash to soda components have occasionally been interpreted analytically in terms of the preferred use of the calcination of terrestrial versus marine vegetative sources which are rich in potassium or sodium, respectively. A high incidence of calcia and soda can also be indicative of a crown glass component being present in the form of cullet. The mineral formation that occurs at the high temperatures adopted in the firing kiln is a function of the chemical changes that have been incurred in the raw materials during the heating cycle, this being typically 40 h at a heating rate of about 5 °C every 10 min, the maintenance of the steady state temperature for a hard paste or a soft paste porcelain being achieved between 1300 and 1400 °C for another 40 h, and finally a steady cooling cycle over a similar period in which the hot vitreous ceramic is annealed to remove stresses and stabilise it for use in the household. In the next section, therefore, it shall be appropriate to explore the mineral formation that can occur chemically during these temperature cycles. Although the changes in the major components, namely silica sand, flints and clays are considered primarily here, the associated thermal changes in other potentially important components are also stated in italic script. This ensures that we do not just consider the chemical changes that take place in the clays and silicaceous materials but recognise that the

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presence of other raw materials that are potentially present will also affect the final mineralogy, such as the presence of calcium and magnesium ions from lime, calcined bone ash or steatite in an alkaline environment at high temperatures and the reactions they can undergo with the silicates that are formed at elevated temperatures.

2.4 Chemical Reactions that Occur in Raw Material Mixtures at Elevated Temperatures To provide an indication of the complexity of the high temperature chemical reactions that occur in the raw material mixtures which have been compounded into ceramic pastes and fired in the kiln, it will be appropriate to consider sequentially the reactions that can occur at several stages in achieving the final kiln operating temperature. We shall first tabulate the major changes that are now known to occur in kaolin clay, which can be found in several locations in a highly pure state (such as the Cherokee lands in South Carolina, where the white unaker clay used in their pottery is estimated to be approximately 97% pure kaolinite), which is normally itself a mixture and can contain small percentages of related minerals such as muscovite, quartz, anatase, feldspar, illite and montmorillonite. Firstly, in the heating process we find that the major component of china clay (kaolin—from the village where it was first found in China, Gaoling, near Jingdezhen in Jiangxi province), kaolinite, undergoes the following transformations over the temperature range indicated: 100–150 °C: Free water is driven off the kaolinite, which can be represented in its commonly used ceramic formulation of Al2 O3 .2SiO2 .2H2 O or mineralogically as Al2 Si2 O5 (OH)4 . Both of these formulae give some information about the state of the water in kaolinite, namely, that some is rather loosely bound as H2 O of coordination, whereas some is more strongly bound as hydroxyl groups attached to the silica or alumina. Any additional moisture retention in the kaolin clay from its storage and absorption in damp conditions would also be eliminated in this low temperature range. Moisture could also be acquired from the damp storage of calcined bone ash frit, which has normally been subjected to a first firing and calcination to about 1000 °C but perhaps then has been stored for some time rather improperly; this will also be volatilised in the early stage of the heating process. Likewise, the preparation of lime involves a thermal dehydration at 800–900 °C, but again fresh lime will absorb water from the atmosphere to form slaked lime, when hydroxylation will occur to form Ca(OH)2 unless it is used immediately. 150–200 °C: The release of water from the inner pores in the kaolinite phyllosilicate crystal structure occurs, which comprises a tetrahedral sheet of SiO4 atoms linked to an octahedral sheet of AlO6 atoms through silicon-oxygen bonds: these sheets can absorb free water and thereby create a material which is a plastic clay for shaping and moulding into pottery. This inner water is now released in this higher temperature range.

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200–450 °C: Further loss of water occurs in a stage that has been termed a “predehydroxylation”, wherein some chemical reorganisation structurally in the kaolinite platelets of the octahedral layer into a tetrahedral layer now commences—this is effectively a precursor stage to the formation of meta-kaolinite. Water retention by slaked lime conversion of the lime raw material, technically represented only by CaO for pure and freshly prepared lime but really involving Ca(OH)2 and potentially CaCO3 as well from the atmospheric absorption of water and carbon dioxide, will now be reversed here. Also, flint, which is comprised of the minerals chalcedony and moganite, both of which are chemically formulated as SiO2 , undergoes a dehydroxylation of the Si–OH interlayer groups present to form Si–O–Si chains and these then cross-link with the elimination of water. Arsenic oxide, white arsenic As2 O3 , is thermally unstable above 400 °C and volatilises but in the presence of lead oxide (as found in flint glass cullet) reacts to give Pb3 (AsO3 )2 and Pb2 AsO4 which effectively retain arsenic in the system regarding their future analytical detection. At a similar temperature, borax is reactive towards lead oxide, forming lead borate, PbB4 O7 and PbBO3 .The lead is present normally from a flint glass cullet additive to the paste mixture and may already be complexed as lead silicate, PbSiO3 . 300–500 °C: Organic carbonaceous matter and impurities in the kaolinite clay are burned off: some observers have noted that the clay appearance thereafter is noticeably whiter in colour. Similarly for the lime and calcined bone ash components. Copper silicate forms at 500 °C but decomposes at 800 °C to brown copper (II) oxide, CuO. At 500 °C the white calx, comprising cassiterite, litharge and silica, used for glazing faience and majolica has several possible diverse chemical reactions: firstly, the lead oxide component reacts with silica to form lead silicate, PbSiO3 , then at 600 °C the tin oxide reacts with litharge to form lead stannate, PbSnO3 , then finally at 700 °C the new reactants lead stannate, lead silicate and unreacted litharge are fused and initiate recrystallisation of the tin oxide, SnO2 . 450–600 °C: An endothermic reaction now takes place after water loss has occurred in which meta-kaolinite is formed from a purely internal structural rearrangement. The time needed for this to take place has been estimated at about 90 min, with a resultant quantitative degree of dehydroxylation of Ddehydr = 0.98. This process is generally represented by the following chemical equation, which although correct chemically does disguise the earlier dehydration and dehydroxylation stages that have occurred: Al2 Si2 O5 (OH)4 → Al2 Si2 O7 + 2H2 O Kaolinite Meta-kaolinite This reaction results in the internal fracturing of the original silicate structures and the creation of new host silicaceous lattices. According to the equation, all hydroxyl groups are now removed from the specimens present. 600–800 °C: Further increase in temperature now produces an increase in the pozzolanic activity and reactivity of the meta-kaolinite, which describes its ability

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to react with calcium hydroxide or oxide present to form products with cementitious properties. Between 600 and 700 °C there is no observed interaction between the biscuit clay body and a lead glaze, but above 750 °C the lead glaze melts and elements can then diffuse from the clay body into the glaze. 830–870 °C: Calcite CaCO3 and dolomite CaMg(CO3 )2 decompose to calcia and magnesia, CaO and MgO, eliminating carbon dioxide, which can be problematic for the prototype ceramics being fired as the gas bubbles are released into a viscous, vitrifying siliceous matrix, thereby causing holes and fissures which can destroy the resulting ceramic texture, translucency and surface appearance. CaCO3 → CaO + CO2 CaMg(CO3 )2 → CaO + MgO + 2CO2 Also in this temperature range, CaO reacts with silica to form wollastonite, CaSiO3 . In the presence of cassiterite, used in tin glazes, SnO2 , wollastonite can react to form malayaite, CaSnSiO5 . The melting point of litharge is 880 °C, but this is lowered in the presence of silica and alkaline fluxes, so any unreacted lead oxide from flint glass cullet is incorporated into the vitreous flux. 925–950 °C: An internal structural rearrangement in the meta-kaolinite structure now occurs with the elimination of some silica molecules to form an aluminium–silicon spinel structure, sometimes referred to as a gamma-alumina structure. 2Al2 Si2 O7 → Al4 Si3 O12 + SiO2 In this temperature range diopside is formed from the reaction of the calcium and magnesium ions present with the silica that has been released which is usually written as: 2SiO2 + CaMg(CO3 )2 → CaMgSi2 O6 + 2CO2 Although, of course, by the time this temperature has been attained the dolomite has been itself converted into the oxides CaO and MgO and the carbon dioxide has already been released so a better descriptive equation would be: 2SiO2 + CaO + MgO → CaMgSi2 O6 Furthermore, in the presence of Fe2+ , as found in impure river sand, magnesosilicates and ferrosilicates can be formed in this temperature range, such as enstatite MgSiO3 and forsterite Mg2 SiO4 , and fayalite Fe2 SiO4 and ferrosilite FeSiO3 . Mixed silicates in the olivine series, Mg2−x Fex SiO4 , are also known to occur with the end members being forsterite and fayalite. Above 900 °C, diffusion occurs of elements between the glaze and the body substrate the most important of which is lead from the glaze into

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the body, an important concept for the analytical interpretation, and in the reverse direction silica diffuses from the body into the glaze. At this temperature, sanidine, KAlSi3 O8 , the high temperature stable plagioclase can form from its more stable room temperature sister polymorphs, microcline and orthoclase, also formulated as KAlSi3 O8 . The sodium analogue is albite, NaAlSi3 O8 . 1000–1050 °C: The structurally rearranged meta-kaolinite now converts to mullite crystals in the form of platelets and also forms the high temperature stable form of silica, cristobalite: 3Al4 Si3 O12 → 2(3Al2 O3 .2SiO2 ) + 5SiO2 Meta-kaolinite Mullite Cristobalite Between 900 and 1000 °C, the moganite component in flints which has been partially transformed at lower temperatures now converts to cristobalite, the high temperature form of silica. Also, in the presence of alumina, Al 2 O3 , calcia and silica react to form gehlenite, Ca2 Al(SiAlO7 ). 1400 °C: A structural transformation from platelet mullite to needle like mullite crystals now takes place, increasing the physical strength of the structure. The total mass loss incurred by pure kaolinite during these thermal procedures and reactions from room temperature to the maximum kiln temperature achieved here is estimated experimentally at 14%, which is a significant mass loss, without invoking further reaction schemes that will inevitable occur in the presence of other raw material components. The situation is complicated further for porcelains which have the presence of a phosphatic component in the form of calcined bone ash, such as Nantgarw and Derby, which not only provides an additional source of calcium ions but also phosphate (V) ions which can form complexes at high temperature with silicaceous minerals, such as bytownite, Cax Na1−x [Al Al,Si)Si2 O8 ], anorthite CaAl2 Si2 O8 , albite NaAlSi3 O8 and whitlockite, Ca9 (Mg,Fe)(PO4 )6 PO3 .OH. Clearly, the kiln operating temperature plays a major part in the creation of the minerals that are formed in a ceramic mixture at high temperatures: earthenwares (terracottas and slipwares) require a kiln temperature of between 600 and 900 °C, whereas stonewares (which include Cologne ware, ironstone china, Coade stone, Bottger ware and Crouch ware) are fired at the higher temperatures of between 1100 and 1300 °C and porcelains generally require an even higher kiln temperature of between 1200 and 1400 °C. Stonewares differ from earthenwares not just in their firing temperatures but compositionally in their clays and in whether or not sand has been used as a component raw material: the latter is a rather grey area which compromises many attempts made at discrete definitions of stoneware that have been proposed in the past, several of which simply state that stonewares do not contain flints, quartz, mica, feldspar or sand, which is certainly not applicable to several types that have been included in this category above— such as Coade stone, ironstone, Crouch ware (which is named after its clay sourced

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alternatively from Crich in Derbyshire or Creussen in Bavaria), Chinese Yixing wares and Cologne wares. Further reactions also become possible to those described above for biscuit porcelain when the glaze and pigments have been applied, even though the glost kiln temperatures would have been significantly less and usually were about 200–400 °C lower that those used for the firing of the ceramic bodies. The glazes often comprised a more complex mixture than those used for the biscuit porcelain bodies and in addition to clay, calcined bone ash, feldspar, a calcareous alkaline solution, arsenic white and borax contained an opacifying agent such as cassiterite (tin oxide, SnO2 ) and/or lead oxide which were all compounded into a viscous liquid “slip” for dressing the biscuit porcelain or earthenware ceramic substrates. The presence of heavy metal oxide or metal silicate pigments, which could contain mercury, copper, lead, arsenic, cobalt, zinc, cadmium, and chromium, afforded yet another possibility for the formation of novel minerals with their dispersion and diffusion into the substrate and thereupon reacting to form metal species which become detectable in molecular spectroscopy. Examples of these novel mineral pigments which have detected in analyses of glazed ceramics are cobalt silicate, lead borate, adelite, roselite and copper silicate. Some manufactory proprietors either consciously or unconsciously added sulfur in the form of a sulfate, usually in the form of an alum such as potash alum, KAl(SO4 )2 .12H2 O, or otherwise K2 SO4 .Al2 (SO4 )3 .24H2 O, or perhaps as Na2 SO4 , which is a component of naturally occurring alkaline natrons which also contain sodium carbonate and bicarbonate. In this event, the presence of sulfur is recorded analytically, and expressed either as sulfur trioxide SO3 or sulfate SO4 2− , but new sulfur minerals can now also be formed at elevated temperatures in the kiln, such as antlerite, Cu3 SO4 (OH)2 and aubertite CuAl(SO4 )2 Cl, which have both been detected analytically in earthenwares and stonewares where copper salts have been used as decorative enamel pigments. Alums were certainly added as minor components to porcelain pastes and recorded by several manufactory proprietors but the purpose of this is not clear from a chemical standpoint, although it may be related to the ancient usage of potash alum and its volcanic congener, alunite, KAl3 (SO4 )2 (OH)6 , as additives for imparting a vitreous and white lustre to materials in which they were incorporated.

2.5 Key Mineral Identification in High-Temperature Fired Ceramics The presence or otherwise of certain minerals in fired ceramics can provide some novel information regarding the firing temperatures, the raw materials and their potential sourcing used in their formulation and the presence of minor additives to the porcelain paste. A list of minerals that have been found in fired ceramics is given in Table 2.3. This list is very broad as this is necessitated by the presence of some unusual minerals that can occur when small amounts of the minor components or

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47

additives have reacted with the major mineral components at elevated temperatures in the kiln. Others have not been featured here because they are only found when reactions have occurred between pigments that contain transition metals such as nickel, manganese and cobalt with arsenic and sulfur-containing minerals from minor additives in the fused ceramic melt, such as rammelsbergite, skutterudite, fairfieldite and bieberite, which have all nevertheless been identified spectroscopically in fired and decorated stonewares and majolica, if not thus far directly in porcelains. The first impression that could arise from the data emerging from the body paste and glaze analyses is that there are two different regimes being explored: the quantitative elemental oxide data refer to the raw material components that were used whilst the qualitative molecular spectral data are more pertinent to the reactions that have been undergone by the prototype porcelain, stoneware or earthenware during the firing process in the kiln. The former data provide information about the raw materials that were used and also their potential sourcing whereas the latter analytical signatures tell us more about the kiln operations and the temperatures that were achieved in the firing process, which can then lead to a better interpretation of the type of ceramic that is being considered, which is otherwise sometimes not clearly definable. Of more recent application is the analysis of the pigments from an elemental and molecular basis, which has revealed novel information about their sourcing, preparation and usage, and this can impact significantly on the body paste and glaze analyses where the interactions between the pigment and the substrate or glaze is evident. Pigment analysis is also a rich source of information about the forensic status of the decorated artefact and whether the chronology of the enamel decoration is compatible with the porcelain body substrate, i.e. whether or not the ceramic artefact is genuine or a fake. A notable example of this forensically was the detection of a later decoration showing the signing of the Declaration of American Independence on July, 1776, in out-of-context enamels on a genuine period Sevres porcelain dish (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021).

2.6 Recipes, Composition and Analysis of Nantgarw Porcelain Over the two centuries that have passed since its first production there has been much speculation concerning the nature of the recipe for Nantgarw porcelain that was adopted by William Billingsley and Samuel Walker for their Phase II manufacturing operations: it is clear that William Billingsley kept this secret during his lifetime and did not inform William Weston Young his partner at the Nantgarw China Works of its nature and composition. Without evidence to the contrary, and bearing in mind the close association between Billingsley and Walker from their time at Brampton-in-Torksey, it is also reasonable to propose that Walker did have detailed knowledge of the Nantgarw recipes for the porcelain and glaze. William

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Table 2.3 Minerals found in fired ceramics with their molecular spectroscopic identifiers Mineral

Chemical formulation

Firing temperature/material interpretation

Spectroscopic bandsa /cm−1

Anatase

TiO2

Low/impurity in kaolin

144, 197, 399, 515, 640

Rutile

TiO2

High/impurity in kaolin

445, 610

Mullite

3Al2 O3 .2SiO2

High

305, 340, 415, 530, 600, 720, 870, 960

Wollastonite

CaSiO3

Low

337, 408, 636, 969, 1045

Parawollastonite

CaSiO3

Low

412, 635, 824, 971

Diopside

CaMgSi2 O6

Mg raw material

323, 356, 391, 666, 1012

Forsterite

Mg2 SiO4

High

824, 856

Fayalite

Fe2 SiO4

High

815, 838

Whitlockite

Ca9 (MgFe)(PO4 )6 PO3 .OH

High

400, 450, 600, 959, 974

Cristobalite

SiO2

High

230, 416

Enstatite

MgSiO3

Medium/high

164, 240, 345, 666, 689, 1014, 1036

Anorthite

CaAl2 Si2 O8

High

197, 286, 485, 505, 744, 914, 977

Albite

NaAlSi3 O8

High

216, 250, 290, 505, 528, 645, 760, 814, 977

Gehlenite

Ca2 Al(SiAlO7 )

High

218, 243, 463, 531, 662, 679, 801, 917, 932, 982, 1009

Moganite

SiO2

High

211, 503

Calcite

CaCO3

Low

151, 276, 712, 1086

Dolomite

CaMg(CO3 )2

Low

176, 258, 299, 725, 1098, 1393

Quartz

SiO2

Medium high

210, 467, 960

Cassiterite

SnO2

Low

472, 634, 776

Litharge

PbO

Low

147, 338 (continued)

2.6 Recipes, Composition and Analysis of Nantgarw Porcelain

49

Table 2.3 (continued) Mineral

Chemical formulation

Firing temperature/material interpretation

Spectroscopic bandsa /cm−1

Microcline

KAlSi3 O8

Low

476, 514, 993

Haematite

Fe2 O3

Low/high

225, 245, 292, 410, 610

Magnesium spinel

MgAl2 O4

High

312, 406, 663, 765

Alamosite

PbSiO3

High

143, 215, 269, 351, 462, 920, 942, 983

Mimetite

Pb5 AsO4 Cl

Low

315, 335, 398, 776, 813

Hedyphane

Ca2 Pb3 (AsO4 )3 Cl

Low

323, 350, 772, 821

Sanidine

KAlSi3 O8

Medium high

162, 283, 473, 513, 770, 803, 1004

Cobalt aluminate

CoAl2 O4

Low

203, 512

Cobalt silicate

Co2 SiO4

Low

462, 823, 917

Roselite

Ca2 Co(AsO4 )2 .2H2 O

Low

835, 878

Pyrochlore

PbSnSbSiO2

Low/medium

130, 208, 305, 338, 388, 452, 513

Schultenite

PbAsO3 (OH)

Low/medium

147, 825

Smalt

CoO.nSiO2

Low/medium

142, 214, 474

Pseudobrookite

FeTiO5

Medium

217, 339

Copper silicate

CuSiO3

Low

255, 635, 715, 980

Malayaite

CaSnSiO5

Low/medium

340, 520, 595, 837

Montmorillonite

(NaCa)0.3 (AlMg)2 Si4 O10 (OH)

Medium

430, 710, 785, 840, 915, 1110

Muscovite

KAl2 (AlSi3 O10 )(OH)2

Low/medium

189, 290, 370, 588, 669

Illite

K(AlMgFe)2 (SiAl)4 O10 (OH)2

Low/medium

205, 271, 391, 465, 638, 709

Monticellite

CaMgSiO4

Low/medium

255, 410, 815, 852, 900

a The

spectroscopic band wavenumber signatures cited here are obtained from non-destructive Raman spectral studies of porcelain bodies, glazes and pigment interactions with the glaze. A description of the technique is provided in Edwards, Howell G. M., Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021

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Weston Young, according to his detailed diary notes (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847), 2019), actually spent very little time at the Nantgarw China Works site between 1817 and 1820 since he was very involved with prosecuting his estate surveying business which necessitated a large travelling component; he details the nights that he spent away from home and the meals that he took on this venture—and the time he spent at Nantgarw with Billingsley and Walker seemed to fit in with specific passing trips, for example to Merthyr Tydfil and Brecon. He would have had very little contribution to make to the synthesis of the porcelain at Nantgarw, but he may well have been involved in acquiring commissions or business locally for services from his wealthy clients. Hence, when Young assumed control of the failing Nantgarw China Works in 1820 and attempted to continue porcelain manufacture thereafter, he was singularly unsuccessful, mainly because he had no knowledge of the presence of the calcined bone ash in the recipe, a vital component in this highly phosphatic porcelain body (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847), 2019). It is not known definitively if Samuel Walker was in possession of the secret Nantgarw body recipe but there are historical indications that he may have been and that he only revealed it publicly after the death of William Billingsley in 1828. In 1942, Ernest Morton Nance wrote the definitive history of the Nantgarw and Swansea porcelain manufactories (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942), including the associated Swansea Pottery, and he included an Appendix entitled “A Series of Experiments which has Resulted in the Reproduction of the Nantgarw Body and Glaze” (pp. 389–394), which he opens with the statement: One of the most interesting developments in connexion with my enquiries into the history of the Nantgarw Works has been the recovery of Billingsley’s recipes for the Nantgarw body and glaze, and their successful demonstration through the kindness of the late Professor J.W. Mellor of Stoke-on-Trent, the most distinguished authority on scientific ceramics of our time. The practical demonstration of the two formulae was made possible only through a series of laboratory experiments carried out by Dr Mellor and his honours students, Messrs Lyman and Middleton, which has resulted in the reconstruction and successful firing of a body and glaze to all appearances and, as we believe, in fact, identical with the originals. Indeed, the very difficulties experienced by him were precisely those which we know to have been encountered by Billingsley and Walker more than one hundred and twenty years ago.

Although preceded by diffuse and apparently definitive accounts of the composition of Nantgarw porcelain and its glaze, specific details of which have been recounted elsewhere (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021) this is indeed a ground-breaking statement, which has ramifications for our understanding of the manufacture of porcelain and the overcoming of the challenging synthetic difficulties experienced by Billingsley and Walker at Nantgarw. They had to rely solely upon their empirical expertise without the benefit of assistance from modern scientific analyses and the application of chemical and mineralogical principles involved in the understanding of the complex high temperature processes operating in the kiln, which have been outlined earlier in this Chapter. The experiments undertaken by Dr Joseph Mellor, it is estimated in

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51

1933/34, in re-creating Nantgarw porcelain a century after the closure of the manufactory have been reviewed in detail elsewhere (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021) and in a summary provided by Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, pp. 389–394, 1942). Some of the cited Nantgarw recipe compositions are indeed varied and are described by Dr Mellor as “unworkable”; several of the earlier ones seem to be merely educated guesses that can be traced back to Simeon Shaw (The Chemistry of the Several Natural and Artificial Heterogeneous Compounds Used in Manufacturing Porcelain, Glass and Pottery, 1837, p. 429) who stated that: Mr Billingsley at Nungarrow manufactured from Lynn sand, potash and other compounds made a porcelain which as artificial felspar has such excellence.

It is to be noted that this rather dubious and effectively unworkable non-starter recipe for Nantgarw porcelain completely ignores the presence of the two key raw material components of china clay (kaolin) and calcined bone ash that we know featured so prominently in Billingsley’s Nantgarw recipe. The component percentages of the raw materials in each of the main four recipes cited in the literature for the Nantgarw porcelain body are listed in Edwards (Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021). Dr Mellor demonstrated that the recipe cited by John Taylor (The Complete Practical Potter, 1847) did indeed produce the expected Nantgarw body of a characteristically high translucency: Taylor allegedly recounted the recipe provided to him by Samuel Walker as “26 lbs bone, 14 lbs Lynn sand, 2lbs potash, mixed with water, then made into bricks and fritted in a hard part of the biscuit kiln, then pounded and ground for use. Then 40 lbs of this frit was taken with 20 lbs of china clay”. An anonymous author in the Pottery Gazette (December 1st issue, 1885) cites the following recipe: “13 bone, 7 sand, 1 potash, sifted and mixed well together and fired in strong biscuit heat. This recipe is completed by adding 20 of China clay to 40 of the above frit by grinding them well together and drying them in the slip kiln”. The component percentages of the raw materials cited in the recipes published by John Taylor and in the Pottery Gazette are identical in every respect, but are markedly different from the other recipes that are cited in the literature. The percentage of calcined bone ash component is cited as 42% by Taylor and the Pottery Gazette, the kaolin component is 34%, and the potash component is 3%. For this recipe the firing temperature of the Minton China Works kiln used by Dr Mellor in his re-creation of Nantgarw porcelain was estimated at 1300 °C (Author: this, of course, is too low actually to attain the required liquidus range for Nantgarw porcelain according to the analytical work of Victor Owen!) but Dr Mellor believed that the cone saggars used to determine the kiln temperature attained were consistently reading low by at least 60 °C or more, because of inadequate compensation being made for their time spent in the kiln which addresses the discrepancy somewhat—we now know that Billingsley’s formulation for Nantgarw porcelain required the attainment of a kiln firing temperature of at least 1400 °C. Before leaving the subject of alternative Nantgarw body formulations, we should mention two more recipes which exist in the literature, firstly that of Walker’s French Body, cited by the same anonymous author in the Pottery Gazette who provided the

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seemingly authentic Nantgarw body recipe. This is a strange mixture of just two components, namely china stone (100 parts, coarse ground) and china clay (150 parts) with an accompanying glaze comprising finely ground china stone only. The second Nantgarw recipe is that of William Weston Young, who stepped in in early 1820 after the departure of Billingsley and Walker for Coalport to take over the failing Nantgarw China Works but was unsuccessful in his recovery operation. Young made a new recipe for what he termed was his Nantgarw Dry Mix which shards discovered on site and recently analysed have matched with a highly siliceous hard paste porcelain completely devoid of a calcined bone ash component (Colomban et al. 2020). Neither of these recipes would remotely satisfy the requirements for a Nantgarw highly phosphatic soft paste porcelain body and have not therefore been considered further here. Keen historians would indicate that the experimental attempts made by Joseph Mellor and Ernest Morton Nance in the 1930s were not the first that were made to simulate the recreation of Nantgarw porcelain as, has been pointed out above, William Weston Young did attempt to make Nantgarw porcelain firstly at Nantgarw after the departure of Billingsley and Walker in 1820 and thereafter elsewhere until the 1840s, which he tried to market as his Nantgarw Dry Mix. However, Young was not aware of the importance of the bone ash component in Billingsley and Walker’s recipe so his trial experiments were doomed to failure in the re-creation of the Nantgarw soft paste phosphatic body and he essentially produced a highly siliceous and apparently unsatisfactory hard paste body version.

2.6.1 The Nantgarw Glazes Alongside the experiments of Joseph Mellor and Ernest Morton Nance on the recreation of the Nantgarw porcelain body, they also carried out some parallel experiments for the evaluation of the glazes from various recipes in the literature. John Taylor (The Complete Practical Potter, 1847) gives two glazes listed that were apparently used by Billingsley and Walker, namely: Glaze 1: “14lbs China clay, 18lbs Lynn sand, 14 lbs bone, 13.5 lbs felspar, 12.5 lbs China stone, 11.5 lbs flint and 110 lbs borax then to the whole of this frit add another 110 lbs lead”. Glaze 2: “8lbs Lynn sand, 6lbs chalk, 2.5 lbs China stone, 10 lbs borax, 40 lbs China clay, 3.5.lbs felspar, 0.5 lbs flint, 6 lbs soda and 3 lbs nitre; all fritted together”. Morton Nance comments that only one glaze was used by Billingsley but there is no evidence that he did not experiment with others. Taylor makes no definitive claim for the glaze that he states was actually used, unlike his assertion that the body formulation came directly from Samuel Walker. Dr Mellor found both glazes to be totally unsatisfactory for his selected best body re-created Nantgarw formulation: Glaze 1 was subject to a crazing that was not usually seen on Nantgarw china and

2.6 Recipes, Composition and Analysis of Nantgarw Porcelain

53

Glaze 2 was impossible to use as it was too high melting for the glost kiln. In contrast, The Pottery Gazette gave a Nantgarw glaze recipe as follows: 50 lbs sand, 60 lbs borax, 20 lbs whiting, 4 lbs nitre and 4lbs lead, sifted well together and run down in the glost oven. Then to 50lbs of this frit add 50 lbs China stone, 4 lbs China clay, 4 lbs whiting and 4 lbs lead.

Dr Mellor adjudged this glaze to be “very promising” and the specimens that he prepared were “most excellent” for the original Nantgarw glaze replication. The anonymous author of The Pottery Gazette article claimed that the glaze recipe was given directly from “the late Samuel Walker”—and Samuel Walker had died in 1875 in New York State, aged 80. Dr Mellor was most impressed with this glaze and commented thus: Judging from the satisfactory appearance and behaviour of this glaze it can be unhesitatingly assumed to be of the correct composition in every respect. It is very gratifying to know that this glaze does resemble the one used by Billingsley and that the correct recipes have been isolated. It is also interesting to note that both the body and the glaze recipes have been provided by the anonymous writer suggesting that he had a very intimate knowledge of the china in question.

The identity of the anonymous writer who provided these apparently correct versions of the Nantgarw recipes for the body and the glaze, as verified experimentally by Dr Mellor, is completely unknown and indeed his article in The Pottery Gazette was seemingly ignored by later historians, Morton Nance suggests this occurred because it was misleadingly entitled “Marks and Monograms on China” which certainly did not pertain to the material content and in addition was full of some obvious errors and inconsistencies in this respect that would have been manifestly obvious to discerning readers! If we consider the relevant chronology it is clear that this anonymous writer cannot have been an original employee at Nantgarw: in 1885, when The Pottery Gazette article was written, the Nantgarw China Works under Billingsley and Walker had been closed for 65 years and it is alleged that if the writer was a young person at that time then he/she would surely not have been privy to the secrets of the manufacturing formulations that were so jealously protected by Billingsley and Walker to such an extent that even their third partner in the business enterprise, William Weston Young, had no knowledge at all of the formulation of these recipes! Samuel Walker was employed after Nantgarw at Coalport from 1820 until 1828, when Billingsley died and he emigrated to the USA with his family in 1842, founding the Temperance Pottery in New York State and staying there until he died in 1875 (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776– 1847), 2019). Nothing is known of Walker’s whereabouts between 1828 and 1842, so perhaps it is in this chronological context that he met the anonymous writer or, alternatively, a meeting may have occurred in New York State before 1875 between Walker and the writer, perhaps a British emigre, who then returned to these shores during the ten years following Walker’s death? Whoever the writer was it is also clear that Dr Mellor cannot be correct in his assumption that he had an intimate knowledge of Nantgarw and its china, at least not directly, but whatever he learned he could well have acquired directly from Samuel Walker personally before he died in 1875! Even

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if Walker had taken a confidante concerning these recipes at Coalport that would have been ostensibly and unfavourably accomplished during Billingsley’s lifetime there, and would imply a time lag of some 60 years that had elapsed before the public revelation of the recipes in 1885! William Weston Young and Thomas Pardoe certainly perfected a glaze that was used at Nantgarw for the decoration of the remnant porcelain between 1820 and 1823 and he noted the recipe for this glaze as: “5 parts Lynn sand and 4 parts borax, to which frit were added either 1 part lead and 1 part glass, or 2 parts lead and 1 part glass”—effectively this recipe describes two glazes which differ in the lead content from the amount of flint glass cullet added. Dr Mellor evaluated both glaze formulations on his simulated Nantgarw china body and concluded that both gave satisfactory results, but they were less pleasing than the white, smooth and delicate Billingsley glaze that featured on the earlier Nantgarw porcelain that was marketed between 1817 and 1820. The Young glazes tended to craze, which Dr Mellor attributed to a variability in its glass component composition: when Dr Mellor used the highest quality lead rich flint glass in his formulation he noted that crazing then did not occur on the test pieces. Dr Mellor fired his glazes at a temperature of between 1100 and 1120 °C in the glost kiln. As a sequel, the combination of the recipes described here for the Nantgarw body and the glaze that were pronounced to be identical with the original versions produced by Billingsley and Walker by Dr Joseph Mellor and Ernest Morton Nance have recently been shown to be correct using modern kiln technology and an understanding of the high temperature chemistry as described earlier for which the modern version of Nantgarw porcelain has been created. In 2018 the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, which now occupies the site of the Nantgarw China Works and operates from the house, Tyla Gwyn, in which William Billingsley and his family lived whilst making porcelain there from 1817 until 1820, decided to revive the manufacture of Nantgarw porcelain again in small quantities to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of porcelain production at Nantgarw. This was led by the Director of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Charles Fountain. Using the existing knowledge concerning the porcelain body and glazes which has been summarised here, and additionally the analytical data which has emerged since (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021), and using the highest quality raw materials and modern technology for the accurate kiln temperature control in Staffordshire a successful project outcome was achieved later that year. In confirmation of the correctness of the venture, the new Nantgarw Nart200 porcelain body and glaze were compared analytically with three selected shards of the original Nantgarw porcelain from the Billingsley and Walker era using SEM/EDAXS and Raman spectroscopic analytical techniques in the laboratories of Professor Philippe Colomban at the Sorbonne University in Paris (Colomban et al. 2020). It transpires that the average compositional percentages of the original Nantgarw porcelain are all within about 1% of the modern reproduction body and glaze which is an excellent analytical indicator and supporter of the correctness of the modern composition.

References

55

References J.A. Anderson, The Duesbury papers—a personal view of the management, c. 1785–1796. Derby Porcelain Int. Soc. J. II, 1–8 (1991) J.A. Anderson, Derby porcelain and the early English fine ceramics industry. Ph.D. thesis, University of Leicester, 2000 Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers (Fergus Gambon, Director of British Ceramics), New Bond Street, London S.A. Church, English Porcelain: A Handbook to the China Made in England During the Eighteenth Century as Illustrated by Specimens Found Chiefly in the National Collections (Chapman & Hall Ltd., London, 1894) P. Colomban, H.G.M. Edwards, C. Fountain, Raman spectroscopic and SEM/EDAXS analysis of highly translucent Nantgarw porcelain. J. Eur. Ceram. Soc. 40, 4664–4675 (2020) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2017a) H.G.M. Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2017b) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847) (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2019) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, Preservation of Cultural Heritage Series (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2022) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China (SpringerNature, Cham, Switzereland, 2022) F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain) (Oriel Plas Glyn-yWeddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016a) Gartre’n Ol, Coming Home: Exhibition to Celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the Nantgarw China Works Foundation (Nantgarw China Works Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, 2019) M. Hillis, The development of welsh porcelain bodies, in Welsh Ceramics in Context, Part I, ed. by J. Gray (Royal Institution of South Wales, Swansea, 2005), pp. 170–192 L. Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from the Prehistoric Times Down to the Present Day, vols. I and II (Virtue & Co. Ltd., Paternoster Row, London, 1878) W. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) W. John, K. Coombes, G.J. Coombes, Nantgarw Porcelain Album (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1975a) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (B.T. Batsford, London, 1942) J.V. Owen, R.D. Barkla, Compositional characteristics of 18th century Derby porcelains: recipe changes, phase transformations and melt fertility. J. Archaeol. Sci. 24, 127–140 (1997) J.V. Owen, J.O. Wilstead, R.W. Williams, T.E. Day, A tale of two cities: compositional characteristics of some Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains and their implications for kiln wastage. J. Archaeol. Sci. 25, 359–375 (1998) J.V. Owen, M. Morrison, Sagged phosphatic Nantgarw porcelain (ca. 1813–1820): casualty of overfiring or a fertile paste? Geoarchaeology 14, 313–332 (1999) J.V. Owen, Antique porcelain 101: a primer on the chemical analysis and interpretation of eighteenth century British wares, in Ceramics in America, ed. by R. Hunter (The Chipstone Foundation, Milwaukee, 2002) , pp. 39–61 W.R.H. Ramsay, E.G. Ramsay, A case for the production of the earliest commercial hard paste porcelains in the English-speaking world by Edward Heylyn and Thomas Frye in about 1743. Proc. Royal Soc. Victoria 120, 236–256 (2008)

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W.R.H. Ramsay, P. Daniels, E.G. Ramsay, The Limehouse Porcelain Factory: Its Output, Antecedents and the Influence of the Royal Society of London on the Evolution of English Porcelain Based on Composition and Technology (Invercargill Press, New Zealand, 2013) A. Renton, T. Pardoe, W.W. Young, in Welsh Ceramics in Context, Part I, ed. by J. Gray (Royal Institution of South Wales, Swansea, 2003), pp. 120–146 S. Shaw, The Chemistry of the Several Natural and Artificial Heterogeneous Compounds Used in Manufacturing Porcelain, Glass and Pottery (Simeon Shaw Personal Publishing, London, 1837; reprinted by Scott, Greenwood & Son, Ludgate Hill, London, 1900) P.D.S. St Pierre, Constitution of bone china; I, high temperature phase equilibrium studies in the system tricalcium phosphate-alumina-silica. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 37, 243–258 (1954) P.D.S. St Pierre, Constitution of bone china; II, reactions in bone china bodies. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 38, 217–222 (1955) J. Taylor, The Complete Practical Potter (Shelton, Stoke-upon Trent, 1847) The Pottery Gazette, Volume IX, No. 92, Organ of the Glass & China Trades (Stationer’s Hall, Ludgate Hill, London, 1885) M. Tite, M. Bimson, A technological study of English porcelains. Archaeometry 33, 3–27 (1991) W. Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of the Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon Etc. (Bemrose & Sons Ltd., The Old Bailey, London, 1897a) J. Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848 (Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2002) W.W. Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), vol. 30 (West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). https://archiveshub.jisc.sc.uk/data/gb216-d/dxch/ ddxch/i/hub

Chapter 3

A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall Nantgarw Service

Abstract The history of Farnley Hall, the Fawkes family, and its owner in the early nineteenth century, Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes MP, a well-known collector of art, who would have chronologically been in place to commission a Nantgarw porcelain service between 1817 and 1820 for his own use at Farnley Hall to entertain his regular visitor and friend, JMW Turner, the famous painter and watercolourist. The discovery of the missing Farnley Hall service in March 2016 in the cellars of Farnley Hall by the author and Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq. is recounted. An estimate of the potential size of the original service is correlated with its current composition using data mentioned by Dr W. D. John. Assignment of the Farnley Hall service to a generic Nantgarw Brace service type is made based upon its embossed beribboned moulded border and dentil-edge gilding. Keywords Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes · Joseph Mallord William Turner · Farnley Hall · Nantgarw porcelain · Brace service category Farnley is mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 as Fernelai (or Fernelie). The first mention of a Fawkes family in connection with Farnley occurs somewhat later in 1289 when Falcasius de Lindeley is reported as having successfully taken legal action against the Vicar of Leathley and 19 others for cutting down trees on his property. In the Subsidy Roll of 1378 there is a mention of “John ffawkes and his wife and of their villa de ffarnlay”. The old villa probably stood on or near the site of the older part of the existing house, which was built in the late 16th or the early 17th Century. In the 1780s, Farnley Old Hall was owned by Francis Fawkes, described as a “the blunt squire of many acres”, a wealthy widower who died without surviving issue (Farnley Hall, Otley, Yorkshire, House Brochure). He bequeathed the Hall and his estate to a kinsman, Walter Beaumont Hawksworth of Hawksworth Hall, Guiseley, who inherited it in 1786 and thereby also acquired the additional surname and arms of Fawkes in the terms of the will (Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic List of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain and Ireland, 1879), becoming High Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1789. His motto was A Deo et Rege, translating as From God and the King. His arms are given as: Quarterly: 1st/4th, sable three hawks close proper; 2nd/3rd, a fess between in chief three mullets and in base as many chevrons interlaced sable (Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic List of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_3

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3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Fig. 3.1 Sketch of Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes MP, of Farnley Hall, Otley, Yorkshire by T. Woolnoth, 7, Fitzroy Square, London, and published in November 1825. Walter Fawkes died on October 24th 1825, aged 56, so this picture would have been intended for inclusion in an obituary appreciation notice. The age of Walter Fawkes at the time of this sketch is not stated. Public domain

and Ireland, 1879). His crest is cited as a falcon ppr. and is depicted in Fairbairn (Fairbairn, Crests of the Families of Great Britain and Ireland and Their Kindred in Other Lands, Volumes I and II, 1905; the crest is shown in Volume II: Plate 85/2). Walter Hawksworth Fawkes died in 1792 but not before he had started to alter the existing Farnley Old Hall to make what is essentially two houses under the direction of the architect John Carr of York. His successor, Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes (1769–1825) (Fig. 3.1), duly completed the transformation of Farnley Old Hall into two distinct but connected buildings, the older wing at the north end and a newer four-square Georgian addition at the south end with several large bays (Figs. 3.2 and 3.3). Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes married Maria, daughter of Robert Grimston of Neswick, in 1794 and they had four daughters and three sons. Maria Fawkes died in 1813 and Walter then married Maria Sophia in 1816, widow of the Hon. Pierce Butler, son of the Earl Carrick, who survived him. There were no children of the second marriage.

3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Fig. 3.2 Photograph of Farnley Old Hall and its Georgian annexe. Public domain

Fig. 3.3 Farnley Hall Georgian annexe with bay window. Public domain

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3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, who became MP for Yorkshire in 1806 and High Sheriff in 1823, then filled his house with a remarkable collection of art work, which included 250 watercolours and six large oil paintings by Joseph Mallord William Turner, which were purchased from Turner for the sum of £3500, equivalent to £400, 000 at present day values (Blayney-Brown, J.M.W. Turner, Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours, 2012). Turner first visited Farnley Hall in 1796 whilst visiting Lord Lascelles in Harewood House with his friend and watercolourist rival Thomas Girtin. Whilst staying and sketching at Farnley Hall, which Turner did for several months in the summer of each year between 1808 and 1824, he compiled his celebrated five-volume Ornithological Collection between 1820 and 1824 (Jacklin, Natural History Studies, ca. 1820–1824, in J.M.W. Turner: Sketches, Drawings and Watercolours, 2017). In 1819, Walter Fawkes held an exhibition in London which included many of the works by Turner in his possession; his wife, Maria Sophia, also befriended Turner and when viewing Turner’s picture of a Snow Storm in 1820 quoted Turner as saying “That he could never have painted the Snow Storm had he not asked a sailor to lash him to the mast to observe it. In this position I stayed for four hours and never expected to escape. I felt bound to record it if I did”. A watercolour of Farnley Old Hall by J. M. W. Turner is shown in Fig. 3.4 and an oil painting of Joseph Mallord William Turner and Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes walking in the grounds of Farnley Hall between 1820 and 1824, painted by John Wildman, is shown in Fig. 3.5. The acknowledged importance of Farnley Hall and its art collection was surely due largely to its tenure by Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes and his friendship with Turner, and merited its inclusion in Neale’s engravings of gentlemen’s seats (Neale, Gentlemen’s Seats: Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, 1830), shown here in Fig. 3.6. Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes’ art collection impressed John Ruskin (1819–1910), the first Slade Professor of Art at the University of Oxford in 1869, when he visited Farnley Hall and commented: Farnley is a unique place, there is nothing like it in the world – a place where a great genius has been loved and appreciated, who did all his best work for that place, where it is treasured up like a monument in a shrine.

It is certainly a credible hypothesis that such an astute collector of fine works of art such as Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, with his access to fellow politicians, dignitaries and influential London society in the second decade in the 19th Century, would have been in a prime position to acquire a service of the finest porcelain which was so much in premium demand and desirability for its elegance from John Mortlock’s agency in Oxford Street by wealthy clients between 1817 and 1820.

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Fig. 3.4 The East Front (“Garden Front”) of Farnley Hall with the Flower Garden and Sundial, a watercolour painted in 1815 by J. M. W. Turner whilst resident as a visitor to Farnley Hall. Now in the Tate Gallery, London, and formerly in the Turner Collection of Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes at Farnley Hall. Public domain

A second potential contender for the possible location of the Farnley Hall service mentioned by Dr John (Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) would be the eponymous Farnley Hall, situated near Leeds, and therefore also in Yorkshire. Built in Elizabethan times by Sir Thomas Danby (1530–1596), who became High Sheriff of Yorkshire in 1576, it passed by succession through the Danbys until eventually William Danby (1752– 1833), who lived mainly in his alternative estate at Swinton Park, became the last of the Danby line to live there and it was sold to James Armitage, a wool merchant from Leeds, in 1802. The last Armitage to live at Farnley Hall was Robert Armitage (1866–1944), a personal friend of David Lloyd George, and who was MP for Leeds and the Lord Mayor of Leeds in 1905. His son, Robert Armitage sold Farnley Hall to Leeds City Council in 1945, who still maintain it, but it is now devoid of its original contents which were sold off at auction in the intervening years. In March 2016, whilst on a quest to discover the potential source of Farnley Hall and its eponymous porcelain service, the author was invited by Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., a descendant of Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes and the current owner of Farnley Hall, Otley, to inspect the storage cellars with him at Farnley Hall with a view to locating the missing Nantgarw porcelain service that may have been potentially

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3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Fig. 3.5 An oil painting by John R. Wildman of Farnley Hall, ca. 1820–24, with Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes and J. M. W Turner enjoying an open air walk in the foreground. Courtesy of the Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection

commissioned by Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes between 1817 and 1820. Stacked on a stone shelf and languishing in the cellar were approximately 20 pieces of a forgotten porcelain service that proved to be Nantgarw porcelain and clearly part of the missing service alluded to by Dr John (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017; John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). The Nantgarw porcelain Farnley Hall service had been located! Upon a preliminary inspection, there was a clear indication that it was London-decorated from the dentil gilt edging on all of the pieces and that it could also be classified as a Nantgarw Brace type generic service with five or six vignettes of single garden flowers, fruit and exotic birds in a Nantgarw embossed edged reserve relief and beribboned moulding, each piece displaying a central bouquet of garden flowers. The smaller flat-wares were also marked with an impressed NANT-GARW C.W.; some of the larger pieces were not marked with the Nantgarw impressed mark but had several impressed numerals ranging from 1 to 7, which indicated their size. There were several large circular and oblong platters and also some exquisitely fine small tureen or sauce comport stands and deep dessert dishes marked with the impressed NANT-GARW C.W. mark. Quite a few pieces were damaged, and several had been restored and riveted, which reflected the hard domestic use to which this service had been put in Farnley Hall. The missing Farnley Hall service had been located at last—and it was still in Farnley Hall!

3.1 An Estimate of the Original Farnley Hall Nantgarw Service Composition

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Fig. 3.6 An etching of Farnley Hall, ca., 1830, by J. P. Neale for his book entitled Gentlemen’s Seats: Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland, H.W. Bond for Sherwood, Jones & Co., Paternoster Row, London, London, 1830. Public domain

3.1 An Estimate of the Original Farnley Hall Nantgarw Service Composition Dr John has stated in his seminal book on Nantgarw Porcelain (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) that the Farnley Hall service was a particularly large example of a combined dinner-dessert service. Dr John (Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) commented that the original service was a substantial combined dinner-dessert service that was significantly in excess of 100 pieces, indeed he believed that the original service might have had 100 plates, and would thus have probably been accompanied by a wide range of serving dishes, comports, vegetable and sauce tureens with lids and stands, and perhaps even including ice-pails originally, which would have increased the service complement to approximately 200 pieces.

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In his description of Nantgarw porcelain shapes Dr John cites the composition of a typical dessert service from his observation of existing surviving examples at the time such as that of Morgan Williams at Aberpergwm House in the Vale of Neath; this type of service would have possessed a combination of plates and dishes of different shapes and designs based upon the standard factory exemplars. The Aberpergwm collection of fine Nantgarw porcelain, single items and services, was dispersed in 1946 (John et al., The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, 1975) Thus, the largest Nantgarw plates were made for the dinner services and were of a diameter between 91/2 and 10 inches (24.1–25.4 cm). The corresponding measurements of three Nantgarw dinner plates in the author’s collection, all from named services, come within this range of diameters, namely, 24.1 cm for the Duke of Cambridge dinner service, 25.1 cm for the Baron Phipps of Normanby dinner service and 25.2 cm for the Lady Seaton service. Two of these, namely the Baron Phipps and Lady Seaton exemplars, have the raised scroll characteristic Nantgarw embossed moulded border with ribbons, foliage, florets and bows and this separates them stylistically from the plain-edged Duke of Cambridge service plate, which is also of a significantly smaller size, being 1 cm smaller in diameter and at the extreme edge of the range of measurements for dinner plates given by Dr John. The dessert service plates that Dr John measured were of varying sizes and were generally between 81/2 and 83/4 inches in diameter (21.5–22.3 cm) and were often accompanied with twelve indentations; the measurement of a moulded Nantgarw scroll dessert plate from the Sir John and Lady Williams Nantgarw service in the author’s possession is 21.6 cm, again within this range quoted by Dr John. Dr John does highlight the larger variety of plate sizes which could also be selected for a C-scroll-moulded dessert service, the largest piece that he had experienced was a circular centrepiece mounted on a small pedestal with a diameter of 101/2 inches (26.7 cm) and having twelve indentations, giving six divisions or vignettes for edge decoration but these were comparatively rarely found. The most commonly manufactured dessert plate with a C-scroll border had either 10 or 12 smaller indentations, providing five or six divisions, or vignettes, for decoration: for example, the Sir John and Lady Williams dessert plate has twelve indentations and six divisions or vignettes, each of which bore an enamelled small single pink rose and foliage. This service is also profusely gilded in the French Empire style of baroque revived rococo, which was then finding favour with the Regency clientele in London. A slightly smaller type of dessert plate was described by Dr John with a diameter between 81/4 and 81/2 inches (20.9–21.5 cm): these he presumed were dual-functional as they were usually supplied as pairs with tea services for use as central plates for biscuits or cakes etc. but could also be ordered by the client to serve as auxiliary sweetmeat plates in dessert services. Even smaller plates of diameter 71/4 inches (18.4 cm) could be provided as tureen stands with an additional concentric moulding, these being particularly attractive especially when supplied with an additional acanthus leaf moulding situated around the centre and these often were accompanied by small tureens and lids with a similar applied design. The selection of dishes to accompany the dessert services as centrepieces involved square, oval, shell and oblong shapes and occasionally a shallow and oval centre dish on a pedestal is found, which Dr John maintains is the largest piece that was

3.1 An Estimate of the Original Farnley Hall Nantgarw Service Composition

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made at Nantgarw, being of height 61/2 inches and of a maximum diameter 111/2 inches (16.5 and 29.2 cm, respectively). These centrepieces sometimes come with an additional and attractive four-armed cruciform moulding. Small tureens, covers and stands would also be part of a dessert service for the serving of cream and fruit sauces. Then, additionally, the presence of ice-pails, liners and covers would be optionally provided for the serving of chilled fruits and desserts which were maintained inside a ceramic liner that was refrigerated by sitting in crushed ice. A very rare and unusual item that was supplied to order for a service was a porcelain ladle; only one of these is referred to specifically in the literature for Nantgarw porcelain and that accompanied a dessert tureen, lid and stand in the Duke of Norfolk service (John et al., The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, Illustration 61, 1975): these ladles, when supplied would probably have had a rather short lifetime as they were very prone to damage through collision with the edge of the sauce or vegetable tureens and households would probably have preferred to use silver ladles which were more compatible with their cutlery, especially when these involved armorial crested markings (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). In contrast, the Nantgarw dinner service composition is not specified in such detail by Dr John but this would necessarily include the provision of deep soup dishes and larger tureens for soup and vegetables, both of which would come with lids and stands, and smaller tureens for creams and sauces. Large platters of various sizes for serving the meat and fish courses would also be provided, perhaps including perforated drainers which sufficed to keep the meat free from sitting in its own juices. The soup dishes in dinner services often doubled functionally as deep dessert dishes in dessert services. It was possible to order combined dinner-dessert services with a matching en suite decoration, which would of course increase the size of the commissioned service order significantly. Of direct relevance to the theme of this book is the statement made by Dr John and quoted earlier that the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service was especially large and would have originally contained at least a hundred plates of different sizes, plus an appropriate number of accompanying dishes, comports and tureens. Unfortunately, Dr John does not refer to his source of knowledge regarding the existence, the composition and size of the Farnley Hall service and it is not clear if he actually saw this service as he did not comment upon its decoration, as has happened with most of the other service examples that he described and indeed he often supplied photographs or illustrations of these. The basis for his estimation of the size of the Farnley Hall service must therefore be considered rather conjectural, but it is quite possible that he did have access to documentation that is no longer extant: for example, when the ceramics retail business of John Mortlock closed in 1933, the records of their sales and purchases from the 18th Century onwards were archived in London. Dr John might well have been able to access and to consult these records for the preparation of his book (which was published in 1948) as he comments elsewhere on Swansea and Nantgarw porcelain services that were personally acquired by John Mortlock for his own use and which were later dispersed and he describes their decoration in some detail. It is a quite credible hypothesis that during his inspection of the Mortlock archives that he encountered the commission for a large Nantgarw service placed

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by Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes of Farnley Hall and that this entry would specifically describe the size and composition of the service. How else would Dr John have even been able to estimate the size of the service, let alone that it had 100 plates! Sadly, these archival records were destroyed in the London Blitz in the early to mid-1940s and are no longer available for consultation by researchers. It was made clear to the author by Mr Guy Horton-Fawkes that the remnants of the Farnley Hall service must have been deposited in the cellar at Farnley Hall for some considerable time prior to its re-discovery by ourselves a few years ago, so there is no other feasible explanation for Dr John acquiring his precise knowledge of its existence. A typical dessert service would comprise 24 plates, 4 circular dishes, 4 shell dishes, 4 oval dishes and 4 square dishes, with 2 small tureens, covers and stands and one round centre dish and stand with possibly the inclusion of an oval centrepiece as well. In all, therefore, such a dessert service would have perhaps up to 52 pieces maximum for a 24-place setting, but usually these services are believed to have anything upwards of some 42 or 43 pieces in number as dictated by the preference of the client. If one now attempts to estimate the size of the original Farnley Hall combined dinner and dessert service, taking into account Dr John’s statement that it contained a hundred plates as a baseline, then the following composition is arrived at: 24, dessert plates, 24 dinner plates, 24 deep soup/dessert dishes, 24 smaller side plates, 4 circular fruit dishes, 4 square dishes, 4 oval dishes, 4 shell dishes, 4 dessert tureens, covers and stands, 4 soup tureens, covers and stands, 4 sauce tureens, covers and stands, 4 vegetable tureens, covers and stands, 4 sauce/gravy tureens, covers and stands, 2 ice-pails, liners and lids, 2 pedestal centrepieces and stands, 4 large meat or fish serving platters and drainers and an indefinable number of medium size and smaller serving platters.

This gives an estimated total for the Farnley Hall combined dinner-dessert service of approximately 194 pieces; clearly, there is no way that this can be verified as the records of John Mortlock’s China agency in Oxford Street, London, who most certainly supplied the Farnley Hall service to Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, were destroyed in the London Blitz in the early 1940s. It is quite possible, of course, that some items in the above estimate were not ordered and others may have been substituted or numbers of other items even increased, but in any case it must be acknowledged that this service would have been probably of a significantly larger complement than the normal size of Nantgarw porcelain service.

3.2 The Farnley Hall Service Today Today, the remaining survivors from the Farnley Hall service number just 19 pieces, some 10% of the estimated original size, and indeed many of these survivors are showing evidence of damage incurred by heavy domestic use and damage through

3.2 The Farnley Hall Service Today

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storage over the past two hundred years. The surviving pieces of the Nantgarw Farnley Hall service are catalogued in Table 3.1. In summary, these now comprise: Three tureen stands; one dinner plate; five deep dessert dishes; eight oblong platters of various dimensions (Small, Medium and Large) and two large circular serving plates. The large circular serving plates and the largest size oblong platters can now definitively lay claim to be candidates for the largest pieces of Nantgarw porcelain ever manufactured as they exceed Dr John’s statement of the largest centrepiece comport manufactured at Nantgarw which he recorded as being some 29.2 cm in diameter (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). The two surviving Farnley Hall large circular serving plates exceed this by 1.7 cm diameter and the two largest oblong platters by 7.2 cm in length on their major axis. The largest oblong platters must also be the heaviest pieces manufactured at Nantgarw as they are very thickly potted to retain their rigidity and have thereby lost much of their celebrated translucency as a result, with weights approaching 2.2 kg each; in comparison, the weight of a standard size Nantgarw dinner plate is 500 g. The volume of porcelain paste in the largest Farnley Hall service platter is, therefore, approximately 500% more than in the large dinner plate so it must have been a challenge for Billingsley and Walker to manufacture these very large and heavy porcelain items without them suffering serious kiln distortion, warping and sagging. However, even the largest pieces of this service still retain their Nantgarw embossed beribboned moulding quite clearly without loss of definition as can be seen in the appropriate Figures given below. Each piece of the Farnley Hall service has been measured dimensionally and photographed; the dimensions are given in Table 3.1 along with the description of each piece and the photographs are shown here in the order that the pieces appear in Table 3.1, namely: Tureen stands: Figs. 3.7, 3.8 and 3.9; Deep dishes: Figs. 3.10, 3.11, 3.12, 3.13 and 3.14; Dinner plate: Fig. 3.15; Large circular serving plates: Figs. 3.16 and 3.17; Small oblong serving platters: Figs. 3.18, 3.19, 3.20 and 3.21; Medium oblong serving platters: Figs. 3.22 and 3.23; Large oblong serving platters: Figs. 3.24 and 3.25.

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Table 3.1 Surviving porcelain comprising the Farnley Hall Nantgarw porcelain service in 2022 Markeda Bearded Floretsc tulipb

Item

Measurements/cm Vignettes Reserve Added Decoration features

1. Tureen stand

Diameter 18.3, depth 2.6

6

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed Yes 1; butterfly

No

2. Tureen stand

Diameter 18.3, depth 2.6

6

4 flowers, 1 fruit, 1 bird

Yes

Yes

2

3. Tureen stand

Diameter 18.4, depth 2.7

6

4 flowers, 1 fruit, 1 bird

Butterfly; insect at edge

Yes

Yes

2

4. Deep dish

Diameter 24.0, depth 4.8

5

4 flowers, 1 fruit

Yes

Yes

2

5. Deep dish

Diameter 23.8, depth 4.9

5

4 flowers, 1 fruit

Yes

No

2

6. Deep dish

Diameter 23.8, depth 4.9

5

4 flowers, 1 fruit

Yes

Yes

2

7. Deep dish

Diameter 24.1, depth 4.8

5

4 flowers, 1 fruit

2 Yes Butterflies

No

2

8. Deep dish

Diameter 24.1, depth 4.9

5

5 flowers

Butterfly

Yes

No

2

9. Dinner plate

Diameter 24.9

6

4 flowers, 1 fruit, 1 bird

Butterfly

Yes

No

2

10. Serving plate

Diameter 31.8, depth 3.9

6

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 7; mothsd

Yes

2, 1, 0

11. Serving plate

Diameter 31.9, depth 4.0

6

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 7; insect

Yes

2, 1, 0

12. Platter

L 28.5, W 21.7, D 6 3.2

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed Yes 7

Yes

2, 1, 0

13. Platter

L 28.4, W 21.7, D 6 3.1

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 2, 7

No

2, 1, 0

14. Platter

L 28.4, W 21.9, D 6 3.1

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 2, 7

No

2, 1, 0

15. Platter

L 28.4, W 21.9, D 6 3.2

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 2, 7

Yes

2, 1, 0

16. Platter

L 32.6, W 24.9, D 6 3.7

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 3; mothsd

No

1

17. Platter

L 32.5, W 24.9, D 6 3.7

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 3, 7; mothsd Insect at edge

No

1

18. Platter

L 36.5, W 27.3, D 6 3.9

5 flowers, 1 bird

Impressed No 4, 7

Yes

0

Butterfly

2

(continued)

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Table 3.1 (continued) Item

Measurements/cm Vignettes Reserve Added Decoration features

19. Platter

L 36.4, W 27.3, D 6 3.9

5 flowers, 1 bird

Markeda Bearded Floretsc tulipb

Impressed No 4; mothsd

No

0

L: length, W: width, D: depth. a Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W. b Indicates the presence of a bearded tulip on the enamelled decoration c Observation of the number of florets encompassed by the right hand side acanthus leaf C-scroll embossed moulding d Moths, mosquitoes or insects in groups painted on underside of the piece to mask blemishes

Fig. 3.7 Nantgarw porcelain small circular sauce tureen stand, diameter 18.3 cm, depth 2.6 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed NANT-GARW C.W. beneath an impressed 1, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one with an exotic bird on a branch with a central bouquet of garden flowers extending into the cavetto. One floral vignette also has an insect or a butterfly that has alighted upon it. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.8 Nantgarw porcelain small circular sauce tureen stand, en suite with that in Fig. 3.7, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., diameter 18.3 cm, depth 2.6 cm. Characteristic Nantgarw edgemoulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding and decorated with six vignettes comprising four of flowers, one of fruit and one with an exotic bird on a branch with a central bouquet of garden flowers extending into the cavetto. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

The 19 pieces of the Farnley Hall service are all based on the embossed Nantgarw beribboned moulding with a central floral decoration and vignettes which contain enamelled decoration of flowers, fruit and exotic birds and can be assigned generically to a Brace-type service as indicated earlier. Before an analysis of their compositional artistic details is made it is necessary to evaluate some of the basic characteristics of the Nantgarw Brace decoration and to establish the criteria underlying the different types of embossed mouldings that can occur on generic services of this type. This will be explored and amplified in the next Chapter.

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Fig. 3.9 Nantgarw porcelain small circular sauce tureen stand, en suite with that in Fig. 3.7, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., diameter 18.4 cm, depth 2.7 cm. Characteristic Nantgarw edgemoulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding and decorated with six vignettes comprising four of flowers, one of fruit and one with an exotic bird on a branch with a central bouquet of garden flowers extending into the cavetto. A butterfly is placed at the edge of the rim in the cavetto to mask a small blemish in the porcelain substrate. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Two further photographs of interest are shown in Figs. 3.26 and 3.27, revealing groups of mosquitoes and moths, respectively, which have been strategically positioned on the undersides of the rims of the medium and large oblong serving platters of the Farnley Hall service to mask blemishes in the glazed porcelain body. In Fig. 3.27 the uppermost moth can be seen to be situated near a blemish in the glaze which has been caused by a gas (carbon dioxide) bubble which must have appeared during the glost firing; another small black blemish (probably a carbon particle) to the right of this is seen to be covered by an applied small flower bud in blue enamel. It was noted that occasionally on other items of the Farnley Hall service, insects and multicoloured small butterflies also appeared at random on the upper faces of the rims of several pieces presumably for a similar purpose designed to mask small surface blemishes. According to John Haslem (Haslem, The Old Derby China Factory: The Workmen and their Productions. Containing Details of their Chief Artist Workmen, the Various Marks Used, Fac-Similes Copied from the Old Derby Pattern Books, the Original Price List of More than 400 Figures and Groups, Etc., Etc., 1876) William Duesbury,

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3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Fig. 3.10 Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.0 cm, depth 4.8 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edgemoulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers exhibiting a bearded tulip in orange pigment. A butterfly is placed in the cavetto but this seemingly is for decoration only as it does not mask a blemish in the substrate. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

the proprietor of the Derby China Works, instructed his decorators in the enamelling workshop to exercise some restraint in their masking of small blemishes in the porcelain pieces they were preparing for decoration because a too prevalent insertion of insects and butterflies in such circumstances would actually draw attention to the number of small irregularities and defects they were designed to mask! Figure 3.28, shows the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service in its entirety (minus two pieces, namely a tureen stand and a deep dish, that had been selected for prior removal for analytical chemical purposes prior to the photograph being taken) placed on the surface of a mid-Victorian mahogany loo table set with 18th Century Chippendale style chairs by Gillows of Lancaster in the saloon of Farnley Hall.

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Fig. 3.11 Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 23.8 cm, depth 4.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire Fig. 3.12 Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.1 cm, depth 4.8 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.13 Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.1 cm, depth 4.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising four of flowers and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Two butterflies are strategically placed in this exemplar. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire Fig. 3.14 Nantgarw porcelain deep dish, diameter 24.1 cm, depth 4.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.10, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with five vignettes comprising five of flowers and none of fruit or birds with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.15 Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, diameter 24.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed NANT-GARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising four of flowers, one of fruit and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. A butterfly has been placed on the foliage. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.16 Nantgarw porcelain large circular serving plate, diameter 31.8 cm, depth 3.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with a Fig. 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Has an insect placed on the foliage. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Fig. 3.17 Nantgarw porcelain large circular serving plate, diameter 31.9 cm, depth 4.0 cm, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.16, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with a Fig. 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.18 Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.5 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.2 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with a Fig. 3.7 on the left hand piece, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers, one of which is a prominent bearded tulip in orange enamel. This item is cracked centrally along the minor axis and is now in two pieces. The right hand piece has the NANT-GARW C.W. impressed mark. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.19 Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.4 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.1 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.18, impressed with the Figs. 3.2 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.20 Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.4 cm, width 21.9 cm and depth 3.1 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.18, impressed with the Figs. 3.2 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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3 A History of Farnley Hall and the Discovery of the Farnley Hall …

Fig. 3.21 Nantgarw porcelain small oblong serving platter, length 28.4 cm, width 21.9 cm and depth 3.2 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.18, impressed with the Figs. 3.2 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.22 Nantgarw porcelain medium oblong serving platter, length 32.6 cm, width 24.9 cm and depth 3.7 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with the Fig. 3.3, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Multicoloured moths are depicted in a group enamelled on the underside Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.23 Nantgarw porcelain medium oblong serving platter, length 32.5 cm, width 24.9 cm and depth 3.7 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.22, impressed with the Figs. 3.3 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Multicoloured moths are depicted in a group enamelled on the underside and an insect painted at the edge rim on the surface. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.24 Nantgarw porcelain large oblong serving platter, length 36.5 cm, width 27.3 cm and depth 3.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, impressed with the Figs. 3.4 and 3.7, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. This piece is a possible candidate for the largest single piece of porcelain produced at the Nantgarw manufactory. Reproduced with the permission of Guy HortonFawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.25 Nantgarw porcelain large oblong serving platter, length 36.4 cm, width 27.3 cm and depth 3.9 cm, from the Farnley Hall service, en suite with that shown in Fig. 3.24, impressed with the Fig. 3.4, cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising five of flowers and one of an exotic bird perched on a branch, with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Multicoloured moths are depicted in a group on the underside. This piece is a possible candidate for the largest single piece of porcelain produced at the Nantgarw manufactory. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.26 Close-up photograph of a group of three mosquitoes placed on the underside of the rim of a platter from the Farnley Hall service of Nantgarw porcelain. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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Fig. 3.27 Close-up photograph of a group of multicoloured moths placed on the underside of the rim of a large serving plate from the Farnley Hall service of Nantgarw porcelain. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

Fig. 3.28 An assemblage of the remaining surviving items comprising the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service set out on a mahogany mid-Victorian circular loo table set with eighteenth century dining chairs made by Gillows of Lancaster: two pieces of the service are missing from this photograph, namely a tureen stand and a deep dessert dish, as they were away for chemical analysis but their dimensions and description are included in Table 3.1. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

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References D. Blayney-Brown, Joseph Mallord William Turner, 1775–1851, artist’s biography, in J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours (The Tate Gallery Research Publications, London, December 2012) Sir B. Burke, A Genealogical and Heraldic List of the Landed Gentry of Great Britain and Ireland, 6th ed. (Harrison & Sons, St Martin’s Lane, London, 1879) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China (SpringerNature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2022) J. Fairbairn, Crests of the Families of Great Britain and Ireland and Their Kindred in Other Lands, vol. I and II. (T.C. and E.C. Jack, Edinburgh and London, 1905; New Orchard Publishing, London, 1986) Farnley Hall, Otley, House Brochure, The Home of Mr and Mrs G.N. le G. Horton-Fawkes (Engraving Services Ltd, Manchester, Date of Publication not supplied) J. Haslem, The Old Derby China Factory: The Workmen and their Productions. Containing Details of their Chief Artist Workmen, the Various Marks Used, Fac-Similes Copied from the Old Derby Pattern Books, the Original Price List of More than 400 Figures and Groups, Etc., Etc. (George Bell & Sons Covent Garden, London, 1876: reprinted by E.P. Publishing, Wakefield, 1973) E. Jacklin, Natural History Studies, ca. 1820–1824, in J.M.W. Turner: Sketches, Drawings and Watercolours, ed. by D. Blayney-Brown. (Tate Gallery Research Publications, London, July 2017) W. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) W.D. John, K.A. Coombes, G.J. Coombes, The Nantgarw Porcelain Album (The Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1975) J.P. Neale, Gentlemen’s Seats: Views of the Seats of Noblemen and Gentlemen in England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland (H.W. Bond for Sherwood, Jones & Co., Paternoster Row, London, 1830)

Chapter 4

The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Abstract The assignment of the Farnley Hall service to the generic Nantgarw service type known as a Brace service demands a comprehensive review of what artefacts currently belong to this classification, which is undertaken here. The differences in composition of the decorative symbols and motifs which underpin the Brace service definition are reviewed, especially regarding the variation in the topics portrayed in the vignettes located between the C-scrolls of the embossed moulded Nantgarw artefact border. Attempted identification of the artist enamellers involved in the London decoration of the Farnley Hall service is undertaken, one of whom is correlated with the mysterious “de Junic”. Keywords Brace service type · Embossed Nantgarw porcelain moulding · Dentil edge gilding · Decorated vignettes of flowers · Fruit and exotic birds · De Junic

4.1 The Nantgarw Brace Service Undoubtedly one of the most attractively decorated Nantgarw services with its characteristic embossed and beribboned moulded border is the Brace service, depicting exquisitely painted fruit, birds and flowers, examples of which command high prices at auction and are very desirable acquisitions amongst most collectors of Welsh porcelain. It derived its name from the presentation of a dessert service of Nantgarw porcelain made to the Rt. Honourable William Brace MP PC in the early 20th Century. William Brace was born in Risca, Monmouthshire, in 1865 and died in Newport in 1947; he was one of six children of Thomas and Anne Brace and started work in his local colliery at the age of 12, becoming a trades union activist and local agent for the Monmouthshire Miners’ Association, Vice-President (to William Abraham, Mabon) of the South Wales Miners Federation and finally their President between 1912 and 1915. He was elected as a Liberal-Labour MP for South Glamorgan in 1906 and served in Lloyd George’s wartime government as Under-Secretary of State for Home Affairs, becoming a Privy Counsellor in 1916. He was critical of what he perceived to be wildcat union leadership and resigned as MP in 1920, taking the position then of Labour Adviser to the Ministry of Mines (Morgan, Rebirth of

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_4

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

a Nation: Wales 1880–1980, 1981). At this point he received the gift of the Nantgarw dessert service from the National Union of Mineworkers for dedicated long service and steering them through troublesome times. The Nantgarw Brace service was dispersed after his death in 1947. In terms of its classification, therefore, the Brace service must be in the category of a named service by association and in the absence of any factory or retail china agency and atelier records its provenance regarding its original commission is now lost (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017). However, the Brace service appellation is now generically applied to Nantgarw dessert porcelain service items that have the characteristic Nantgarw edge moulding of ribbons, stars and foliage, which are exquisitely enamelled with a central bouquet of garden flowers and containing between four and six vignettes in the reserve, comprising a combination of exotic birds, fruit and flowers, accompanied by only minimal gilding in the characteristic London dentil-edge fashion. It was never recorded that this Nantgarw service was an especially large one and it can be assumed that it comprised a standard dessert service which as we have seen could number up to 42 or more items and a maximum of around 52 pieces of porcelain. Superbly decorated exemplars that belong en suite to the Brace service frequently appear at auctions, where they invariably command high sale prices, and this could imply that there were several such services that were originally commissioned of this generic type. Intriguingly, there is no mention specifically of the origin of this Brace service of Nantgarw porcelain in any of the three earlier accounts of the Nantgarw manufactory, namely those of William Turner (Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of The Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks, 1897), Ernest Morton Nance (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942) and Dr William John (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) although all give extensive coverage to the workshop decorating activities of James Bradley and Son, 54 and 47 Pall Mall, London, where the original Brace service is now believed by connoisseurs to have been decorated. Dr John does illustrate a Nantgarw square dessert dish of what we would now describe as typifying a Brace dessert service component, but he erroneously attributes it to the work of the Robins & Randall atelier in Islington, London (Illustration Plate 31 B in Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). In addition, he does not mention it specifically as being part of a Nantgarw named service but credits it as being in the porcelain collection of the Rt. Hon. William Brace MP. This error in atelier attribution was first exposed by Oliver Fairclough in his critique of the Robins & Randall atelier attribution (Fairclough 1997) through the obvious stylistic similarities between the decoration of the Brace service item illustrated in Dr John’s book with similar pieces of Swansea porcelain decorated at the atelier of Bradley & Co. of 54 and 47, Pall Mall, and inscribed as such in an enamelled script on their base. It is natural that Dr John would have assumed that the atelier responsible for the artistic decoration of the Brace service to be Robins & Randall as these were the prime decorators of choice employed by John Mortlock for his commissions (along with the alternative atelier of John Sims at Pimlico); being London decorated, it is a sine qua non that such a service would have been ordered originally through

4.1 The Nantgarw Brace Service

85

Mortlock’s of Oxford Street as John Mortlock had negotiated the supply of almost all the Nantgarw porcelain output that was perfect from William Billingsley in 1817. Clearly, the Brace service nomenclature has been acquired relatively recently and is now being applied generically to similarly decorated Nantgarw porcelains, which credibly perhaps could all emanate specifically from the workshop of Bradley & Co. situated at 54 and 47, Pall Mall, London. To evaluate the assignment of Nantgarw porcelain pieces to a potential generic “Brace service” nomenclature, it was therefore decided to investigate the assignment of Brace-type items from a survey of the auction sales and ceramics literature to estimate what the criteria would be, and if any could be applied, for their attribution and assignment to this category. A listing of the results of this search is presented in Table 4.1 and an evaluation of the data follows below: • Of the 30 Nantgarw porcelain items listed in Table 4.1 which have all been recorded and classified by others as Brace service in type, two exemplars from the Farnley Hall service have also been included for comparison purposes, namely a tureen stand and a deep dish which have been illustrated here in Figs. 3.7 and 3.10. • The remaining 28 pieces comprise 3 square dessert dishes, 1 tureen stand and 24 plates; it was not specified whether these were dinner or dessert plates, but probably they can be assumed to be dessert plates as the original Brace service was described historically as a dessert service although it would not necessarily exclude dinner plates if their decoration scheme also complied with the generic type. • The number of vignettes in the reserve moulding vary with the type of specimen exemplar, being 4 for the small square dessert dishes, 5 for the deeper dessert plates and 6 for the dessert plates and tureen stand. • The composition of the vignettes varies significantly in their depiction of flowers, fruit and exotic birds: the flowers:fruit:exotic birds decoration ratio is normally 4:1:1 and this ratio appears on 13 of the 30 items surveyed here (43%). However, the variation in flowers:fruit:exotic birds appearing in the six-vignetted examples appears over a range of ratios comprising 2:3:1, 5:0:1, 3:1:2, 2:2:2, 6:0:0, 4:2:0 and 4:1:1, in the four-vignetted examples as 2:1:1 and in the five-vignetted examples as 3:2:0 and 4:1:0. In summary, there are, therefore, no fewer than 10 different vignette ratio combinations of flowers; fruit; exotic birds in the 30 items surveyed, which all encompass a Brace service declaration and assignment. • Despite the variation in the number of vignettes decorated and their variable subject composition, there is an apparent consistency in the display of the central decoration as always comprising a bouquet of garden flowers, except for a solitary example in the list which is still nevertheless advertised (correctly or incorrectly) as a Brace service plate, where the central feature is an exotic bird perched on foliage. This is itemised here in the list as No. 22, with five vignettes comprising 3 of flowers, 2 of fruit and none of an exotic bird. It seems standard practice that for other central bird features illustrated elsewhere, the decoration then generally omits the bird from the vignettes and depicts these as comprising fruit and flowers

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Table 4.1 Nantgarw generic Brace type service pieces and their characteristicsa Piece No

Description

No. of vignettes

Flowers

Fruit

Birds

Bearded tulip

Dentil gilt edging

Special featureb

1

Tureen stand

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

Farnley Hall service

2

Deep dish

5

4

1

0

Yes

Yes

Farnley Hall service

3

Plate

6

2

3

1

No

Yes

4

Plate

6

4

1

1

Yes

Yes

5

Plate

6

5

0

1

No

Yes

6

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

7

Plate

6

3

1

2

No

Yes

8

Plate

6

4

1

1

Yes

Yes

9

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

10

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

11

Plate

6

4

1

1

Yes

Yes

12

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

13

Plate

6

3

1

2

No

Yes

14

Plate

6

2

2

2

No

Yes

15

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

16

Plate

6

6

0

0

Yes

Yes

17

Plate

6

4

1

1

Yes

Yes

18

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

19

Plate

6

3

1

2

No

Yes

20

Plate

6

4

1

1

Yes

Yes

21

Plate

6

3

1

2

No

Yes

22

Plate

5

3

2

0

No

Yes

23

Plate

6

4

2

0

No

Yes

24

Square dessert dish

4

2

1

1

No

Yes

25

Square dessert dish

4

2

1

1

No

Yes

26

Plate

6

4

2

0

No

Yes

27

Plate

6

4

1

1

No

Yes

28

Plate

6

6

0

0

No

Yes

29

Tureen stand

6

2

2

2

No

Yes

Bird central feature Brace: John Illus 31B

Morton Nance CLXXXIE Attributed to Pardoe

Gambon Illus N50 (continued)

4.1 The Nantgarw Brace Service

87

Table 4.1 (continued) Piece No

Description

No. of vignettes

Flowers

Fruit

Birds

Bearded tulip

Dentil gilt edging

Special featureb

30

Square dish

4

2

1

1

No

Yes

Gambon Illus N51

a Taken

from auction sales descriptors and the ceramics literature where appropriate

b References:

Farnley Hall service: this book Gambon, Fergus, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw porcelain), Plas Glyn-y Weddw, Llanbedrog, Pwllheli, Gwynedd, 2016 John, William D., Nantgarw Porcelain, Ceramic Book Co., Newport, 1948 Morton Nance, Ernest, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, B.T. Batsford & Son, London, 1942 Others: Messrs. Christies, Sothebys, Bonhams, Auctioneers and Valuers, London

only. This is certainly manifest for the Swansea porcelain service analogues which display a similar composition with a central exotic bird decoration, as will be shown later in Figs. 4.11, 4.12, 4.13, 4.14 and 4.15. • Item No. 24 in the list is the square dessert dish illustrated in Dr John’s book (Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948, Illustration 31B) where it is accredited to the collection of the Rt. Hon. William Brace MP—which must then truly be representative as the original exemplar and forerunner of the generic Brace service! An illustration of a Brace service square dessert dish is shown in Fig. 4.1. The reference to this in Dr John’s book on Nantgarw porcelain (Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) is the first mention of Nantgarw porcelain and William Brace occurring together in the Welsh ceramics literature. William Brace died in 1947 and thereafter it seems that his porcelain collection was dispersed; this would have occurred after Dr John’s book was published. The connotation and appellation of “Brace service”, therefore probably appeared a while later and was used to describe his Nantgarw porcelain service items as well as others that have now become generically associated with this type of London decoration involving the Nantgarw embossed beribboned moulding, dentil edged gilding and a decoration scheme of flowers, fruit and exotic birds in the edge vignettes accompanying a central bouquet of flowers. A dessert plate from the Brace service which is decorated en suite with the square dessert dish in Fig. 4.1 is shown in Fig. 4.2. • Item No. 26 in the list is a curious blend of mismatched data; a pictorial illustration of a moulded Nantgarw dessert plate which in all respects comes within the category of a Brace-type piece as described above, with six vignettes in the ratio of 4:2:0 for flowers:fruit:birds and a central bouquet of flowers and dentil-edge gilding. However, this has been attributed to the local decoration of Thomas Pardoe by Ernest Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942), which is now clearly incorrect as Thomas Pardoe never decorated for the London ateliers and the implication is therefore it was locally decorated at

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Fig. 4.1 Nantgarw porcelain, square dessert dish from the Brace service, marked impressed NANTGARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with four vignettes comprising two of flowers, one of a bird on a branch and one of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London

Nantgarw between 1821 and 1823! An independent survey of the feature of dentiledged gilding on Swansea and Nantgarw porcelains has been carried out by this author (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022: Appendix III: Local versus London Decoration of Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains) and it has been determined therefrom that although only some 25% of London-decorated porcelains were accompanied by dentil-edged gilding, locally decorated porcelains from the Nantgarw China Works are never found with this form of edge gilding. Hence, this Brace-type plate would now be better assigned to a London decorator and it is a non sequitur to attribute it to the local decoration of Thomas Pardoe at the Nantgarw China Works. • Items 29 and 30 in the list are Brace-service exemplars from the Andrews Collection at Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, which was surveyed by Fergus Gambon (Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016) and shown there in his book as illustrations N50 and N51: the first of these comprises three pieces in the form of a sauce tureen, lid and stand, but of these only the tureen stand has been included in Table 4.1 as the flowers:fruit:birds composition of the tureen and lid cannot be assessed from the photograph in Fergus Gambon’s book. Illustration N51 is a square dish with four vignettes and a flowers:fruit:exotic birds ratio of 2:1:1, compared with

4.1 The Nantgarw Brace Service

89

Fig. 4.2 Nantgarw porcelain, dessert plate from the Brace service, marked impressed NANTGARW C.W., cruciform moulding with characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Decorated with six vignettes comprising three of flowers, one of a bird on a branch and two of fruit with a central bouquet of garden flowers. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London

the six vignettes on the N50 tureen stand which display a corresponding 2:2:2 ratio for flowers:fruit:exotic birds. In summary, it is clear that a Brace service type classification for Nantgarw porcelain as used today is not strictly definitive per se and can therefore encompass a rather wide variety of decoration, unlike other analogous service types; examples from the Nantgarw porcelain portfolio include the Duke of Cambridge, Duke of Gloucester and Marquess of Anglesey named services, for which several small variations have been noted in the composition of the eight vignettes (comprising 4 landscapes, 2 birds and 2 floral sprays in the original version of the Duke of Cambridge service), the density of the oeuil-de-perdrix ground decoration (in the Duke of Gloucester service) and the floral wreath composition (in the Marquess of Anglesey service), respectively, for other service “copies” of each type. For the Brace service genre, the discovery of the Duchess of Richmond Nantgarw dessert service (Fig. 4.3), comprising some 20 pieces of a part dessert service including square and oval dishes, and now the recent discovery of the Farnley Hall service, have both been added to complement the range of Brace-type porcelain known to be in the public domain (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). The common feature of all the Brace-type service items that have been categorised thus far is their exemplary high quality of decoration on the finest Nantgarw porcelain body substrates and our next quest must be to try and determine the origin of such decoration and, additionally, if it was the product of just one London atelier or perhaps of several

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Fig. 4.3 Nantgarw porcelain, Duchess of Richmond dessert service, of the generic Brace type, comprising two shell dishes, one central pedestal comport, two circular small sauce tureen stands, one oval dish, one large square dessert dish, three medium square dessert dishes, one small square dessert dish, and ten dessert plates, all with characteristic Nantgarw moulded border and dentil edge gilding. Decorated centrally with garden flowers and varying numbers of vignettes namely, four, five and six, with indefinable compositions of flowers, fruit and exotic birds

that were engaged in the decoration of Nantgarw porcelains through the agency of John Mortlock of Oxford Street when he had secured the commercial monopoly of supply from William Billingsley at the Nantgarw China Works.

4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers John Mortlock, who negotiated with William Billingsley in 1817 for the majority of the Nantgarw china production in the white (i.e. glazed, biscuit porcelain) to be sent to his China retail agency in Oxford Street, London, for decoration on commission at his chosen ateliers had certainly assumed the absolute control of the distribution of Nantgarw porcelain in the capital. He visited the Nantgarw China Works site and announced to William Billingsley that he could not acquire sufficient of this desirable commodity to satisfy the demands of his wealthy clients, who were prepared to pay considerable premiums to purchase Nantgarw porcelains from his store. It is recorded that Mortlock would charge a premium of up to 500% for Nantgarw porcelain, which

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91

was said to match or even exceed that of the much-admired Sevres French porcelain at that time, which itself was relatively unobtainable to ardent supporters towards the latter years of the second decade of the 19th Century because of the political situation and turmoil in France at the conclusion of the Napoleonic Wars. Indeed, several Nantgarw services were commissioned by clients of John Mortlock with a decoration in simulation of the Sevres patterns, with the extensive and profuse French Empire style gilding that was then so much in vogue in Regency England. Examples of these are to be found in the Nantgarw Porcelain Album (John et al. 1975) such as those depicted there in Illustrations 45, 52 and 54. Dr John illustrates an example of a dessert service purchased and decorated by John Mortlock personally in the Sevres style of decoration: this service, believed to be the last produced from the Nantgarw China Works and delivered to John Mortlock, comprised 33 pieces of exquisitely fine Nantgarw porcelain which for many years after the closure of the Nantgarw China Works was displayed in his shop window in Oxford Street and labelled there as being “unequalled”. It was only sold after the winding-up of the Mortlock family China business in 1933; it was decorated in the Sevres style with an emerald green border and sumptuous gilding with three vignettes containing floral groups (John et al., The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, Illustration 45, 1975). The fascination with Sevres colours and designs even extended to locally decorated commissions and an example is that of the Greenmeadow service ordered by the influential local industrialist, Wyndham Lewis MP, with a rose du Barri (or rose Pompadour) Sevres pink ground colour decorated by Thomas Pardoe to his commission in 1822. A second Nantgarw service commissioned by Wyndham Lewis MP was more plainly executed but again was painted superbly by Thomas Pardoe in Nantgarw in 1822 and was later sold at auction in 1838 (John et al., The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, Illustration 43, 1975). Undoubtedly, Mortlock’s of Oxford Street was the premier retail China agency in Georgian London and it was a key factor in the sales success of the Nantgarw porcelain manufactory business between 1817 and 1820. In their public advertisements, Mortlocks promoted themselves as “A Pottery for Presents: The Largest Selection of Ornamental China and Glass in London”. He had his ardent clients and the enthusiasm of Mrs Hester Thrale Piozzi Salusbury for their fine porcelain and ceramics is manifest in a letter she wrote to Sir James Fellowes, and she writes: When you feel your purse too heavy take it to MORTLOCK’S in Oxford Street and carry Lady Fellowes a beautiful specimen of South Wales china and tell him I am panting for my ice-pails and large dishes to use this day tonight.

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Although the china business of Mortlock’s was established by John Mortlock (1698–1758) in 1746 in 47, Oxford Street, London, it will come as perhaps a surprise to many readers that there were in fact two independent Mortlock china retailing businesses operating in the capital in the early 19th Century. In 1785, John Mortlock’s grandson William (1747–1801) took over the family business until 1801 when he handed over to his sons in partnership, William (1778–1833) and John (1776–1837). In 1803, their partnership was dissolved, leaving John Mortlock to carry on the family business at 250, Oxford Street whilst William set up a new china retail business nearby at 18, Regent Street. This second Mortlock family business also seemed to thrive although perhaps in the shadow of the John Mortlock Oxford Street business in the early nineteenth century, but in 1860 they provided a Coalport porcelain armorial service for Queen Victoria for use in Buckingham Palace which was simply decorated with a blue Garter band with the motto “Honi Soit Qui Mal y Pense”. John Mortlock favoured two London ceramics enamelling ateliers for executing the decoration on his commissions, namely Richard Robins & Thomas Martin Randall of Barnsbury Street, Spa Fields, Islington, and John Sims of Five Fields’ Road, Pimlico. These ateliers employed recognised artists and renowned enamellers of excellence but also stipulated that the individual identification or marking of an artist’s work on their ceramic pieces would not be countenanced on commissions, although occasionally a mark indicating that the production of a piece had been effected at a particular atelier was appended to a selected piece, usually by the incorporation of a script mark or backstamp. Some examples of this practice being adopted by an atelier and even by John Mortlock to advertise his business on services that were adjudged to be particularly noteworthy or especially beautiful are well recorded (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). The workshop of Robins & Randall had over 40 artists working for them during this time and the hands of Thomas Randall and Moses Webster have been identified by connoisseurs on Nantgarw porcelain pieces decorated at their workshop; likewise, in John Sims’ workshop, the hands of James Plant and James Turner have both been identified on Nantgarw porcelain—perhaps the most famous of these is the Nantgarw porcelain plate depicting “The Three Graces” painted by James Plant in John Sims’ workshop (Fig. 4.4). This example of fine Nantgarw porcelain currently holds the sale record for a single piece of Nantgarw at auction, realising the sum of £32,000 in Philip Serrell’s Auction Rooms, Malvern, a few years ago. The plate was commissioned by Sir Thomas Coutts, who in 1763 married Elizabeth (Susan) Starkey by whom he had three daughters: Susan, who married George North, the Earl of Guildford, in 1796, Frances, who married John Crichton-Stuart the Marquess of Bute in 1800 and Sophia, who married Sir Francis Burdett in 1793. Elizabeth Starkey died in 1815 and soon thereafter Sir Thomas married Harriet Mellon, an American actress. The considerable Coutts inheritance eventually passed to Harriet’s step-granddaughter Angela Burdett-Coutts the youngest daughter of Sophia, who then became the most eligible heiress in England. The Three Graces shown on the Nantgarw plate are from left to right, Susan, Frances and Sophia Coutts, and the image was taken from an oil painting by Angelica Kaufmann RA. Another example en suite with this plate

4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers

93

Fig. 4.4 Nantgarw porcelain, dinner plate featuring “The Three Graces”, attributed to the three daughters of Sir Thomas Coutts, banker to King George III, painted by James Plant in John Sims’ atelier in Pimlico, London. Particularly fine gilding pattern with six symmetrically placed arcs of foliage and an inner gilding pattern around the cavetto. Reproduced with the permission of Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Collection at Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

has recently been discovered and has been also assigned to James Plant’s decoration (Fig. 4.5). Some readers may wonder why the discovery of another plate en suite with The Three Graces plate has not demanded that they now be considered as components of another “named” Nantgarw service credited perhaps to Sir Thomas Coutts but there is no evidence that this was the case and they could therefore have been specially commissioned cabinet plates for display only rather than for domestic use. If there had been a Nantgarw porcelain service in the Coutts household it surely would have been inherited by Baroness Angela Burdett-Coutts and have been registered as such, as was the eponymous Swansea porcelain service bearing her name that is now so well-known and appreciated (see discussion below). However, the decoration of Nantgarw porcelain pieces in the capital was apparently not strictly and exclusively accomplished solely in the workshops of Robins & Randall or Sims, and there is now increasing evidence emerging of the decoration of marked Nantgarw pieces which carry the names of other ateliers and workshops on their bases. Two examples of these are the workshops of John Powell, 91, Wimpole Street and James Bradley & Co., 47 and 54 Pall Mall: an example of a marked

94

4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Fig. 4.5 Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, featuring two Georgian dancers, one carrying a tambourine, which is clearly en suite with the plate featuring The Three Graces described in Fig. 4.4. The fine associated gilding exactly matches that shown in Fig. 4.4. Reproduced with the permission of Fergus Gambon Esq., Bonhams Auctioneers and Valuers, Bond Street, London

Nantgarw dessert plate with an embossed moulded border is illustrated in John et al. (The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, Illustration 24, 1975) which is inscribed on the base “J. Powell, 91, Wimpole Street, London” which has a cobalt blue underglaze border ground colour that has long been associated with a local factory decoration by Thomas Pardoe but here is clearly London-decorated and finished, so perhaps this provides a clue that possibly other ateliers were perhaps later purchasing Nantgarw porcelain from Young and Pardoe in the closing years of the Nantgarw China Works between 1821 and 1823? It is intriguing that both of these establishments, namely Bradley & Co. and Powell, were known to provide the decoration of Lewis Dillwyn’s Swansea duck-egg translucent porcelain commissions in London, which presumably they undertook either directly from the manufactory in the white or perhaps were purchased at the later auction sale organised by Timothy and John Bevington, who assumed control of the disposal of the remnant stocks of Swansea porcelain after 1817 when Lewis Dillwyn had ceased to be in charge of the Swansea China Works (John, Swansea Porcelain, 1958). In contrast, there can be no credible mechanism envisaged whereby John Mortlock would have sold on his stock of precious Nantgarw porcelain obtained directly from William Billingsley “in the white” as Billingsley had recorded in an earlier exchange of correspondence with John Coke of the Pinxton China Works that only a minimal profit would result from this action and it was infinitely preferable financially to decorate the porcelain in-house prior to its external sale (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017). What seems to

4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers

95

be clear is that John Mortlock would not have passed Nantgarw china “in the white” to ateliers other than those of Robins & Randall and Sims unless it was financially advantageous to do so as this could also be viewed as his losing his monopoly of the decoration of Nantgarw porcelain in London: a potential reason for this action could be that Mortlock may have had a surge of commissions which his chosen ateliers could not handle over a reasonable time so he would have perhaps seen fit to engage with the equally reputable ateliers of either Bradley & Co. or Powell to undertake the commissioned decoration as a supplement to his preferential use of the Robins & Randall and Sims workshops. It is already known from their signed work with Swansea porcelains of the highest quality that the two decorating workshops of Bradley & Co. and Powell did execute particularly fine and beautiful decoration, which can be considered as being in no way inferior to that carried out by the rival ateliers of Robins & Randall and John Sims. As an exemplar, the most prestigious London-decorated Swansea service, namely the very large Burdett-Coutts dinnerdessert service which was commissioned by Thomas Coutts, banker to King George III, to celebrate his marriage to the actress Harriet Mellon in 1818, was decorated by James Turner in John Sims’ atelier. It has been estimated that this service was one of the largest ever ordered from the Swansea China Works and that it would have comprised almost three hundred pieces originally. It was dispersed in 1922 as part of the estate of Baroness Angela Burdett-Coutts, grand-daughter of Thomas Coutts, who inherited the service through her mother, Frances, one of the Three Graces mentioned above; the remaining items of this service were sold as one lot at the auction of Baroness Burdett-Coutts estate and brought the sum of 1500 guineas, equivalent to almost £100,000 today. Even so, examples of Burdett-Coutts dinner or dessert plates, of which only some 48 are known to have survived today, regularly bring between £1000 and £2000 at auction, so beautiful is their ceramic artistry: an example of a Burdett-Coutts dessert plate is shown in Fig. 4.6. Unfortunately, it is not possible generally to identify unequivocally the individual artists who were employed in the ateliers of Robins & Randall, John Sims, John Powell and James Bradley & Co., with the exception of Moses Webster, Thomas Randall, James Plant and James Turner, who were renowned for their painting on Nantgarw porcelain. It is recorded that Robert Bloor, proprietor of the Derby China Works, visited John Sims’ atelier in 1820 and observed the beautiful painting with landscapes and naval scenes executed by James Plant on Nantgarw porcelain dessert plates, several of which he immediately purchased and instructed his team of decorators at the Derby China Works to copy the scenes and use them as the basis of his new commission for a sumptuous Derby porcelain dessert service that had been ordered by Lord Ongley. Presumably, these plates were being decorated in addition to the stipulated number for a particular commission: Joseph Lygo, the agent at the end of the 18th Century for Derby porcelain in London, kept having to remind William Duesbury to provide extra pieces for his service commissions to allow for breakage and damage caused in transit in wagons using the rather dilapidated and rut-lined roads and turnpikes of the early 19th Century. These additional pieces would then be decorated en suite and potentially retained and used as exemplars of the quality of the finished article for prospective purchasers in the agency showrooms. The Lord

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Fig. 4.6 Swansea duck-egg porcelain, dessert plate from the Burdett-Coutts service, commissioned by Sir Thomas Coutts, banker to King George III, upon the occasion of his marriage to the American actress Harriet Mellon in 1818. London-decorated by James Turner in John Sims’ atelier in Pimlico. Believed to be perhaps the largest service ever commissioned from the Swansea China Works, and estimated originally to exceed 300 pieces. In a Private Collection

Ongley service was certainly one of the most expensive ever made at Derby and Robert Bloor remarked that he was going to levy a charge upon Lord Ongley of 5 guineas per plate (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002)! A specimen of a Lord Ongley Derby dessert plate modelled upon a Nantgarw plate exemplar that was painted by James Plant in John Sims’ atelier and purchased by Robert Bloor is shown in Fig. 4.7, showing children in a snowballing scene, and another naval scene en suite is depicted in Fig. 4.8. The Bloor Derby mark on the underside of these plates is shown in Fig. 4.9 and a close-up of the embossed moulded beribboned edge is shown in Fig. 4.10: the substantive detail of this moulded embossed border will be discussed later in comparison with the Swansea and Nantgarw moulded embossed analogues. After completion of the Lord Ongley service, Robert Bloor disposed of his Nantgarw exemplars from the Sims atelier, which eventually found their way into the Museum of Practical Geology established by Sir Henry de la Beche at Jermyn Street, London, and an example is to be seen today in the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff. The surviving remnants of the Lord Ongley dessert service, now amounting to just six plates and two dessert tureens and stands, are in the porcelain collection at Muncaster Castle, Ravensglass, Cumbria; these were acquired at auction after the dispersal sale of Lord Ongley’s estate in the 1860s and they were identified at Muncaster Castle on a visit made by John Twitchett a few years ago (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). There were obviously several variants produced at Derby and a

4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers

97

Fig. 4.7 Dessert plate from the sumptuous Lord Ongley service, Derby porcelain, Bloor period, ca. 1820, with Nantgarw-style moulded C-scroll border and inspired by James Plant’s Nantgarw decoration at John Sims’ atelier, London, ca. 1817–1819, showing children playing at snowball and vignettes of birds, fruit, flowers and butterflies. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle

most interesting Bloor Derby dessert plate is illustrated in Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, Plate CLXXIIIA, 1942) which shows a boy and a girl holding each other and a similar scene with a boy and girl holding a hurdy-gurdy and a poodle on a Nantgarw dessert plate, with the latter having an embossed beribboned border and six gilded vignettes with landscapes in contrast with the Derby plate having a plain border and a continuous landscape scene, both being identified as being decorated by James Plant in London. The inference is clear, namely, that James Plant must have also decorated Derby porcelain for Robert Bloor at John Sims’ London atelier. It should also be appreciated that it was common practice for an atelier or china decorating workshop to assign several artists for the decoration of a large service commission according to the desired and specified pattern. In this context, some connoisseurs have detected two or more hands at work on the local decoration of the large Swansea porcelain Lysaght service, although it has traditionally been ascribed solely to the hand of Henry Morris only. Similarly, John Twitchett, the Derby porcelain connoisseur, has claimed that he can detect eight different hands involved in the decoration of the large Rothschild (Pattern 100) service of Derby porcelain,

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Fig. 4.8 Dessert plate from the sumptuous Lord Ongley service, Derby porcelain, Bloor period, ca. 1820, with Nantgarw-style moulded C-scroll border and inspired by James Plant’s Nantgarw decoration at John Sims’ atelier, London, ca. 1817–1819, showing a naval scene with a man-o’war in heavy seas and vignettes of birds, fruit, flowers and butterflies. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle

Fig. 4.9 Bloor Derby red stencilled mark on the Lord Ongley service dessert plates; note the surface crazing of the glaze. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter Frost-Pennington Esq., Muncaster Castle

4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers

99

Fig. 4.10 Detailed enlargement of the Nantgarw-type embossed border of the Lord Ongley dessert plate shown in Fig. 4.7; note the asymmetry of the floral embossment and C-scrolls. From the Private Collection at Muncaster Castle, Cumbria. Reproduced with kind permission of Peter FrostPennington Esq., Muncaster Castle

Fig. 4.11 A square dessert dish, Swansea duck-egg porcelain, Brace-type service with Nantgarw type embossed moulding, London-decorated with dentil edge gilding, ca. 1817–1822. Inscribed “The King of the Greater Birds of Paradise” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Fig. 4.12 Swansea porcelain dessert plate, with Nantgarw type moulding, en suite with the square dessert dish shown in Fig. 4.11, London-decorated with dentil edge gilding, ca. 1817–1822, superbly painted and retailed by Bradley and Co, No. 47 Pall Mall, London, as inscribed in red enamel script on the base. After ornithological specimens taken from George Edwards’ A Natural History of Uncommon Birds: And of Some Other Rare and Undescribed Animals, Quadrupeds, Fishes, Reptiles, Insects, &c., Exhibited in Two Hundred and Ten Copper-Plates, from Designs Copied Immediately from Nature and curiously Coloured After Life, 4 Volumes, published between 1743 and 1751: this plate was also inscribed “The Red Coot-Footed Tringa”. One of four dessert plates and a square dessert dish from the same service now in the Andrews Collection, Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Gwynedd. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

although only William Billingsley is credited as being the painter of this service in the Derby China Works pattern books that have survived and are now archived in the Derby China Works Museum (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). In contrast, the artists who were working locally in the decoration of Nantgarw porcelain are generally better known by name, being William Billingsley, William Weston Young, Thomas Pardoe, William Henry Pardoe, Lavinia Billingsley, Kitty (?) and William Pegg the Younger. The latter was known to be at Nantgarw with William Billingsley, with whom he had worked at the Derby China Works at the end of the 18th Century, however, his work has been said to be very similar in style to that of William Billingsley and has yet to be identified unequivocally on locally-decorated Nantgarw porcelain examples. A locally decorated large Nantgarw

4.2 The London Porcelain Decorating Ateliers

101

Fig. 4.13 Another dessert plate from the same service shown in Fig. 4.11, Swansea porcelain. This plate shows two birds: inscribed “The Little Brown Humming Bird” and “The Long-tail’d Red Humming Bird” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

service, the Hensol Castle service, has been identified with the painting of Thomas Pardoe (Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016): it is a simply decorated large breakfast service with cobalt blue berries and gilt sprigs which would have been typical of the local decoration at the time but some auctioneers have also assigned this to John Sims’ workshop in London. It is certainly not typical of London decorated and gilded Nantgarw porcelain of that period. Hensol Castle is an ancient foundation dating from 1419 near Pendoylan in the Vale of Glamorgan and has been the home of several families, including the eminent Judge Jenkins in the 17th Century, passing to William Talbot MP, later Baron Talbot of Hensol, then Samuel Richardson, a Cardiff banker, who purchased the estate in 1789 and then sold it to Benjamin Hall, an ironmaster, in 1815, who would have been resident at Hensol Castle when the Nantgarw China Works was operational and who would have been probably in a position chronologically to commission the service locally. He married Charlotte Crawshay in 1801 of the Crawshay Merthyr ironmaster dynasty to whom the estate passed in 1824 after which they relocated to Cyfarthfa Castle in Merthyr. Their son, Benjamin Hall Jr (1802–1867), became a baronet in 1838 and installed the 14ton “Big Ben” bell in the clock tower of Westminster—a name apparently derived

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4 The Decorative Enamelling of Nantgarw Brace-Type Porcelain Services

Fig. 4.14 A dessert plate from the same service shown in Fig. 4.11, Swansea porcelain. This plate has the inscription “The Brown and Spotted Indian Cuckow” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

from Benjamin Jr’s stature! Hensol Castle passed to several later owners until it was purchased from Sir Francis Caradoc Rose Price by Glamorgan County Council in 1926. An interesting and relevant item of information has surfaced from auction sales descriptors recently regarding the attribution of London-decorated Swansea porcelain pieces that have a remarkable resemblance in type to the generic Nantgarw Brace service pieces and several of these Swansea porcelain pieces bear a script identification at their base confirming their origin as being from the atelier of James Bradley & Co., Pall Mall, London. An example is illustrated here in Fig. 4.11, which is a Swansea duck-egg porcelain square dish comport with an embossed Nantgarwtype edge moulding, dentil edge gilding and four vignettes in the ratio of flowers:fruit of 3:1. Further examples of this part-dessert service of Swansea porcelain exquisitely decorated in a similar fashion but all with exotic birds occupying a central theme are shown in Figs. 4.12, 4.13, 4.14 and 4.15 from the John Andrews Collection at Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, which are shown in Fergus Gambon’s book (Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016). The dessert plates all have six vignettes with the composition of flowers:fruit in the ratio of 4:2.

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Fig. 4.15 Another plate from the same service shown in Fig. 4.11, Swansea porcelain. This plate has the inscription “The Red Bird from Surinam” in red enamel on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

It seems that the major problem centres upon what precisely defines a Bracetype generic service and the spread of compositional data listed in the examples in Table 4.1 reflects this dilemma: a variable number and composition of vignettes between fruit, flowers and exotic birds and the central theme of flowers or birds encompasses a wide range of possibilities, although all examples cited here are of Nantgarw porcelain that have been exquisitely decorated. Although the original Brace service as illustrated by Dr John is established as having a central bouquet of flowers with vignettes of flowers, fruit and birds, this has now apparently been enlarged to include, rarely, a central bird motif (which then results in vignettes that comprise fruit and/or flowers only) and in some cases even the absence of the characteristic dentil-edge gilding that was originally applied to the service has been noted on some examples. Hence, of the 28 examples of Brace-type service exemplars listed in Table 4.1 we have noted the variable number of decorated vignettes between 4, 5 and 6 and only 13 of the exemplars have the “standard” Brace service plate composition of flowers:fruit:birds in the ratio of 4:1:1 accompanying the central floral bouquet. However, of especial note and of particular significance is the depiction of an unusual bearded tulip in the central floral decoration on some of these pieces, which has been researched previously and assigned to the characteristic hand of an

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enameller called de Junic (or de Juinnie) (John, Swansea Porcelain, 1958; Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988; Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). The alternative central bird decoration on the Swansea analogues of the Nantgarw Brace-type service category is very expertly done and the models for the exotic birds involved, which are described by script marks in red enamel on the underside of the pieces concerned, are taken from the ornithological drawings of George Edwards (Edwards, A Natural History of Uncommon Birds: And of Some Other Rare and Undescribed Animals, Quadrupeds, Fishes, Reptiles, Insects, &c., Exhibited in Two Hundred and Ten Copper-Plates, from Designs Copied Immediately from Nature and Curiously Coloured After Life, 4 Volumes, 1743–1751; Edwards, Gleanings of Natural History, Exhibiting Figures of Quadrupeds, Birds, Insects, Plants &c., Volumes I and II, 1758–1760). George Edwards was the well-respected and official drawing master of the Royal College of Physicians, Warwick Lane, London, in the mid-18th Century and his ornithological work detail is much admired for its accuracy. Occasionally, some oddities surface such as the Nantgarw plate (marked with the impressed mark NANT-GARW C.W.) illustrated in John et al. (The Nantgarw Porcelain Album, Illustration 73, 1975), which has been unequivocally identified as being from the hand of William Pollard, a Swansea China Works artist who never worked in Nantgarw or London; the accepted explanation of this anomaly is that he could have purchased this plate at the final Nantgarw auction sale in 1822, or even as late as 1823, in the white from the disposal of the last remaining Nantgarw china stock during the tenure at the Nantgarw China Works of Young and Pardoe. From William Weston Young’s Diaries (Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN) it seems that for the final auction sale of Nantgarw porcelain held in October 1822, Thomas Pardoe was working up to the last minute to decorate as much of the remnant stock as possible and it is unlikely, therefore, that Young and Pardoe would have consigned china remaining in the white at that sale, especially since afterwards Pardoe was still decorating Nantgarw porcelain left “in the white” right up to the time of his death in June 1823. It is more reasonable, therefore, to propose that William Pollard purchased this Nantgarw plate for decoration at home in Swansea: it would be instructive to closely examine the glaze on this piece analytically to establish if it was the Billingsley (Nantgarw No.1 glaze) or the Young/Pardoe (Nantgarw No.2 glaze) which would clarify its production and glazing date at Nantgarw—it is even possible that Pollard may have purchased unglazed biscuit porcelain as there was a quantity of that also remaining in stock at the Nantgarw China Works, in which case it may have been a Swansea glaze of different composition that was applied to the Nantgarw biscuit porcelain plate and this distinction could probably be demonstrated analytically!

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4.3 The Enameller “de Junic” The name “de Junic” or “de Juinnie” was for a long time a mysterious and rather ephemeral artist whose work was found on locally decorated Swansea porcelain and his very existence has been called into doubt by some ceramics historians (John, Swansea Porcelain, 1958) despite him being mentioned as an artist at Swansea by Henry Morris in an interview regarding his personal recollections of the operations of the Swansea China Works with Colonel Grant Davidson in 1851 (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021). Following on from the initial investigative research of Jimmy Jones and Sir Leslie Joseph carried out at the Royal Sevres Manufactory (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988), it is now confirmed that de Junic had left Sevres before 1810, where he had been listed in their archives as an “extraordinary employee”, and was then employed at the Swansea China Works until about 1815/16, after which he disappeared from the scene. Later research by Edwards (Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021) places de Junic in London, painting Nantgarw porcelain, it was hypothesised in the atelier of either John Sims or Robins & Randall, and incorporating his signature bearded tulip in his floral groups. His work is exemplified in the Sir John and Lady Williams Nantgarw dessert service illustrated here in Fig. 4.16, which is also accompanied by de Junic’s effusive and baroque French Empire style of gilding which was then so much in vogue with the London Georgian clientele. It is clear that much of de Junic’s attributed work appears on Swansea porcelain and only recently has it been discovered also on Nantgarw porcelain: from his decoration featuring on both Swansea and Nantgarw porcelains it can be concluded that de Junic must have operated as an enameller in a London atelier as he is never recorded as spending any time decorating at the Nantgarw China Works—this is confirmed by the appearance of a supportive London “signature” such as the dentiledged gilding especially on named services such as the Nantgarw Sir John and Lady Williams service, which also exhibits the French Empire baroque style of gilding with which he was associated from his time at the Sevres manufactory (Fig. 4.16). His London base would be a logical conclusion as Nantgarw porcelain was never sent to Swansea for decoration during Billingsley’s tenure at the Nantgarw China Works and the chronology dictates that by 1817, the start-up date for the Nantgarw Phase II operations, de Junic was already enamelling in London. The question can now be posed: is it possible to identify the London atelier with which de Junic was associated? The following material points need to be considered in this discussion: • The presence of de Junic’s work on the high quality Swansea porcelains decorated in London may perhaps be credited to one of the following key ateliers that were noted for their decoration of the finest Swansea porcelain: Bradley & Co., Pall Mall; Apsley Pellatt, St Paul’s Churchyard; J. Powell, Wimpole Street. • Swansea porcelain decorated in the workshops of Robins & Randall, Islington, and John Sims, Pimlico, is not commonly encountered in collections of Welsh

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Fig. 4.16 Nantgarw porcelain, dessert plate from the Sir John and Lady Williams generic service, ca. 1817–1820, with embossed beribboned edge and profusely gilded in the French Empire baroque style with six vignettes, each containing a pink rose and rosebuds and a central group of garden flowers displaying a bearded tulip, which is a characteristic signature of the Swansea artist “de Junic”. In a Private Collection

porcelain and their work on Nantgarw porcelain can be credited to the commissions received directly from John Mortlock, who did not seem to have the agency in the capital for Swansea porcelain although, according to Hester Thrale Piozzi, Mortlock’s did acquire the agency in London for sales from the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea in 1808, upon the closure of their own warehouse there (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942). • We must therefore seek an atelier that decorated both Swansea and Nantgarw porcelains between about 1817 and 1823. The most likely contender is surely Bradley & Co., Pall Mall, whose script mark appears on exemplars of both manufactories. It is therefore hardly conjectural to propose that de Junic joined the decorating team in this workshop when he departed from Swansea in around 1815/1816. The affirmative evidence for this assertion would be the discovery of de Junic’s signature of his characteristic “bearded tulip” on a Swansea or a Nantgarw plate that also bore the script mark of Bradley & Co., 47 and 54 Pall Mall, London. The presence of the bearded tulip on the Nantgarw Farnley Hall service has already been noted here and from Table 3.1 some 7 pieces from the complement of 19 remaining of this service show evidence of this feature in comparison with 7 from 28 generic Brace service analogues mentioned in Table 4.1. It can now,

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therefore, be stated categorically that de Junic probably executed the painting in London of several pieces of the Farnley Hall service. It would be hypothetical to assume that de Junic was the sole decorator of the Farnley Hall service because of its estimated size that was by all accounts originally approaching 200 pieces (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). The artistic complement of Bradley & Co.’s atelier is not known, but that of Robins & Randall in Islington has been quoted as being nearly 40 enamellers, and it would not be untoward to propose that several of these might be involved in the en suite decoration of a large porcelain service commission received to a precise standard for specific delivery to a deadline date. An inspection of the surviving Farnley Hall Nantgarw service items has been undertaken for evidence of any atelier or retailer’s mark which may shed some light on this hypothesis but none was found: this in some respects is really a tall order as little Nantgarw porcelain that has survived bore such marks anyway. Also, it is clear that from the survival of the part services of Swansea porcelain that do bear the script marks of their London atelier or retailer, only very few were so marked: an example of this is the part dessert service of exquisite Swansea porcelain from the Andrews Collection at Plas Glyny-Weddw (illustrated in Figs. 4.11, 4.12, 4.13, 4.14 and 4.15), for which only one of the five surviving pieces bears the Bradley & Co. red enamel script mark of J. Bradley & Co., No. 47 Pall-Mall, London (namely Fig. 4.12), although all pieces are clearly components of this same service (Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain), 2016). A detailed examination of the John Andrews Collection of Swansea and Nantgarw porcelains at Plas-Glyn-y-Weddw as recorded in Fergus Gambon’s book (Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016) reveals a photograph of a Nantgarw sauce tureen and cover with its characteristic spindle handles which is described authoritatively as being painted in London at the atelier of John Sims as it can readily be attributed to the decorative style appropriate to that atelier (see Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016, page 54, and the figure shown there labelled N3). This sauce tureen is decorated with sprays of garden flowers on an apple green ground and it is very fortunate indeed in this figure that the major floral spray on the tureen body clearly shows a bearded tulip extending out from the group in de Junic’s characteristic manner (and this is reproduced here in Fig. 4.17)! Here, the gilding which accompanies the enamelled decoration is not of the dentil edge form, although the assignment of the attribution of the tureen decoration has been unequivocally made to that of a London atelier. With this evidence, therefore, it is reasonable to assign the artist de Junic to the employment of John Sims at his atelier in Pimlico, London. This is, of course, compatible with the discovery of de Junic’s work on Nantgarw porcelain and also means that London decorated Swansea porcelain that features the bearded tulip must also have originated at the workshop of John Sims in Pimlico.

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Fig. 4.17 Sauce tureen and cover, Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, with gilded spindle handles, displaying groups of garden flowers on a bright apple green ground which has been identified as being decorated in John Sims atelier in Pimlico, London. The large floral group facing the viewer on the side of the tureen clearly shows the “bearded tulip” extending outward from the group, which immediately suggests that de Junic was the artist decorator involved. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

4.4 The Identification of Artist Enamellers on Welsh Porcelain—“Characteristic Signatures” It is appropriate to now consider more widely the criteria that are used for the identification of artistic enamellers and decorators of porcelain with particular reference to the Welsh porcelain manufactories of Swansea and Nantgarw as this will provide evidence of the potential artists who were involved with particular artefacts or services. It is true that the basis for the attribution of most ceramic decoration is connoisseurship, whereby the composition and subject is assigned on the basis of a known stylistic behaviour and treatment which has been accumulated from years of experience and study by experts, just as is found to occur with the assessment of the workshop origin of oil paintings. In most cases, within the particular ceramic dataset involved, the artist has on occasion marked their work on a ceramic artefact with a script signature, such as “Billingsley, Mansfield” or “Thomas Pardoe, Swansea” and this facilitates the matching and correlation of the artwork stylistically to a particular artist. Only one female artist on Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains is on record as signing their work, namely “Kitty”, a signature which appears on the underside of a Nantgarw spill vase which was exhibited in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of June 2019 (Gartre’n Ol, 2019) to celebrate 200 years of the foundation of the Nantgarw China Works: a very competently executed painting of garden flowers in a vignette

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on a black ground is accompanied by a delicately gilded frieze and is shown here in Fig. 4.18. It is believed that Kitty was employed as a paid artist at Nantgarw and was taught by Thomas Pardoe, in whose style the decoration is very similar. A summary of the major criteria that are used generally to assign an artist to the decoration of a ceramic artefact can be listed as follows: • The presence of a signature, usually found on the underside of an artefact, which categorically then provides first-hand evidence of the artist concerned. This is sometimes accompanied by a place name or a date which further assists in its placement in the manufactory chronology, such as “Pardoe, Bristol”, “William Billingsley, Mansfield” or “Thomas Pardoe, 1802”. • For botanical or zoological specimen decoration on cabinet pieces or on special services the name of the animal, bird, flower or plant is written in the artist’s handwritten script, which can be collected and researched to match with the script signature of the artist. An example of this approach will be illustrated in Chap. 7, where some 85% of the handwriting of William Billingsley used

Fig. 4.18 Nantgarw porcelain cylindrical spill vase, locally decorated by “Kitty”, as signed in red enamel script on the base. Pardoe/Young period, ca. 1820–1823, and it is recorded that an artist called Kitty was taught by Thomas Pardoe at the Nantgarw China Works site. This specimen featured in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of the finest Nantgarw porcelain held between July and September 2019 to celebrate the 200th Anniversary of the foundation of the Nantgarw China Works, held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw. Private Collection and reproduced with the courtesy of Charles Fountain, Director of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw

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on ceramics has now been reported from an analysis of the written script describing scenes on a glassy porcelain Swansea service with landscapes painted and described by William Billingsley. A special advantage in the elucidation of William Billingsley’s handwritten script was the additional discovery of a letter he wrote to John Coke at the Pinxton China Works in 1795 in which he discussed the operational synthesis of the new porcelain there. • The consultation of manufactory workbooks and pattern books where the proprietor has noted the designs and artwork carried out on particular services. There is a hidden danger here in that although a specific artist may have been nominated as being responsible for the artwork on a particular commission, one should be aware that for some reason, such as the necessary completion of the service within a specific time to a precise deadline, other artists in the workshop may have been drafted in from the workshop to assist in the decoration. This has certainly been noted and commented upon in several instances, for example in the Derby China Works pattern books, where although William Billingsley is described as the nominated artist responsible for the Rothschild service (Pattern 100), Dr John Twitchett has claimed that he can see evidence for several unidentified artists who were additionally used to complete this large service from an examination of a relatively large number of surviving pieces (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). • It has also been alleged that porcelain manufactory proprietors would reproduce copies of popular services upon demand from clients and the decoration may then involve other artists in the workshop. In some cases a small deviation in pattern has been incurred to preserve the “uniqueness” of the original client’s service: an example of this would be the copy(ies) of the London-decorated Duke of Cambridge Nantgarw dessert service, which in its original form has eight vignettes comprising two of exotic birds, two of fruit and four of landscapes, whose decorating ratio changes significantly on the copy services. The Nantgarw London-decorated Mackintosh service, of which three types are known, is also believed to have several copies in existence, although three of these are identifiable with the artist Charles Muss. In a rather different departure from this practice, the Derby China Works copied the Prince of Wales service, which is recorded as William Billingsley’s first commission in 1786 under the heading “pattern 65”, and re-issued the same pattern on a later service as “pattern 157”, which has an identical arrangement of gilding and central rose painting within a circlet of gilt dots but the border on the later copy service is not salmon pink as it was originally but is now specified as a “fawn colour” in the Derby plate pattern book. Of an even greater significance, however, is that these later services based upon the original patterns, which were maintained into the Bloor Derby period, are composed of very different shapes to those which were utilised originally in the 1786 William Duesbury version, although one still sees these advertised in collections and in auction sales as Prince of Wales service items, which they clearly are not chronologically (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002)! Strictly, the descriptor for these later services should state that they are in the style of or are Prince of Wales type services.

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• In the absence of script signatures or other evidential contributions from the historical documentation for ceramic artefacts then the decision for the attribution of an artist is made on the basis of connoisseurship experience and the assessment of style of the artwork alone: generally then, the definitive statement can be made as “painted by William Billingsley” or perhaps “in the manner or style of William Billingsley” depending on how definitive the attribution appears to be. This can be a very subjective assessment as artists trained in the ways and methods of the master artist in a workshop or atelier naturally developed similar traits and skills and it has been pointed out above that the painting of “Kitty” at Nantgarw is very much in the style of Thomas Pardoe under whom she is said to have trained at the Nantgarw China Works between 1821 and 1823. • A new set of evidential criteria has now been built up over many years’ study which can be termed “characteristic signatures”: these comprise stylistic idiosyncrasies, special effects, the use of particular decorative motifs, distinctive ways of depicting flowers or perhaps of figures in a landscape and associated patterns of geometric gilding which may accompany the decorative enamelling. These can provide accurate signals of the identity of a potential artist if the researcher knows what to look for and there are some good pointers to be established here for the potential assignment of an enameller. A word of caution needs to be exercised, of course, in that, as with any holistic research study, several different components need to be assimilated and evaluated to prevent a mis-assignment being made. For example, a Swansea duck-egg porcelain violeteer recently appeared at an auction sale described as having being painted by Thomas Pardoe; such an attribution should be treated with extreme caution as Thomas Pardoe left the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea, in 1809 to set up his decorating business at Bristol and he never worked at Lewis Dillwyn’s Swansea China Works, which did not even start manufacturing porcelain in Swansea until 1814 (Pountney, Old Bristol Potteries, 1920). The esteemed duck-egg porcelain, of which this violeteer is said to be made, was not manufactured before 1817, well after the time that Pardoe had departed from Swansea for his decorating business at Bristol, so it is extremely unlikely that any attribution to Pardoe could be made, unless he had acquired the piece somehow “in the white” from Dillwyn or the Bevingtons at Swansea for decoration in Bristol, which is extremely unlikely! Any associated information which definitively links the decoration to Thomas Pardoe would thus be desirable for an objective attribution to be confirmed. This violeteer is shown in Fig. 4.19: a similar Swansea violeteer is shown in Fig. 4.20, the decoration of which has been formerly attributed to Henry Morris, but the presence of the gilt curlicue border on the lid perhaps suggests a re-attribution should be made to Thomas Baxter, for whom this special “characteristic signature” complies? The prominent use of the auricula, a favourite of Henry Morris, could even suggest that he was the artist involved in both violeteers.

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Fig. 4.19 Swansea porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, violeteer, with pierced lid, attributed to Thomas Pardoe stylistically. Private Collection

Fig. 4.20 Swansea porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, violeteer, with pierced lid, attributed to Henry Morris stylistically. Similar to that shown in Fig. 4.19. The gilt curlicues on the pierced lid are a special signature of Thomas Baxter so there could be cause for a re-assessment of the attribution of the painter here. In a Private Collection

After leaving Swansea in 1809, Thomas Pardoe was based in Bristol with his wife Sarah and family and certainly in the earlier years he concentrated upon building up his ceramics decorating business, moving addresses to facilitate this, starting off at “Under the Bank” and moving finally to Long Row in 1820 (Renton 2015). He diversified his business during this time and broadened his portfolio to the decoration

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of glass and velvet, which afforded him the opportunity to act as a tutor in painting techniques to amateur artists (Renton 2015). He advertised this in the form of a watercolour with the inscription: Flowers, Birds & c. by T Pardoe, Enameller. Ladies taught Painting on China, Glass, Velvet & c.

There is a beautifully decorated Nantgarw porcelain inkwell with the initials CHJ in the National Musuem of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, which has been attributed to Caroline Helena Goodrich, whom it is believed was taught to paint china by Thomas Pardoe in about 1821 whilst she was based with her family at Caerphilly, close to Nantgarw (Renton 2015). The input of the so-called “amateur artists” such as Mary Moggridge and Caroline Goodrich to the decoration of Welsh porcelains should not, therefore, be ignored. Other attributions have been made to locally decorated Nantgarw porcelain by William Billingsley when the artefacts are accompanied with the dentil edged gilding that is manifestly a sign of a London atelier decoration, so this type of attribution must be treated with suspicion unless there are other indicators present that renders this adoption tenable. It is clear that several anonymous artists in the decorating workshops copied the artwork and styles of their better known exponents and colleagues and occasionally one can recognise that the work, although recognisable stylistically as being very similar, may not be quite of the required standard expected for the master enameller, but occasionally mismatched examples do slip through the stylistic vetting process and can then cause problems in their definitive attribution. In Table 4.2 some “characteristic signatures” have been itemised along with known artists and their placement for the Swansea and Nantgarw manufactories: this compilation will assist researchers in arriving at a potentially correct possible attribution for porcelain decoration based upon the idiosyncracies of the enamelling artists concerned. Some useful information in relation to the basis of construction of Table 4.2 can now be summarised as follows: • For the sake of comprehensiveness of coverage all known artists for the Swansea and Nantgarw manufactories are listed in Table 4.2, irrespective of whether or not they are accompanied by decorative and individual idiosyncracies which may potentially assist in their identification. Of the eighteen artists listed in Table 4.2, fifteen are men and three are women, namely Lavinia Billingsley, Mary Moggridge and Kitty. • 7 artists decorated exclusively at Nantgarw, 7 at Swansea and 4 others are known to have decorated both porcelains, namely William Billingsley, William Weston Young, de Junic and Lavinia Billingsley. Only one of the latter group decorated porcelains both locally and in London, namely de Junic, whose work is known on both locally decorated Swansea duck-egg porcelain and London-decorated Nantgarw porcelain. • Of the 18 artists in the list, 10 have been identified graphologically using their characteristic handwritten script descriptors of landscapes and botanical specimens and also of their handwritten rendition of the enamelled script Swansea factory mark.

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Table 4.2 The characteristic signatures of enamellers of Welsh porcelains Artist

Manufactory

London/local

Example of workc

Characteristic signatures

William Billingsleya

Swansea and Nantgarw

Local

1.7S and 2.1NG

Washed out roses, foliage, underside of roses

Thomas Pardoea

Nantgarwb

Local

5.6NG, 4.21NG, 4.22NG, 4.23NG, 4.24S

Finches, lighter groups, star motif, cailloute, Special gilding ovoids

William Weston Younga

Swansea and Nantgarwb

Local

4.25S, 4.32NG, 4.33NG

Local landscape scenes and botanicals

De Junic

Swansea and Nantgarw

London and Swansea

4.16NG

Bearded tulip, French Empire gilding

Thomas Baxtera

Swansea

Local

7.10S

Curlicues gilt border

Thomas Randall

Nantgarw

London

4.26NG

Exotic birds

Swansea

Local

5.8S

Tight groupings, auricula

Swansea

Local

1.8S

Loose groupings

Swansea

Local

5.9S

Very fine delineation, faded appearance

Henry

Morrisa

David Evansa William

Pollarda

James Plant

Nantgarw

London

6.1NG

James Turner

Swansea

London

4.6S

Moses Webster

Nantgarw

London

4.27NG

Roses dying back

Richard Bix Gray

Nantgarw

London

4.29NG

Cherubs

George Beddowa

Swansea

Local

4.29S

Landscapes

William Henry Pardoe

Nantgarw

Local

4.30NG

Lavinia Billingsley

Swansea and Nantgarw

Local

1.9NG

Mary Moggridgea

Swansea

Local

4.31S

MM initials

Kittya

Nantgarw

Local

4.18NG

Script Kitty

a Artists

who have been identified using their script descriptors of scenes or botanical specimens, and in the case of Swansea porcelain from their rendition of the Swansea enamelled script mark b Known to have decorated creamwares and pearlwares at the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea, but generally not recorded on Swansea porcelain with one exception of a botanical service on Swansea porcelain with cruciform moulding decorated by William Weston Young personally for Lewis Weston Dillwyn and identified from Young’s botanical descriptions on the reverse c Numbers refer to Figures cited in this book; S Swansea, NG Nantgarw

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Fig. 4.21 Nantgarw cylindrical spill vase, ca. 1821–1823, with mask heads and simple edge gilding, depicting two male goldfinches on a tree branch in a landscape and attributed to Thomas Pardoe. In a Private Collection

• Some typical “characteristic signatures” of Swansea and Nantgarw artists mentioned in Table 4.2 are given here along with illustrations of their work: Thomas Pardoe: Finches, Fig. 4.21; Garter star motif, Fig. 4.22; Cailloute, Fig. 4.23; Gilded ovoids, Fig. 4.24; William Weston Young: Botanical, Fig. 4.25; local landscape scenes Figs. 4.32 and 4.33; Thomas Randall: Exotic birds, Fig. 4.26; Moses Webster: Faded rose blooms, Fig. 4.27; Robert Bix Gray: Cherubs, Fig. 4.28; George Beddow: Landscapes, Fig. 4.29; William Henry Pardoe: Simplistic designs, Fig. 4.30; Mary Moggridge: Simplistic design and initials, Fig. 4.31. The illustration of the Nantgarw dessert plate in Fig. 4.30 which has been attributed to William Henry Pardoe in Fergus Gambon’s book (Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016) is based on the stylistic evaluation only although other pieces do occasionally surface, such as the cup and saucer in Fig. 4.34, which bears the red enamelled script “Pardoe, Cardiff” on the underside. This piece can be attributed chronologically to William Henry Pardoe’s time spent at his Cardiff residence

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Fig. 4.22 Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, ca. 1821–1823, with groups of flowers around a central gilt Garter Star motif which is a signature of Thomas Pardoe that he used in his days in the Cambrian Pottery from about 1800. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

after his father’s death in 1823 when the Nantgarw China Works closed down. Although William Henry Pardoe did reopen the site in 1833 as the “Old Nantgarw China Works” to manufacture brown glazed earthenwares, salt glazed stonewares and clay pipes, he apparently did not manufacture porcelain there: his wife Mary is reported as claiming that they were approached by the Marquess of Bute in 1833 to re-commence the manufacture of porcelain at Nantgarw with a financial incentive of £1000, but she confirms that this proposition was rejected. However, the Pardoe original decorating business in Bristol was apparently still thriving under the proprietorship of Thomas’ wife, Sarah, at least until about 1827. Sarah never moved to Nantgarw with Thomas but William Weston Young records in his Dairies that she visited Nantgarw occasionally, sailing out of Bristol, for example, for one week at the Nantgarw China Works site on the 2nd March 1821 (William Weston Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843)). The friendship between Young and Pardoe which started in the Cambrian Pottery (Renton 2003) has already been mentioned and it is significant that Thomas Pardoe was present at the meeting between Dillwyn and Billingsley with Young in Margam Park in 1813 to set up the engagement of William Billingsley (and

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Fig. 4.23 Nantgarw porcelain plate, ca. 1821–1823, with a central feature of exotic birds in a chinoiserie landscape and six baroque vignettes each containing two exotic birds and a further six elliptical vignettes in the cavetto each containing a stylised ten petalled chrysanthemum flower in red enamel all with a gilt cailloute ground in semblance of pebbles, often termed “marbled” and a characteristic of Thomas Pardoe. A similar plate in Nantgarw porcelain is recorded with Pardoe’s signature on the underside. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

Samuel Walker) to manufacture porcelain at the Swansea China Works. In addition to his pottery manufacturing venture at Nantgarw, William Henry Pardoe in 1847 also purchased the St Philip’s Pottery in Avon Street, Bristol from Henry Yabbicon & Sons, previously of the Westbury-on-Trym Pottery, and this became a successful manufacturing venture which was eventually taken over by his sons, Henry, Charles and George Pardoe between 1861 and 1866; William Henry Pardoe died in 1867. His residence was at Laurel Grove in Cardiff and the inscription on the tea cup and saucer shown here in Fig. 4.34, namely “Pardoe, Cardiff”, therefore, probably refers to his decorating business carried on there: the cup and saucer are not of a Nantgarw shape and are more akin to the products of Coalport, Ridgway or Mintons in Staffordshire in the 1830s to 1840s. There is an advertisement dating from 1858 which implies that William Henry Pardoe has attempted to make porcelain at Nantgarw and was then selling off the hardware but no porcelain shards have been found at the site waste tip from this period: one thing is clear, and that is any porcelain manufactured at Nantgarw at this time

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Fig. 4.24 Swansea creamware jug from the Cambrian Pottery, ca. 1805, with an urban landscape scene with figures in a gilded vignette and a spout with a gilded cailloute ground adjacent to a geometric gilt pattern of elliptical ovoids each containing three gilt dots, another characteristic border used by Thomas Pardoe. Reproduced by courtesy of Fergus Gambon, Bonhams Auctioneers, Bond Street, London

would not have been of the soft paste highly phosphatic Nantgarw type as the recipe was still not common knowledge at that time, although John Taylor had cited a Nantgarw recipe in his book in 1847 (The Practical Potter, 1847) which seemed to have escaped attention at the time. A very similar recipe was given somewhat later in the Pottery Gazette (The Pottery Gazette, 1885) which again did not excite much comment as it appeared under the rather misleading title of factory marks.

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Fig. 4.25 Swansea duck-egg porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, dessert dish of cruciform pattern made especially for Lewis Weston Dillwyn and decorated by William Weston Young with botanical subjects, here with the red enamelled script “Cypripedium calceolus” on the underside in Young’s hand, more commonly known as the Lady’s Slipper Orchid. William Weston Young, an accomplished botanical draughtsman, had been engaged by Lewis Weston Dillwyn to act as botanical illustrator for his book on the British Confervae between 1803 and 1806, for which Dillwyn was a awarded an FRS. Young’s botanical work is much more frequently found on Swansea Cambrian pottery creamwares and pearlwares. Reproduced from Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) with permission from D. Brown & Sons, Publishers, Cowbridge, Mid-Glamorgan

4.5 What Comprises a Service? There has been much discussion about named and commissioned service in Nantgarw porcelain and Table 2.1 lists some 53 known examples of commissioned artefacts from the Nantgarw China Works that have been identified in the literature as services. Perhaps it is timely to actually consider whether or not all of these can be genuinely classified as “services” and appropriately confirm their presence in this list: in this context it is relevant to describe the basis on which a “service” can be identified when there are but few surviving examples, sometimes there is only one piece! • A service, be that of a coffee/tea, breakfast, dinner and dessert nomenclature, will comprise several different types of porcelain artefact which are suited to its prescribed use in the household. For example, a tea and coffee service will

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Fig. 4.26 Nantgarw porcelain, plate from the London decorated Mackintosh service which was painted by Thomas Randall of the Robins & Randall atelier in Spa Fields, Islington, London, ca. 1817–1820. It was commissioned by E. Priest Richards, of Plas Newydd, Cowbridge, land agent of the Marquess of Bute, and would have been ordered through John Mortlock of Oxford Street, London. It was presented to Priest Richards’ daughter, Arabella, in 1880, on the occasion of her marriage to The Mackintosh of Mackintosh, Head of Clan Mackintosh of Moy, Inverness. There are several Nantgarw services of generic Mackintosh type known each differing in subtle gilding patterns but all containing vignettes of flowers and an exotic bird centrally painted by Thomas Randall, who excelled in his ornithological work: the attribution has been made by comparison with sketches and paintings that were retained in the Randall family archives. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

necessarily contain cups and saucers, or trios comprising a teacup, saucer and a coffee cup or coffee can, a teapot, cream or milk jug, teapot, lid and stand, coffee pot and a slop bowl. Other items could be small teaplates, a larger cake plate and a hot water jug. Likewise, dinner and dessert services will comprise a selection of plates of different sizes, comports, cream or sauce boats, tureens, platters and centrepieces, with perhaps optional ice pails and water bottles (guglets). The identification of surviving pieces that may have originally been part of a service is straightforward when some of these components are found en suite with the usual flatware items, a number of which may have survived because there was a relative profusion of them initially—such as a dessert service which usually contained at least 24 dessert plates from a complement of 42 pieces.

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Fig. 4.27 Nantgarw porcelain coffee cup and saucer, ca. 1817–1820, London decorated with dentil edge gilding by Moses Webster in the atelier of Robins & Randall, Spa Fields, Islington, with groupings of three pink roses and rosebuds and scattered insects and moths. The cup has the characteristic Nantgarw heart-shaped handle and the saucer a plain unglazed base with no footrim. In a Private Collection

• Porcelain artefacts were also created for display rather than table or household use, such as cabinet pieces: cups and saucers and plates that were beautifully decorated and which were supplied as single items or as small sets. Cabaret, or opera, sets were scaled down versions which were designed for solitaire usage and comprised a cup and saucer, teapot/coffee pot, small bowl, cream jug and an oval or square porcelain tray and these are not therefore, strictly, services although one has been identified in Table 2.1 as being commissioned by the Princess Charlotte. Princess Charlotte of Wales (1796–1817), the only child of Prince George (later King George IV) married Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld in 1816, ordered her cabaret set from John Mortlock in Oxford Street, but this probably was little used as she died in childbirth in November 1817. This special cabaret set has been included in the Nantgarw named “services” cited in Table 2.1. • In the absence of the special artefacts that originally comprised a service, that may not have survived to the present day, it could be rather difficult to precisely identify whether or not a particular pierce originally came from a service or perhaps was one of a limited number of cabinet pieces. We have noted already that most services have suffered badly in terms of the survival of many pieces— and the Farnley Hall service is certainly no exception in this regard, but of the 19 surviving pieces the complement of plates, deep dishes, platters and circular large plates definitively ascribes this to be the remaining part of a service without

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Fig. 4.28 Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, ca. 1817–1820, with beribboned border moulding and a central painting of Cupid with an arrow playing in the clouds; London-decorated and attributed to Robert Bix Gray, nephew of Thomas Randall, at the atelier of Robins & Randall, Spa Fields, Islington. The decoration of the border is unusual in that the vignettes are left blank but the moulding is enamelled in green and puce and the piece is otherwise devoid of gilding. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

question. It is a very different matter when we examine the Nantgarw “service” that was commissioned by the Rev. William Williams in the list given in Table 2.1. Some eight plates from this service are known to exist, and all are in the National Museum of Wales Collection, Amgueddfa Cymru, in Cardiff. A more in-depth investigation of this unusual “service” is undertaken in Appendix A. These specimens comprise landscape scenes attributed to William Weston Young, painted on Nantgarw unmoulded plates bearing enamelled inscriptions on the reverse which are richly gilded at the verge. The eight known plates represent scenes that were important to the Rev. William Williams and, along with their Museum Accession Numbers, comprise: The Church of St Mary Hill Coychurch (NMW A 31413), The Free School Cowbridge (NMW A 31414), Dolgellau (NMW A 31415), Cadair Idris (NMW A 31416), Llandaff Cathedral (NMW A 31417), an unidentified church (NMW A 31418), an unidentified church (NMW A 31419),

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Fig. 4.29 Swansea porcelain cabinet cup saucer, ca. 1817–1820, decorated locally by George Beddow with a mountainous landscape, a bridge over a river, a house and figures. Richly gilded on a cerulean blue ground. Inscribed in enamel on the back of the saucer in Beddow’s hand “In Wales”. Reproduced from Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) with permission from D. Brown & Sons, Publishers, Cowbridge, Mid-Glamorgan

and Cowbridge Church (NMW A 31420) (Andrew Renton, personal communication to the author, 2022). It is presently unknown whether or not these plates are the definitive survivors of a service or possibly of a set of cabinet plates. However, for the sake of completeness, the series of plates from the Rev. William Williams Nantgarw commission have been included in the list in Table 2.1. An example of one of these plates is given in Fig. 4.33: a relevant observation is that the border gilding design is not constant through this series of eight plates … this in itself would generate a query relating to their being part of an en suite decorated service and may actually hence favour their attribution instead to being a set of cabinet plates. This aspect is explored further in Appendix A, where the eight known plates are illustrated in Appendix Figs. A.1 to A.8, from which some observations are made which indicate that this is also an unusual Nantgarw “service” but in a very different category to the Farnley Hall service.

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Fig. 4.30 Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, ca. 1821–1823, simply decorated in a naïve style and using a chocolate brown enamel as edging in place of gilding, which was adopted by Young and Pardoe during their period at the Nantgarw China Works to economise on the decorating costs of simpler pieces. Although originally attributed to Thomas Pardoe, these simpler pieces are now believed to have been decorated by William Henry Pardoe—other examples of this type include a man riding on an elephant and a carp swimming amongst reeds and flowers. Reproduced with permission from Gwyn Jones, Director of the John Andrews Charitable Trust Collection, Oriel Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

4.5.1 What Defines a Service of Porcelain? It is now appropriate to describe a porcelain service, as with many things that are incorporated into a database from which analyses will be made the definition is essential and required to make decisions as to what artefacts should or should not be included for assessment and analysis by a researcher. As a general basis for our definition the following statement can be considered: A service comprises artefacts of porcelain which are designed for eating and drinking in the household and which are often then associated with items manufactured of other materials such as silver, gold, wood and glass which complement their usage for this purpose.

Thus, we can immediately include porcelain items used for breakfast, dessert, dinner, tea and coffee serving as services, irrespective of their size or numerical complement of artefacts. There are, of course, several sets of porcelain artefacts which, although ostensibly designed for eating and drinking, now require further

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Fig. 4.31 Swansea porcelain cylindrical spill vase with slightly flared rim, ca. 1817–1820, with a square vignette of a gazelle in a landscape on a pale blue ground with assorted motifs and floral groupings. Inscribed on the base, M.M. Swansea 1819, which identifies the artist as Mary Moggridge, a painter at the Swansea China Works. Reproduced from Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain : Shapes and Decoration, 1988) with permission from D. Brown & Sons, Publishers, Cowbridge, Mid-Glamorgan

investigation as to whether or not they qualify for inclusion as designated for porcelain services on this mandate. Examples include supper sets and cabaret sets, whilst also excluding boudoir sets and writing sets which although formally being decorated en suite with each other and are termed sets do not conform to the category of household dining and drinking. In another class, cabinet sets have a rather special distinction in that although each artefact or component is clearly based upon the concept of usage for eating and drinking they were never actually designed for usage but were intended for display purposes only: exemplars would include the beautifully decorated cabinet cups and saucers, which were sometimes supplied as sets with different decorative scenes, and cabinet plates which were designed to illustrate some particular theme or subject of importance to the client, such as Biblical topics, favourite animals, racehorses and landscapes, such as those illustrated in Figs. 4.35 and 4.36. Clearly, these plates and dishes, whilst not debarring their usage every day or on special occasions for household dining, would be rather impractical vehicles for that purpose on account of the damage that they would invariably have received with use.

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Fig. 4.32 Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1820–1822, dessert plate with beribboned moulding and simple edge gilding decorated locally by William Weston Young with a landscape scene showing Melincourt Waterfall, Vale of Neath. Young was particularly taken with scenes from the Vale of Neath and prior to his becoming a resident decorator at the Cambrian Pottery, Swansea, he lived with his wife Elizabeth at the watermill house, Aberdulais Falls, on the outskirts of Neath, which he especially loved as noted in his Diaries. This plate featured in the Gartre’n Ol exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019. Reproduced by courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and in a Private Collection

4.5.2 Cabinet Porcelains Cabinet porcelains are usually characterised by a superior quality of decoration of the subject topic compared with their service analogues, even though in many cases the same artist is involved in the decoration, but the main feature of a cabinet piece is often a rather more intricate body—and the epitome of this is the cabinet cup and saucer, which is of a completely different design to its service cup and saucer analogues. The service cup and saucer has to be functional and fit for purpose, even though Nantgarw was famed for its beautifully delicate coffee cups with heartshaped handle as shown here in Fig. 4.27. A typical Nantgarw cabinet cup is shown in Figs. 4.37 and 4.38, which featured in the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition of the finest Nantgarw porcelain (Gartre’n Ol, 2019), and another two-handled cabinet cup with gryphon handles in Fig. 4.39. Because cabinet plates could be supplied individually or in limited numbers in a cabinet set it is often difficult to be categorical about the status of a single item as a cabinet plate or asset: a classic example of this is the Three Graces Nantgarw plate illustrated in Fig. 4.4, and recently another plate with the same gilding has been recorded which is clearly en suite, so making it a cabinet set (of two items currently

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Fig. 4.33 Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1820–1822, dessert plate with plain edge border and simple edge gilding but also with a gilding pattern of swags and foliage, decorated locally by William Weston Young with an unspecified landscape scene of a church and tower. Apparently, part of a service that was commissioned by the Rev. William Williams this plate featured in the Gartre’n Ol exhibition of fine Nantgarw porcelain held in Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019. Reproduced by courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff

and perhaps there may be others?). What is doubly intriguing, therefore, about the cabinet set classification of the Rev. William Williams pieces is the lack of an en suite pattern to the gilding on each of the eight items, which means that individually they are very different in appearance and could have been mistaken for single items, as perhaps any missing items from the set may have been in the past?

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Fig. 4.34 Porcelain coffee cup and saucer, ca. 1830–1840, competently painted with floral groups and having the enamelled inscription on the base of the saucer, Pardoe, Cardiff . The style of the piece indicates a Staffordshire porcelain factory origin, probably Coalport, Ridgway or Mintons, and the inscription confirms that William Henry Pardoe, despite having set up as a potter manufacturing salt glazed and brown glazed earthenwares and clay pipes in the Old Nantgarw China Works at the Nantgarw site in 1833 still decorated porcelain bought in for other places “in the white” using a muffle furnace at his residence in Laurel Grove, Cardiff. In a Private Collection Fig. 4.35 Nantgarw porcelain, cabinet plate, ca. 1820–1823, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe with central landscape, a stream and two Welsh brown and white setters. Attractively gilded with a plain edge gilding and full gilding to the cavetto with a geometric pattern and six typical gold border motifs. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan

4.5 What Comprises a Service? Fig. 4.36 Nantgarw porcelain cabinet plate, ca. 1817–1820, decorated in London with a brace of pheasants at the centre surrounded by a circle of pink roses. The C-scroll border is painted with blue swags and clusters of fruit. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan

Fig. 4.37 Nantgarw Porcelain cabinet cup, ca. 1820–1823, on three claw feet, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe showing a goldfinch and garden flowers. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff

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Fig. 4.38 Nantgarw Porcelain cabinet cup, ca. 1820–1823, on three claw feet, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe showing two finches on a tree branch with hollyhocks and garden flowers. The reverse side to the item shown in Fig. 4.37. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July– September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff

Fig. 4.39 Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, cabinet cup and saucer, London decorated with a central wreath of garden flowers on a geometric gilding pattern. Attractively moulded with two gryphon-headed handles in gilt. In the Gartre’n Ol Exhibition, Tyla Gwyn, July–September 2019. Reproduced by Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Trust Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, Glamorgan, and the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff

References

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References G. Edwards, A Natural History of Uncommon Birds: And of Some Other Rare and Undescribed Animals, Quadrupeds, Fishes, Reptiles, Insects, &c., Exhibited in Two Hundred and Ten CopperPlates, from Designs Copied Immediately from Nature and Curiously Coloured After Life, vol. 4. (The Royal College of Physicians, Warwick Lane, London, 1743–1751) G. Edwards, Gleanings of Natural History, Exhibiting Figures of Quadrupeds, Birds, Insects, Plants &c., vol. I and II. (The Royal College of Physicians, Warwick Lane, London, 1758–1760) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, Preservation of Cultural Heritage Series (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2022) O. Fairclough, The London China trade, 1800–1830. Trans. English Ceramic Circle 16, Part 2, 206–207 (1997) F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain) (Oriel Plas Glyn-yWeddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016) Gartre’n Ol, Coming Home—An Exhibition of the Finest Nantgarw Porcelain (Nantgarw China Works Museum, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, 2019) W. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) W. John, Swansea Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1958) W. John, K.A. Coombes, G.J. Coombes, The Nantgarw Porcelain Album (The Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1975) A.E. Jones, “Jimmy” and Joseph, Sir Leslie, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration (David Brown Publishers, Cowbridge, 1988) K.O. Morgan, Rebirth of a Nation: Wales 1880–1980 (University of Wales Press, Cardiff, 1981) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (B.T. Batsford, London, 1942) W.J. Pountney, Old Bristol Potteries (J.W. Arrowsmith, Bristol, 1920), pp. 115–116 A. Renton, Thomas Pardoe and William Weston Young, in Welsh Ceramics in Context, Part I, ed. by J. Gray. (Royal Institution of South Wales, Swansea, 2003), pp. 120–146 A. Renton, Thomas Pardoe in Bristol. Trans. English Ceramics Circle 26, 93–110 (2015) J. Taylor, The Complete Practical Potter (Shelton, Stoke-upon-Trent, 1847) The Pottery Gazette, Volume IX, No. 92, Organ of the Glass & China Trades (Stationer’s Hall, Ludgate Hill, London, 1885) W. Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of the Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon Etc. (Bemrose & Sons Ltd., The Old Bailey, London, 1897) J. Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848 (The Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2002) W.W. Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), vol. 30. (West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). https://archiveshub.jisc.sc.uk/data/gb216-d/dxch/ ddxch/i/hub

Chapter 5

The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

Abstract Detailed analysis of the features represented in the embossed, beribboned C-scrolled Nantgarw moulding on the Farnley Hall service and cataloguing of the variations noted against other Nantgarw service exemplars related to the size and dimensions of the porcelain artefacts has bene undertaken. Comparative analysis of the Nantgarw embossed moulded C-scroll border and those produced by the contemporary Swansea, Derby and Coalport manufactories. Reference to the correctness of the current literature interpretation and differentiation between Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains based on their embossed borders suggests some revision is now necessary from the data retrieved from the Farnley Hall service. Keywords C-scroll embossed moulded border · Nantgarw · Derby · Coalport and Swansea porcelains · Differentiation characteristics Most authors of books and articles on Nantgarw porcelain at some stage refer to its attractive and characteristic edge moulding, comprising an acanthus leaf foliage which runs parallel to the edge of the piece and then sweeps into curlicues called C-scrolls which surround a bow and freely trailing ribbons containing stars and petalled florets. This moulding usually accompanies artefacts which have twelve rim indentations arranged in pairs, thereby creating six vignettes at the edge of the piece which can be decorated with enamelled flowers, fruit and exotic birds. The raised embossed moulding is occasionally richly gilded, often very profusely, in vogue with the revived rococo and baroque French Empire style that was in favour with Georgian Regency society in the second decade of the 19th Century. This moulding is very pronounced at the surface of the piece and a characteristic Nantgarw body feature is that it is manifest also on the underside of the artefact where its presence can be observed there visually and by touch. It is believed by several ceramics historians, rightly or wrongly, that this particular moulding originated at Nantgarw; it was adopted certainly by other manufactories and was also used at Coalport, Derby and Swansea during the latter years of the second decade of the 19th Century. Jimmy Jones and Sir Leslie Joseph in their seminal book on Swansea porcelain (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, page 162, 1988) have made a detailed comparative study of the moulded border of this type that was used by the Swansea and Nantgarw manufactories between 1817 and 1820 and they have listed © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_5

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several differential features which they have proposed can be used to distinguish and discriminate between the artefacts from the two factories: these require a very careful visual examination of the embossed moulding design to be made. This is often not easily accomplished as the moulding details can be compromised by the presence of the glaze and gilding, especially where the latter has been applied profusely, as it has for example in the London—decorated Nantgarw plate shown in Fig. 4.16 from the Sir John and Lady Williams service and the Derby plates from the Lord Ongley service shown in Figs. 4.7, 4.8 and 4.10. It is often useful to examine the moulding detail using intense back illumination to highlight the features. This exercise, which was first undertaken by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988), was repeated by the author and has now also been extended to include artefacts with similar mouldings from the Derby and Coalport manufactories (Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains, 2018). The conclusion was that each specific manufactory, namely Swansea, Nantgarw, Derby and Coalport, did possess some minor distinctive features in their otherwise superficially very similar edge mouldings. This observation seems to dispel the earlier hypothesis made by some ceramics authors and historians that these factories had taken examples of the Nantgarw moulding from finished porcelain artefacts and had made secondary moulds of these for their own products, which of course would have then given the identical mouldings for all the manufactories, although a consistently different range of dimensions from their normal wares would then have resulted from the shrinkage of the porcelain formulation that would have occurred in the moulds (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847), 2019). It is recorded that in 1820 Robert Bloor, the proprietor of the Derby China Works, was visiting the London atelier of John Sims in Pimlico and he observed James Plant decorating some Nantgarw dessert plates there. Robert Bloor was so impressed with the quality of these pieces that he immediately purchased six Nantgarw dessert plates and took them back to Derby, where he instructed his workshop to produce similar work along the same lines, using these as models for his forthcoming Lord Ongley dessert service commission. The Lord Ongley service was one of the most expensively decorated at Derby, for which Robert Bloor charged Lord Ongley five guineas a plate (equivalent now to over £500): the Lord Ongley service Derby plates are definitively modelled with a characteristically similar Nantgarwtype edge moulding, beautifully painted and these are profusely gilded. Examples of plates from the Lord Ongley Derby service are shown in Figs. 4.7 and 4.8, with an enhanced detail of the edge moulding shown in the montage in Fig. 4.10. Originally, the Lord Ongley service would have comprised about 42 pieces or possibly a few more, including dessert comports and sauce tureens, with 24 plates but now only six plates and two sauce tureens with their lids and stands remain, and these are exhibited in Muncaster Castle, Ravenglass, Cumbria, where they were discovered on display by the Derby porcelain connoisseur John Twitchett a few years ago (Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848, 2002). A photograph of the Lord Ongley items on display at Muncaster Castle is shown in Edwards (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017), which includes the plates and a sauce tureen, lid and stand. What is clear upon close inspection is that Robert Bloor did not

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copy exactly the Nantgarw edge moulding from his London acquisitions of Nantgarw porcelain which were then used as exemplars for the Lord Ongley service, although at least one central scene was exactly copied—namely, that of two children having a snowball fight (Fig. 4.7)—and the Nantgarw original and the Bloor Derby version of this are both still extant. A little while later, according to John Haslem (Haslem, The Old Derby China Factory: The Workmen and their Productions. Containing Details of their Chief Artist Workmen, the Various Marks Used, Fac-Similes Copied from the Old Derby Pattern Books, the Original Price List of More than 400 Figures and Groups, Etc., Etc., 1876), Robert Bloor disposed of the Nantgarw originals he had purchased and several of these were then put on display in the Museum of Practical Geology in Jermyn Street, London. The Museum of Practical Geology, founded in 1835 by Sir Henry de la Beche FRS (1796–1855), a noted geologist and palaentologist, is one of the oldest single science museums in the world and later became the Geological Museum, which was then incorporated into the Natural History Museum, South Kensington, London in 1935. The name de la Beche appears in the annals of Welsh porcelain history because his daughter Elizabeth (Bessie) married Lewis Llewelyn Dillwyn, the son of Lewis Weston Dillwyn, proprietor of the Swansea China Works, in 1838 and she proceeded to influence artistically the designs of the Cambrian Pottery earthenwares then being manufactured at the Cambrian Pottery, being responsible especially for the novel artistic Etruscan wares in terracotta red and black which appeared there in the late 1840s (Jenkins, Dillwyn’s Etruscan Ware, 1971). Sir Henry de la Beche also undertook some empirical experimentation with Lewis Llewelyn Dillwyn on improvements in the clay recipes for his earthenwares in the late 1830s upon his family visits to Swansea. Of perhaps more immediate geographical interest is the Swansea embossed edge moulding on their finest duck-egg porcelain, examples of which can be seen here in Figs. 4.11, 4.12, 4.13, 4.14 and 4.15. Several hypotheses have been proposed for the appearance of this Nantgarw type characteristic feature on Swansea porcelain between 1817 and 1820, one being that it was first manufactured at the Swansea China Works with moulds that were constructed upon the arrival there of William Billingsley and Samuel Walker from Nantgarw in 1813, using perhaps the initial formulation of the highly phosphatic Nantgarw soft paste porcelain, and that Dillwyn then fashioned the Swansea moulds from these Nantgarw exemplars furnished by Billingsley and Walker (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017). Others have suggested that Billingsley and Walker brought the actual moulds with them from Nantgarw when they first arrived at Swansea. However, the detailed comparison of the composition of the edge-moulding has always been a critical factor in their potential designation and the critical differentiation of Nantgarw formulation porcelain made at Swansea or decorated at Swansea and of Nantgarwtype porcelain that would have been made in the Swansea China Works from their own distinct moulds is paramount to this discussion: this has been quantified by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988) with their proposed protocol for the differentiation between the mouldings used by the two factories. The strong implication is that there was sufficient difference between

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the Nantgarw and Swansea mouldings to dispel any thought that they could have originated from the same moulds.

5.1 Definition of the Nantgarw Embossed Beribboned Moulding It is necessary to take a few steps backward and to forensically examine the basis for the assertion that this C-scroll moulding and its attendant composition is characteristic of Nantgarw: the word characteristic in this context refers forensically and linguistically to a feature whose presence is typical, and perhaps therefore also unique, and by inference then becomes an essential property that can assist in the attribution of an artefact. So how does this relate to the Nantgarw embossed edge moulding—of course, to achieve this classification it would necessarily have to be unique in form, unchanging and of a constant appearance and apparently this has until now universally been thought to apply consistently for the Nantgarw moulded embossed and beribboned pieces? Certainly, ceramics authors and historians through the ages have credited the edge moulding of Nantgarw porcelain to be distinctive and therefore characteristic for its attribution—but the encompassing reality here would imply that it would have to be unchanging in all pieces manufactured, otherwise it cannot be a characteristic of the porcelain, otherwise small changes would not be recognised for the real thing and could be credibly dismissed as an inexact copy! Sir Leslie Joseph and Jimmy Jones believed the characteristic mouldings that were used at both Swansea and Nantgarw were distinctive and could be used to differentiate between the two manufactories in their book (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988), and to this end they used a set of differential comparators to define the difference between Swansea and Nantgarw porcelain bodies on the basis of their characteristic manufactory embossed edge mouldings. However, they also mention in their book that Dr Isaac Williams, who first archaeologically excavated the Nantgarw China Works site in 1931 and located the waste pit with shards from the Billingsley/Walker era at level 6, some one metre below the surface, found a Nantgarw porcelain waster which had an edge moulding that was very similar to that seen on their Swansea analogues (Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site, 1932). Jones and Joseph summarise Dr Williams’ observation as follows: Isaac J. Williams in his book The Nantgarw Pottery and its Products: An Examination of the Site (published by the National Museum of Wales in 1932), illustrates a porcelain fragment of a plate from the site with the Swansea C-scroll moulding.

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They, therefore, concluded that this fragment was in fact identical to that of the Swansea C-scroll moulding but buried with others in the Nantgarw China Works waste pit. No explanation was advanced for the curious presence of this shard, which seemed to be assumed perhaps to be an interloper in the Nantgarw waste pit and this discovery from Dr Isaac Williams has thus far seemingly escaped the attention of historians, except for this note in Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988), which has not seemingly been observed and cited elsewhere. Its implications are actually far-reaching for our discussion here because it means that, contrary to the established opinion and belief, it indicates that the Nantgarw China Works edge moulding could potentially have had some changes incorporated within it which would then forensically automatically negate it being a “characteristic” of the manufactory in being unchanging. The next stage must be, therefore, to examine Nantgarw porcelains closely for evidence or otherwise of any deviation or differentiation in the standard composition of these edge moulding patterns, and if one is found, how that might relate to the type of artefact produced by the manufactory. However, a re-appraisal of the evidence for the Jones and Joseph comment upon Isaac Williams’ discovery of an embossed shard in the Nantgarw waste pit which matched that of the Swansea analogue is necessary to establish the baseline for its accuracy for this occurrence before proceeding further. Reference to the relevant statement in Isaac Williams’ book (Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site, pages 20–23 and Figures 14 and 15 therein, 1932) shows sketches of a Nantgarw plate rim and a shard that he recovered from the waste pit with the characteristic Nantgarw embossed moulding, the first of these being shown in Figure 14/5 and the other in Figure 15/8—these are reproduced here in Figs. 5.1 and 5.2, respectively. The first point that can be made in the comparison of these two moulded forms is that they are certainly not identical, as noted by Jones and Joseph, and reference to our standard compositional visual data indicated above firmly places shard 15/8 (Fig. 5.2) as having the standard Nantgarw moulding (which is actually in contrast with the conclusion of Jones and Joseph) and the Nantgarw plate rim shown in 14/5 (Fig. 5.1) as being non-standard and very Swansea-like according to the protocol advanced for the Jones and Joseph differential criteria. Dr Williams goes on to attribute the origin of the moulding in shard 15/8 as being based upon that of the Sevres manufactory but he fails to mention the difference between the two mouldings, which obviously he did not notice or perhaps deemed to be insignificant. A comparison between the standard Swansea and Nantgarw embossed mouldings reproduced in Jones and Joseph’s book (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) does indeed indicate that the plate moulding labelled 14/5 in Dr Williams’ book is in fact identical with that of the Swansea China Works! The implication is clear and raises the question that perhaps Nantgarw did not have a unique “standard” embossed moulding and if so, this hypothesis needs to be verified. What is also clear is that Dr Williams did not find two types of moulded shard in his excavations of the waste pit as hinted at by Jones and Joseph, and we can but enquire about the origin of his so-called “Nantgarw plate” in his Figure 14/5, as it is not a shard, which has a Swansea-type moulding? It is also worth commenting

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here that Isaac Williams was extremely fortunate to recover the shard that he illustrates in Fig. 5.2 (in his own drawing, Figure 15/8) which has the complete embossed moulding evident upon it: normally, one would observe just sections of this moulding on similar shards, from which it would be extremely difficult to base an objective opinion: for example, Fig. 5.3 shows a selection of shards from the same stratum of level 6 of the Nantgarw waste pit that was excavated more recently and which were used for an analytical chemical analysis of the body paste (Colomban et al. 2020). It is clear that it would not be possible to determine if these conformed to the stated criteria for being a standard or modified Nantgarw type of characteristic moulding from these typically fragmented pieces recovered as not one fragment has a complete moulding displayed. As an illustration of the complete Nantgarw “standard” moulding, a dinner plate from the Nantgarw Baron Phipps of Normanby service is shown in Fig. 5.4; the photographic contrast here has been enhanced to eliminate the surface reflection and to better show the embossed moulding in relief that is seen to be “characteristic” of the Nantgarw manufactory. This is the “standard” Nantgarw C-scroll embossed edge moulding pattern as found in the shard discussed above (i.e. Dr Williams’ Figure 15/8 and Fig. 5.2, here) and the details can now be summarised as follows: ● The physical size of the C-scroll can vary dimensionally to accommodate the actual physical dimensions of the artefact. ● Here, the six C-scroll components of the edge moulding embossment on the dinner plate are identical and enclose six vignettes for potential decoration, of which only one bears the armorial crest in gilt of Baron Henry Phipps, a demi-lion rampant holding in its front paws (heraldically, dexter and sinister) a palm frond and sitting on its gilt and white torse (Fig. 5.4). ● Although the Nantgarw embossed edge moulding may be accompanied by gilt dentil edging, which signifies unequivocally a London atelier decoration, the Baron Phipps service is completely devoid of gilding apart from the armorial crest displayed in one vignette. Locally decorated versions of moulded analogues are known which do not bear dentil-edge gilding, such as that of the Ferguson service, painted by Thomas Pardoe at the Nantgarw China Works between 1821 and 1823, where the embossed moulding is not as clearly defined as it is in the more simply decorated Phipps service shown in Fig. 5.4 because it has been covered over completely with a dark cobalt blue enamel ground colour. The author has conducted a survey of London atelier decorated Nantgarw porcelains in the literature and has estimated that actually only some 25% are found to have been accompanied by the London dentil edge gilding (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelains, Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022), so even this observation cannot be claimed to be fully characteristic of a London decoration source for Nantgarw porcelain as three out of four items do not possess it. The presence of dentil edge gilding is, therefore, definitive generally of a London decorated piece of Nantgarw porcelain but logically its absence cannot be assumed to reflect a locally decorated source piece.

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Fig. 5.1 Sketch by Isaac Williams of the embossed border of a Nantgarw plate, from Figure 14 of his monograph on the archaeological site excavation of the Nantgarw China Works in 1931

● The “standard” composition of a Nantgarw embossed edge moulding is as follows; two inverted C-scrolls are formed from acanthus leaves and foliage enclosing between them a beribboned bow and florets near the cavetto. The right-hand side C-scroll contains two florets (in the major distinction from the Swansea analogue which has just one floret). A central floret between the acanthus scrolls at the edge rim of the piece has a six-petalled flower with a four-petalled floret and to its left a solitary leaf. The right-hand C-scroll has a six-petalled floret with two leaves

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Fig. 5.2 Sketch by Isaac Williams of a shard with an embossed border excavated from the waste pit of the Nantgarw China Works in 1931

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Fig. 5.3 A collection of shards with the embossed border presented to the author for chemical analysis by the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, excavated from the waste pit at level 6, depth 1 m, representing the Billingsley/Walker era. Courtesy of Charles Fountain Esq., Director of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw

and two florets on a stem plus two more, one six-petalled floret with three leaves and the other a five-petalled floret. The left-hand C-scroll has two pendant florets, one with four leaves and the other a flower bud, the stem ending in a stylised flower bud with a leaf. Also in the left hand C-scroll extending over to the next vignette, the lower stem goes under the upper one, then the upper stem goes under the lower and ends in a three-leaf pattern. Finally, on the left-hand side C-scroll there is a single prominent five-leaved floret. Rowland Williams in his monograph (Nantgarw Porcelain 1813–1822, 1993) has also considered the moulding differences between the Swansea and Nantgarw beribboned embossed analogues and he has summarised the observed differences as follows: It is to be noted that in the case of the Nantgarw moulding there are nine florets whereas in the case of the Swansea there are eight. A characteristic of the Nantgarw mould is the starfish like floret within the bracket on the left-hand side. The Nantgarw moulding occurs also on Swansea porcelain on tureens, round centre dishes and very rarely plates and on the other hand the Swansea moulding was found on a shard at Nantgarw by Isaac Williams in 1937 and it has been seen on a Nantgarw plate.

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Fig. 5.4 Nantgarw dinner plate from the Baron Phipps, Viscount Normanby, service, ca. 1817– 1819, impressed mark NANT-GARW C.W., demonstrating the beauty of Nantgarw porcelain translucency at its very best with a simple gilt armorial crest decoration at the verge between embossed moulded scrolls of foliage and florets and otherwise undecorated. Only two Nantgarw services are known of this type displaying just a crest and being otherwise completely undecorated with no enamelling, the other exemplar being the plain, unmoulded Homfray tea and coffee service of Penllyne Castle (Crest: an otter, pierced by an arrow in gold), Henry Phipps was Lord Chief Justice of Ireland, created Baron Mulgrave of York in 1794 and Viscount Normanby, Earl of Mulgrave, in 1812. Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W. His crest comprises a demi-lion rampant or holding in both paws a palm branch vert. In a Private Collection

This is a very relevant comment and supports the conclusions of the current study. Rowland Williams illustrates his hypothesis with a figure (his Figure 25 in Nantgarw Porcelain 1813–1822, 1993, shown on page 15), which is reproduced here in Fig. 5.5 and he has highlighted in red the major differences between the Nantgarw and Swansea mouldings. The Nantgarw plate that he refers to which apparently shows a characteristic Swansea moulding is shown here in Fig. 5.6: this is a locally decorated plate by Thomas Pardoe with a large group of garden flowers painted centrally and six gilt anthemions located around the beribboned moulded reserve. Any variation on this composition on a marked Nantgarw piece means that there would also exist a “non-standard” Nantgarw analogue moulding variant and it would be important to recognise this for attribution purposes, otherwise it could be inferred that the artefact being examined would not be confidently assigned to the Nantgarw China Works, especially in the absence of the manufactory mark for the larger pieces, with a potentially deleterious and negative outcome occurring for the piece in question. Also, from the detailed discussion above, if it was found that Nantgarw did in fact use the Swansea-type moulding on their own products then that

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Fig. 5.5 Highlighted differences between the Nantgarw and Swansea beribboned moulding patterns: taken from Figure 25, page 15 of Rowland Williams’ monograph, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1813–1822, 1993. Reproduced with the permission of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw

immediately compromises the major discriminatory criterion that was operational for the forensic differentiation between artefacts originating from the two manufactories on the basis of their embossed mouldings, as professed by Jones and Joseph! It hence now becomes of critical importance to determine the truth behind the basis of establishing a “characteristic” embossed moulding difference between the two manufactories of Swansea and Nantgarw and in that context the Farnley Hall service could afford a unique opportunity to objectively evaluate the constancy or otherwise of the moulding composition and the presence of potentially other variants of the mouldings used by Nantgarw over the range of artefact shapes and dimensions which are present in the Farnley Hall service.

5.1.1 Selected Swansea and Nantgarw Artefacts with an Embossed Moulding As part of this exercise, prior to his extending the analysis to the Farnley Hall service, the author has examined critically several pieces of Nantgarw and Swansea porcelain in his own collection all of which bore the embossed beribboned C-scroll edge mouldings that have been considered above and the results are shown in Table 5.1. The five

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Fig. 5.6 Nantgarw dessert plate, ca. 1820–1822, decorated locally by Thomas Pardoe which apparently possesses the non-standard Nantgarw moulding: reference Rowland Williams’ monograph, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1813–1822, 1993, Figure 26, page 16. Reproduced with the permission of the Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw

exemplars selected for examination and which have provided the data accumulated in Table 5.1 are as follows: ● A Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, diameter 25.0 cm, depth 3.0 cm, from the Lady Seaton service, Fig. 5.7, marked NANT-GARW C.W. impressed, which exhibits two florets encompassed by the right hand C-scroll acanthus leaf as expected for Nantgarw porcelain as defined by the critical protocol established by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988), wherein they differentiate between the Swansea and Nantgarw embossed moulded borders on this basis. The dentil gilt edging additionally defines this piece as a London atelier decorated plate. ● A Nantgarw porcelain dessert plate, diameter 21.7 cm, depth 2.9 cm, from the Sir John and Lady Williams service, Fig. 4.16, marked NANT-GARW C.W. impressed with a “3” impressed above, which exhibits only one floret encompassed by the right hand C-scroll acanthus leaf, as would have been expected for a Swansea porcelain embossed and beribboned moulding, and therefore not Nantgarw, as defined by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988).

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Table 5.1 Embossed mouldings on Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains exemplars Service

Artefact

Mark

Floretsa

Moulding typeb

Manufactory attribution

Lady Seaton

Dinner plate

NANT-GARW C.W.

Two

Nantgarw

Nantgarw CW

Sir John Williams

Dessert plate

NANT-GARW C.W.

One

Swansea

Nantgarw CW

Baron Phipps

Dinner plate

NANT-GARW C.W.

Two

Nantgarw

Nantgarw CW

Henry Morris

Dessert plate

None

One

Swansea

Swansea CW

William Pollard

Dessert dish

SWANSEA

Two

Nantgarw

Swansea CW

a

This column is based on the definitive descriptor as given in Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988) which differentiates between Swansea and Nantgarw embossed mouldings and relates to the number of florets encompassed by the right hand C-scroll formed by the acanthus leaves in the embossed edge moulding b As defined from the “characteristic” moulding for each manufactory as laid out by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988).

Fig. 5.7 Dinner plate from the Lady Seaton service of Nantgarw porcelain, ca. 1817–1819. The association of this service with Lady Seaton of Bosahan Manor, Cornwall, is unknown. Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W., underglaze cobalt blue hand-enamelled pattern, London decorated through John Mortlock’s, Oxford Street, with the characteristic dentil gold edging. In a Private Collection

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● A Swansea porcelain dessert plate of fine duck-egg porcelain, diameter 20.9 cm, depth 3.4 cm, Fig. 5.8, decorated by Henry Morris locally at the Swansea China Works, unmarked, which exhibits only one floret encompassed by the right hand C-scroll acanthus leaf as would be expected for the standard Swansea porcelain embossed beribboned C-scroll border as defined by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988). The C-scroll moulding is here accentuated by larger decorative gilded C-scrolls sweeping into the centre of the plate from the edge rim and into the cavetto of the plate. ● A Swansea porcelain deep dessert dish or soup plate in fine duck-egg porcelain, diameter 20.7 cm, depth 4.2 cm, Fig. 5.9, decorated by William Pollard locally at the Swansea China Works, marked SWANSEA in red stencil enamel on the reverse (Fig. 5.10), which exhibits two florets encompassed by the right hand C-scroll acanthus leaf as would be expected for a standard Nantgarw porcelain embossed and beribboned moulding as defined by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988). Five exotic birds are depicted in the vignettes with a central geometric gilded star motif. ● A Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, diameter 25.1 cm, depth 3.0 cm, from the Baron Phipps of Normanby service, Fig. 5.4, marked NANT-GARW C.W. impressed, which exhibits two florets encompassed by the right hand C-scroll acanthus leaf moulding as expected for a Nantgarw porcelain embossed and beribboned moulding as defined by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and

Fig. 5.8 Swansea porcelain dessert plate with embossed edge moulding and gilt C-scrolls accentuating the C-scroll moulding, ca., 1817–1820, decorated locally by Henry Morris with six vignettes containing groups of flowers and a central bouquet of garden flowers. In a Private Collection

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Fig. 5.9 Swansea deep dish with embossed beribboned edge moulding, duck-egg porcelain, ca. 1817–1820, decorated by William Pollard locally with five vignettes containing exotic birds perched on branches and a central geometrically gilded star motif. In a Private Collection

Fig. 5.10 The underside of the Swansea deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, showing the red stencilled SWANSEA mark on its base when viewed by transmitted light—the characteristic duckegg colouration of the highest quality Swansea porcelain is also clearly seen here. In a Private Collection

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Decoration, p. 162, 1988), wherein they differentiate between the Swansea and Nantgarw embossed moulded borders on this basis. There is no gilt edging which would automatically define this as a London atelier decorated plate so its origin could possibly be local. However, the family seat of Baron Phipps is at Whitby in North Yorkshire so it is reasonable to propose that this service could possibly have been commissioned from John Mortlock in London and that the commission specified minimal gilding, apart from its crest and no decoration. The crest decoration is of a particularly fine quality and resembles that of the crest of an embrued otter on the locally decorated Homfray of Penllyne Castle armorial service, which has been attributed to William Billingsley, who was a highly accomplished gilder in the Derby China Works (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). The surprising initial conclusion from an inspection of the data presented in Table 5.1 is that two exemplars from the two Swansea and three Nantgarw porcelain artefacts cited in the table apparently do not conform to the established differentiation criteria and protocol outlined in Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988) regarding the standard embossed and beribboned mouldings used by the Nantgarw and Swansea manufactories. Firstly, the Londondecorated Sir John and Lady Williams Nantgarw China Works dessert plate has a Swansea embossed moulded border and, secondly, the Swansea deep dessert dish decorated locally by William Pollard at the Swansea China Works bears a Nantgarw embossed moulded border! Both of these deductions are clear and irrefutable, so what does that imply historically for our interpretation of manufactory practices and production policies at the Swansea and Nantgarw China Works? Dr Isaac Williams (Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site, Figure 14/5, page 21, 1932) shows a sketch made of an embossed border of his Nantgarw plate, shown here in Fig. 5.1, which curiously bears a Swansea embossed border that is essentially different from his Nantgarw shard sketch based upon his excavations at the waste pit on the site of the Nantgarw China Works (shown in Figure 15/8, page 22) and reproduced here in Fig. 5.2. Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988) do mention this curious anomaly, but they incorrectly assign the shard fragment to a Swansea porcelain border, and assume the Nantgarw plate has Nantgarw border, and they offer no explanation for the discrepancy. Intriguingly, Jones and Joseph also then allege that: The Nantgarw C-scroll may be found on Swansea porcelain but it is more likely to occur on the large shapes. The Authors have not seen the Swansea C-scroll moulding on Nantgarw porcelain although it may, of course, exist.

This statement is seemingly keeping the options open but can now also be seen to be quite prophetic; in Table 5.1 we can see that both of these alternative scenarios which have been proposed by Jones and Joseph actually have now been documented in the form of a marked Nantgarw piece which exhibits a Swansea C-scroll embossed border and, conversely, a marked Swansea piece which exhibits a Nantgarw C-scroll embossed border! The forensic scientist Professor Angela Gallop has recently written a book (Gallop, When the Dogs Don’t Bark: A Forensic Scientist’s Search for the

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149

Truth, 2019) on her laboratory forensic case studies and has defined the extent of a forensic scientific examination as establishing the three major outcomes of an investigation in terms of “What is it, how much of it is there and where did it come from?”. However, a very important question which is often then asked of a forensic scientist but is found to be much more difficult to answer forensically is “Why is it there?”. Likewise, here, we are now faced with attempting to explain why the two scenarios occur relating to the artefacts highlighted above, which are otherwise typical of their individual manufactories of Nantgarw and Swansea and exhibit clearly evident manufactory marks, and that each should nevertheless bear what is apparently, according to Jones and Joseph, an unequivocal identifier of the other manufactory? The porcelain body composition of each item has been established analytically to be unequivocally characteristic of the factory concerned, in this case highly phosphatic Nantgarw soft paste porcelain for the Sir John and Lady Williams dessert plate and Lewis Dillwyn’s duck-egg Swansea translucent porcelain for the William Pollard decorated deep dessert dish (Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective, 2018; Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021). The two pieces were therefore unquestionably each manufactured at their designated source factories of the Nantgarw China Works or the Swansea China Works, respectively, using their individual body paste recipes. The observed difference in the embossed mouldings must therefore have occurred at the prototype formation stage when the semi-liquid porcelain paste is poured into the moulds prior to the removal and firing of each piece in the biscuit kilns at the Swansea China Works and Nantgarw China Works, respectively. This is an incontrovertible deduction as the embossed moulding is an integral part of each cast piece that arises directly from the moulds and in the case of Nantgarw (and also the Swansea pieces here shown in Figs. 5.8 and 5.9) can be seen on the underside of the edge; in other words, the embossed moulding is not a feature which is applied and stuck on to the piece independently, as happens for example with knobs, mask heads, handles, feet and small spherical balls found elsewhere on pieces of Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains. The inference, therefore, is that the respective moulds must have existed at both Swansea and at Nantgarw of each other’s embossed and beribboned pieces: the alternative hypotheses that Swansea paste was moulded in Nantgarw, fired, and sent back to Swansea for decoration and that Nantgarw paste was sent to Swansea, fired, then returned to Nantgarw for despatch to Mortlock’s in London for decoration are surely not acceptable scenarios to offer any credible explanation for consideration. Another hypothesis that needs to be evaluated could be that the Swansea Pollard-decorated deep dessert dish was actually a Nantgarw piece purchased at a Nantgarw sales auction then decorated at Swansea and marked accordingly, as several ceramic historians have suggested could possibly have occurred: however, two pieces of evidence do not subscribe to the veracity of this particular scenario—firstly, the Swansea deep dish exemplar is composed of a Swansea duck-egg paste formulation, bearing the SWANSEA mark alone (Fig. 5.10) and also, if manufactured originally at Nantgarw it would inevitably have borne the impressed mark as most Nantgarw China Works flatwares did (see for example the five similar deep dessert dishes investigated here in the Farnley

150

5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

Hall Nantgarw service) and it would naturally then have also exhibited the characteristic Nantgarw translucency and not the duck-egg translucency as can be seen visually in Fig. 5.10. Whilst researching this particular Swansea theme and its interaction with the Nantgarw China Works, an opportunity arose to examine a closely related item from Swansea, which putatively can be assigned to the same, or very similar, dessert service: this is an oval dessert dish with an embossed and beribboned moulded border and decorated in the identical style with exotic birds in six vignettes by William Pollard (Fig. 5.11) with a central gilded geometric star motif. Like the dessert dish described above, it is of the finest duck-egg translucency porcelain (of length along the major axis 26.3 cm, minor axis 18.7 cm and height 3.9 cm) and similarly marked with the red stencilled SWANSEA on the underside. However, the C-scroll moulding here clearly exhibits a single floret only, as expected from the prediction of Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain;Shapes and Decoration, 1988) for a Swansea China Works product. The occurrence of William Pollard’s painting of solely exotic birds on Swansea porcelain without their accompanying floral sprays is exceedingly rare and it is an inevitable conclusion that these two pieces probably belong to the same dessert service; for some inexplicable reason, the Swansea China Works adopted a secondary mould for the deep dessert dishes manufactured from the Nantgarw version, but minus its impressed mark, of course. Could it be perhaps that at that particular time, the moulds for the deep dishes at Swansea were already committed and to fulfil the new commission deadline the new Nantgarw-type moulds were needed? The argument becomes even more complex when two more items from apparently the same service

Fig. 5.11 A Swansea oval dessert dish with an embossed beribboned moulded border en suite with the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, duck-egg porcelain, and similarly decorated locally by William Pollard with six vignettes, each containing an exotic bird perched in a tree, and with an identical central geometric gilded star motif. Red enamelled stencilled mark SWANSEA on its base. Courtesy of Dr and Mrs Morgan Denyer

5.1 Definition of the Nantgarw Embossed Beribboned Moulding

151

are revealed in the John Andrews Collection at Plas Glyn-y-Weddw: these are shown here in Figs. 5.12 and 5.13, being respectively a square dessert dish with four vignettes of birds and a dessert plate with six vignettes of birds: these are both illustrated in Fergus Gambon’s book (Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016, page 209, illustrations S31 and S32). In both cases the “standard” Swansea moulding pattern has been adopted, in contrast to the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, which only has five vignettes with birds! Hence, we can but conclude that within this Swansea duckegg porcelain service we have differential moulding patterns which reflect both the Swansea and Nantgarw standard mouldings. We are, therefore, left with the inevitable conclusion that both the Swansea China Works and the Nantgarw China Works could possibly have had more than one mould type available for their embossed beribboned bordered pieces and that in both cases the manufactories actually had moulds which were characteristic of each other’s productions. As the great detective Sherlock Holmes said: Watson, when you have eliminated all which is impossible then whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth! Sherlock Holmes, “The Adventure of The Blanched Soldier”. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (1926).

Many critics of the Sherlock Holmes deductive and inductive reasoning approach (Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022), as exemplified in the above quotation, have described it as an omniscient logical fallacy because one never really knows whether or not all possible alternative explanations have been duly considered and rejected as being inadmissible for the sequence of events being considered and for reaching the inevitable conclusion as spelled out by Sherlock Holmes. Forensically, we are, of course, unable to evidentially consider the “why”, without exploring many potentially contentious issues and it could be that a previously unconsidered explanation is tenable: for example, did Billingsley and Walker take their Nantgarw moulds to Swansea in 1814 and then when they left to start up again in Nantgarw in 1817 they left them there and then they made new moulds for their Nantgarw Phase II operation that were slightly different? A clear way of experimentally verifying the correctness of this hypothesis would be to identify the earliest possible Nantgarw products from their Phase I operations in 1813 prior to their Memorial application in September of that year and, if any exhibit the embossed beribboned moulding, to visually examine its components in comparison with the later versions outlined above.

5.1.2 Reduction upon Firing of Porcelain Formed from Moulds From Table 5.1 it has been concluded that the Swansea porcelain deep dish (Fig. 5.9) painted locally by William Pollard has a characteristic edge embossed border which is definitively Nantgarw from the criteria offered by Jones and Joseph (Swansea

152

5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

Fig. 5.12 Swansea duck-egg porcelain square dessert dish locally decorated by William Pollard with four vignettes containing exotic birds and en suite with the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9 and the oval dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.11. Reproduced with permission of Gwyn Jones, John Andrews Collection, Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) and the potential reason for this should now be explored. It does not exhibit the Nantgarw impressed mark and has the Swansea duck-egg paste translucency rather than the clear white translucency of the finest Nantgarw porcelain. One possibility is that it was made at Nantgarw and sent to Swansea for decorating; this is untenable as the body analyses confirm that it is definitively Swansea porcelain (Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective, 2018), the translucency seen by transmitted light is typically duck-egg and it is marked SWANSEA in red stencilled enamel on the underside (Fig. 5.10). Also, if it had been made in a Nantgarw mould at the Nantgarw China Works then it would have been accompanied by the impressed mark NANT-GARW C.W. as possessed by all of the five Nantgarw deep dishes surveyed in the Farnley Hall service. Another more intriguing possibility arises when we consider the relative dimensions of the five Nantgarw marked deep dishes in the Farnley Hall service and this Swansea exemplar. The Nantgarw deep dishes all have a diameter of 24.0 cm and a depth of 4.9 cm whereas the Swansea deep dish has a diameter of 20.7 cm and a depth of 4.2 cm; altogether, therefore, the Swansea version is a significantly smaller piece. In a previous work, the author investigated the contraction of porcelain phosphatic soft paste bodies upon firing at the kiln temperatures adopted; this arose

5.1 Definition of the Nantgarw Embossed Beribboned Moulding

153

Fig. 5.13 Swansea duck-egg porcelain dessert plate locally decorated by William Pollard with six vignettes containing exotic birds and en suite with the deep dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.9, the oval dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.11 and the square dessert dish shown in Fig. 5.13. Reproduced with permission of Gwyn Jones, John Andrews Collection, Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd

from the ceramic technology experiments that were associated with William Weston Young’s hard paste porcelain experiments on his high-fired silica bricks which were carried out in the Nantgarw kilns at the Nantgarw China Works between 1821 and 1823 (Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847), 2019; William Weston Young Diaries, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). It is known that upon taking the prototype porcelain paste artefact formed from the mould and firing it in the kiln at a temperature around 1300 °C that a reduction in the final dimensions occurs approaching 13%, i.e. the fired biscuit porcelain item is always some 13% smaller than its unfired analogue—this is due mainly to moisture loss upon firing and the incipient chemical reactions and resulting rearrangement in molecular structures of the silicaceous clays and raw materials involved in its formulation and recipe composition which have been described earlier. If a mould was, therefore, made at Swansea from an existing Nantgarw finished piece of porcelain and the paste model therefrom was then fired, a 13% diminution in the dimensions of the piece would result upon firing. From the original dimensions of the original Nantgarw China Works deep dish from

154

5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

which the new mould was constructed this would have resulted in a finished piece that was now of a diameter 20.8 cm and a depth 4.2 cm! This is precisely, within experimental error, what has been measured for the Swansea deep dish shown in Fig. 5.9 here: the interpretation of this data then would be that if a mould was made of a Nantgarw deep dish at the Swansea China Works the fired Swansea deep dish as a result would have exactly the dimensions that we see here. The forensic “why” now intrudes upon the discussion—and this is an insoluble question, given that Swansea seemingly potentially already had its own version of the Nantgarw type embossed border anyway so there would be surely little advantage to be gained by adopting a novel border for a piece of porcelain of a measurably reduced size! The second scenario that has emerged from the analysis of the exemplars listed in Table 5.1 is the reverse of that considered above and now relates to the potential usage of a Swansea embossed border type on a marked, impressed Nantgarw dessert plate. Unfortunately, no dessert plates remain in the Farnley Hall service from which it would be possible to make an objective comparison of dimensions. However, the author does possess two Nantgarw dessert plates which were both simply and locally decorated, each with a plain border and an impressed mark of NANT-GARW C.W., and these possess the dimensions of a diameter of 21.8 cm and depth of 2.9 cm, which compare favourably with that of the moulded border dessert plate discussed above to within an acceptable experimental measurement error of ± 0.1 cm. If the appropriate Swansea dessert plate mould had been used by Nantgarw to create the Sir John and Lady Williams dessert plate, the consequential dimensional reduction upon firing would then have been expected to yield a potential Nantgarw plate of 18.2 cm diameter and 3.0 cm depth, which clearly does not match that of the actual Nantgarw dessert plate under consideration here and this cannot, therefore, be a valid hypothesis to consider. Inevitably, therefore, it is not possible to provide a reasonable and cogent explanation for the use of each other’s embossed borders by the Swansea and Nantgarw manufactories and it now remains to see if the composition of the embossed borders of the surviving pieces in the Farnley Hall Nantgarw dinner-dessert service can shed any light upon this situation.

5.2 Comparison of the Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport C-scroll Embossed Beribboned Mouldings It was mentioned earlier that some ceramics historians have alleged apocryphally that the Nantgarw C-scroll moulding engendered “copies” that appeared at other manufactories and it is appropriate here that we now evaluate how close these were to the “original”. Several ceramic historians have suggested that manufactory proprietors could have acquired exemplars of the Nantgarw C-scroll moulding on plates and therefrom created their own versions of the embossed edge moulding for use on

5.2 Comparison of the Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport C-scroll …

155

Table 5.2 Embossed C-scroll border analysis on Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport plates Exemplar

Florets RHa

Central floretb

Florets LHc

C-scrolld

Ribbons and bowse

Nantgarw

2

1/6-petals

2 pendant/4 leaves

2-branched

Yes

Swansea

1

0

1

1-branched

Yes

1

1/7-petals

2

2-branched

Yes

Derby 1f

0

0

0

5-branched

No

Coalport 2g

2

2

1

1

Yes

Coalport a Refers

to the number of florets encompassed by the RH C-scroll

b The presence and number of petals possessed by the single floret situated between the RH and LH

C scrolls number of florets and type encompassed by the LH C-scroll d Appearance of the acanthus C-scroll e Presence of ribbons and bows f Beige ground Coalport g Blue ground Coalport c The

their own services. This would mean, of course, that the copies would be identical and formed upon pieces that were significantly smaller in size than the Nantgarw exemplar because of shrinkage that occurred in the biscuit porcelain paste in the kiln upon firing. Additionally, Llewelyn Jewitt reported in his book (Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from the Prehistoric Times Down to the Present Day, Vols. I and II, London, 1878) that upon the departure of William Billingsley and Samuel Walker from Nantgarw in 1820 an auction sale was held by William Weston Young in October 1820 of Nantgarw China Works material, including equipment such as the moulds, which were purchased by John Rose, proprietor of the Coalport China Works. Critics have commented that John Rose already had his moulds for the operation of his successful manufacturing operation at Coalport, so he would not have need of redundant moulds sourced elsewhere, but others have responded with the statement that he might have purchased the Nantgarw moulds to prevent his competitors from acquiring them! It has also been argued that William Weston Young, who took over the running of the Nantgarw China Works in 1820, would have needed those same moulds, which would be essential for delivery of his plans to continue with the manufacture of porcelain at Nantgarw in the post-Billingsley period as set out in his Diaries (Young, William Weston, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), 30 Volumes, West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea, SA1 3SN). William Weston Young would therefore not have seen fit to dispose of those moulds whilst he still had ongoing ambitions and a desire to revive porcelain manufacture at Nantgarw, as he most certainly did in the period between 1820–1822. Whatever the true situation, it will be beneficial to examine the C-scroll mouldings on some selected analogues of the Nantgarw embossed beribboned moulding to establish how close these copies are to the original and to provide a protocol for their potential discrimination on unmarked pieces. The database from which these observations will be accomplished is provided by the following exemplars:

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5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

Fig. 5.14 Coalport porcelain, dessert plate, ca. 1820, decorated with a cobalt blue border and an embossed edge with gilding and white pigment highlights. The vignettes are not decorated. Exquisitely painted central flower bouquet. In a Private Collection

● ● ● ● ●

Nantgarw porcelain, dinner plate, Baron Phipps armorial service, Fig. 5.4; Swansea porcelain, dessert plate, decorated locally by Henry Morris Fig. 5.8; Derby porcelain, dessert plate, Lord Ongley service, Fig. 4.7; Coalport porcelain, dessert plate, with cobalt blue edge ground colour, Fig. 5.14; Coalport porcelain, dessert plate, with a light beige brown edge ground colour Fig. 5.15.

Each exemplar was examined closely to ascertain the presence or absence of key features for an objective comparison to be made with the Nantgarw primary exemplar and these are summarised in Table 5.2 using the enhanced detail photographic montage of the embossed moulded borders shown in Fig. 5.16. The conclusions that are manifest from an analysis of the data presented in Table 5.2 now follow: ● Both Derby and Swansea have the closest similarities to Nantgarw and together form the nearest approximation to its embossed C-scroll border. However, they are not identical. ● None of the other manufactories exactly match the Nantgarw embossed C-scroll border, so it is an implicit conclusion from this observation that the Nantgarw

5.2 Comparison of the Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport C-scroll …

157

Fig. 5.15 Coalport porcelain, dessert plate, ca. 1820, decorated with a brown-beige border and an embossed edge, profusely gilded, with a central landscape scene. Contains five vignettes each containing sprays of garden flowers. Note that the C-scroll border is devoid of ribbons and florets. Courtesy of Dr and Mrs Morgan Denyer

manufactory moulds were not used elsewhere to manufacture porcelain and additionally that new moulds were not taken from existing Nantgarw porcelain to furnish these exemplars. ● The Coalport exemplars 1 and 2 are completely different from each other and confirm that more than one C-scroll border was in use at the Coalport China Works in the 1820s: it is seen that the Coalport 1 exemplar does not even possess ribbons and bows with accompanying florets in its embossed C-scroll border. ● It is practical to use the data in Table 5.2 to formulate a protocol for the differentiation between the embossed C-scroll borders of the selected factories of Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport and this is portrayed in Fig. 5.17. The substance of this protocol confirms that for the selected exemplars chosen here direct copies were not made of each other’s wares and from the Nantgarw original.

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5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

Fig. 5.16 Montage of the C-scroll borders manifest on Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport plates, enlarged for clarity from specimens shown in previous Figs. 4.7, 5.4, 5.8, 5.11 and 5.14; from the top, Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby, Coalport brown-beige border, Coalport cobalt blue border

5.2 Comparison of the Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport C-scroll …

159

Fig. 5.16 (continued)

The conclusion to this exercise does not apply to the larger pieces of Nantgarw porcelain, such as those in the Farnley Hall service, which have been noted to exhibit non-standard versions of the C-scroll embossed mouldings which do not conform to the observed criteria used for establishing the protocol shown in Fig. 5.17. This is perhaps expected since new moulds of significantly different size and shape are needed to produce the larger pieces in the service, but we are still faced with the conundrum that there was a significant and sensible change made to the embossed beribboned and “standard” border that accompanied the larger pieces of the service— and the reason for that observation is not readily available.

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5 The Nantgarw Porcelain Embossed and Beribboned Body Moulding

Presence of Ribbons and Bows

No

Yes

Coalport 1

Florets on RHS C-scroll

One

Two

Swansea, Derby

Nantagrw, Coalport 2

Florets on LHS

Central florets

One

Two

One

Two

Swansea

Derby

Nantgarw

Coalport 2

Fig. 5.17 Analytical protocol for the differentiation between C-scrolled embossed borders on Nantgarw, Swansea, Derby and Coalport porcelains

References P. Colomban, H.G.M. Edwards, C. Fountain, Raman spectroscopic and SEM/EDAXS analyses of highly translucent Nantgarw soft-paste porcelain. J. Eur. Ceram. Soc. 40, 4664–4675 (2020) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2018) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847) (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2019)

References

161

H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China (Preservation of Cultural Heritage Series, Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2022) A. Gallop, When the Dogs Don’t Bark: A Forensic Scientist’s Search for the Truth (Hodder and Stoughton, Victoria Embankment, London, 2019) F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain) (Oriel Plas Glyn-yWeddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016) J. Haslem, The Old Derby China Factory: The Workmen and their Productions. Containing Details of their Chief Artist Workmen, the Various Marks Used, Fac-Similes Copied from the Old Derby Pattern Books, the Original Price List of More than 400 Figures and Groups, Etc., Etc. (George Bell & Sons Covent Garden, London, 1876). Reprinted by E.P. Publishing, Wakefield, 1973 W.E. Jenkins, Dillwyn’s Etruscan Ware 1847–1850 (Crown Printers, Morriston, Swansea, 1971) L. Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from the Prehistoric Times Down to the Present Day, vol I and II (Virtue & Co Ltd, London, 1978) W. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) A.E.J. Jones, S.L. Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration (David Brown Publishers, Cowbridge, 1988) J. Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848 (The Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2002) I.J. Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site (The National Museum of Wales/Press Board of the University of Wales, Amgueddfa Genedlaethol Cymru, Cardiff, 1932) R. Williams, Nantgarw Porcelain 1813–1822 (Friends of Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, GPS Printers, Taff’s Well, Glamorgan, 1993) W.W. Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), vol 30 (West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea), SA1 3SN. https://archiveshub.jisc.sc.uk/data/gb216-d/dxch/ ddxch/i/hub

Chapter 6

Analysis of the Composition of the Farnley Hall Service

Abstract The characteristic decoration motifs and vignette composition on the moulded borders and the features that each moulded C-scroll possess are correlated with the dimensions and type of porcelain artefact on which they are displayed in the Farnley Hall service, which comprises an unusually large number of surviving serving platters. Some of the variations are explicable on size factors but others are not. These variations have not been reported in analogous Nantgarw porcelain services hitherto. The identification of the bearded tulip in the central floral bouquets confirms that the artist de Junic painted some of this service. Keywords Embossed moulding characteristics · Vignette decoration · Large size variation of borders · Bearded tulip Hitherto, we have examined several criteria which have been applied historically to establish the basis of an evaluation of Nantgarw porcelains and their differentiation from Swansea and other contemporary porcelain manufactories. It is apparent that our understanding of the complexity of the manufacturing operations and the classification of the porcelain made at the Nantgarw China Works is still rather incomplete and this is not surprising when it is realised that the local factory work books at Nantgarw, notes pertaining to potential recipe changes and the details of the commissioning of artefacts by clients through their main agent and outlet in London, John Mortlock of Oxford Street, are non-existent. The only way forward therefore has been through inductive reasoning (also paraphrased as “reverse analysis”) as applied by that great fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes, in many of his famous literary cases. The high kiln losses referred to earlier and the consequent rarity of the porcelain products has not furnished a particularly wide range of exemplars from which a database can be established for modern forensic analysis to be applied and we are therefore reduced to making some generalities from a limited repertoire. When one factors in historical thought that was advanced over the past two hundred years about what methods and procedures were adopted to manufacture this wonderful ceramic and its artistic decoration, some of which was not based upon fact but rather informed and sometimes ill-founded opinion, then the real situation can be obfuscated and could well account for researchers travelling down incorrect avenues and making incorrect assumptions in their search for information. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_6

163

164

6 Analysis of the Composition of the Farnley Hall Service

The Nantgarw China Works manufactured mainly dessert, dinner and tea services and only occasionally other decorative porcelain items such as toilet sets, small solitaire cabaret and boudoir sets, writing sets, spill vases, chamber candlesticks and vases; it was estimated from contemporary remarks that some 25 dozen tea sets, dinner sets and dessert sets comprised a single kiln charge at Nantgarw on a weekly basis—it taking about two days to attain the optimal operating temperature for firing, a further four days to maintain the charge at this temperature and then another two days to effect the cooling down of the kiln and its charge to ambient temperature, whereupon the kiln could be emptied of its fired porcelain artefacts. For a 90% kiln loss as noted by Lewis Dillwyn in his discussions at the Nantgarw site with Samuel Walker in October 1813, which was supported by his observation of a large number of porcelain shards at the site, this means that only about 30–40 perfect pieces of biscuit porcelain, or perhaps a few more possibly, would be normally expected from a single kiln firing—with a small percentage of the remainder, namely those with some blemishes that could be masked by subsequent strategic decoration, being usable locally. This would translate into an estimated effective production at Nantgarw of only 2000 pieces per annum and a total production of perhaps 6000– 7000 pieces during the lifetime of the China Works, most of which would be bound for John Mortlock’s agency in London, plus perhaps another 2000–3000 pieces or so that were retained locally. We have noted in Table 2.1 that 52 named services have been identified as emanating from Nantgarw during its lifetime but in most cases the survival rate has been very small: for example, in some cases only one example is known to be extant for a particular service, such as the Viscount Weymouth, Wyndham, and the Jeffreys of Brecon services. Even the larger original commissions are now severely reduced, such as the Ramsay of Straloch and the Theodore Ellis services and to these may now be added the Farnley Hall service. This makes it rather difficult in many cases to fully appraise the composition of a porcelain service, and hence its more intimate details of construction, which as we have seen above can be sometimes tantalisingly obscure.

6.1 Analytical Deductions The Farnley Hall service, although not unique in having relatively few surviving pieces from a once much larger entity in Nantgarw porcelains, does possess some features which are ideal for following through with some aspects of the analytical challenge to verify what structural criteria can be deemed to be characteristic of the Nantgarw manufactory. The major feature in this exercise relates to the range of larger wares which are accessible for study despite many of the more standard service wares having disappeared: for example, only one dinner plate now survives from Dr John’s statement that 100 plates, comprising dessert plates and dinner plates, would have been commissioned originally as part of this service (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). Reference to Table 3.1 gives the current composition of this Farnley Hall service as follows.

6.1 Analytical Deductions

165

3 tureen stands, 5 deep dessert dishes, 1 dinner plate, 2 large circular serving plates, 4 small oblong platters, 2 medium oblong platters and 2 large oblong platters. The first impression received from an inspection of this list is that very few of the anticipated original pieces that were manufactured in larger numbers have survived, such as the dinner plates, dessert plates, square dishes and oval comports that have been noted as comprising the standard provision of such services in the literature. Other named services also have lone survivors in this category or perhaps only a few exemplars. All of the 19 surviving pieces in the Farnley Hall service are en suite in respect of the embossed edge moulding design and the accompanying London atelier decoration of the vignettes with dentil edged gilding manifest at the rim of each piece. Each piece conforms to type in having flowers, fruit and exotic bird subjects occupying the vignettes between the left and right C-scroll acanthus leaf edge Nantgarw body mouldings but careful inspection of the detail of these mouldings and the composition of the decorated vignettes reveals some features of potential interest. ● The deep dessert dishes have five vignettes in the embossed edge border but all the other pieces of the Farnley Hall service have six vignettes: even the largest pieces, the large oblong platters, with a total edge dimension at the circumference of 128 cm, have six vignettes (and no more) as do the smallest, the tureen stands, which have a total edge dimension at their circumference of 54 cm, which is only some 40% of the larger sized pieces. The number of vignettes never exceeds six: it should be noted that on the Duke of Cambridge service Nantgarw dinner plate (Fig. 6.1) there are eight vignettes enclosed in a dimension at the circumference of only 75 cm and that these are located on a plain edged rim which is not embossed with the C-scroll border. The mouldings of the C-scrolled beribboned embossed border vary but little in length between 4.5 and 6 cm in extent. This means that the vignettes on the large platters are significantly larger than those on the smaller pieces and would technically be suitable for more elaborate decorating themes, which does not seem to have occurred in practice, and the smaller vignettes on the Duke of Cambridge service pieces, in fact, contain more expansive decorating themes and involve landscapes:exotic birds:fruit in the ratio 4:2:2, all with a centrally located bouquet of garden flowers. Calculation reveals that the vignette dimension along their major axis on the small tureen stands in the Farnley Hall service is approximately 4.5 cm compared with that on the largest oblong platters of 15.5 cm. In comparison, the eight vignettes on the Nantgarw Duke of Cambridge service are not all of an equal dimension, being 6.4 cm for those containing fruit and exotic birds and 5.5 cm for those containing the landscapes, the limitation in size of the space between the vignettes being a maroon ground pigment colour edged with gilt rather than the moulded embossed C-scrolls on the Farnley Hall service. ● A very interesting feature is revealed when the composition of the vignettes in the Farnley Hall service pieces is analysed. Although the formal appearance of a ratio on the themes between flowers:fruit:exotic birds seems superficially to have

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Fig. 6.1 Nantgarw porcelain dinner plate, 1818, diameter 25.0 cm; London decorated by James Plant at Robins and Randall’s atelier for Mortlock’s of Oxford Street; commissioned by George, the Prince Regent, as a wedding present for his younger brother, Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge on his marriage in June, 1818, at Buckingham Palace to Princess Augusta Wilhelmina Louise, Landgravine of Hesse-Cassel. Marked impressed NANT-GARW C.W. This specimen plate was selected for display at the Special 200th Anniversary Exhibition of exquisite Nantgarw Porcelain entitled, Gartre’n Ol, “Coming Home”, Exhibition, and held at Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, July–September, 2019, in the residence of William Billingsley on the actual Nantgarw China Works Site. In a Private Collection

been preserved uniformly, upon close inspection the actual compositional distribution of these topics varies significantly between the service pieces of different types. Hence, a summary is given below for the ratios of flowers:fruit:exotic birds displayed in the individual vignettes for different service items: Tureen stands

5:0:1 and 4:1:1

Deep dessert dishes

4:1:0 and 5:0:0

Dinner plate

4:1:1

Circular serving plate

5:0:1

Small oblong platter

5:0:1

Medium oblong platter

5:0:1

Large oblong platter

5:0:1

● The first thing that strikes one from this list is the variation employed by the atelier in the decoration of the vignettes for pieces in the same service: the number of vignettes employed for the service is straightforward by comparison with other services in that the deep dishes have five and the larger platters and dinner plates have six vignettes. What is also clear is that the larger circular serving plate and

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oblong platters also all have six vignettes in the embossed moulding pattern. Even the largest pieces, the large oblong platters, have a numerical limitation of six vignettes and not more as indicated above. ● The vignette dimensions change according to the type of artefact: naturally, the smallest vignette is found on the tureen stands, where six vignettes each of 4 cm length are available for decoration. On the deep dishes the vignette size increases to 6 cm and this is maintained for the oblong platters where four vignettes have a dimension of 6 cm and two of 4.5 cm on the diametrically longer axis. The actual size of the embossed beribboned motif also changes from the tureen stand, deep dish to oblong platter being 4.5, 6.5 and 6.5 cm, respectively, which indicates that the embossed motif is some 25–30% smaller on the smaller items then does not change materially through the larger ones. The embossed beribboned edge border maintains its dimensions through all pieces of the same type in the service, as expected for items that are presumably made from the same moulds. ● Perhaps the most striking visual comparison that is derived from this analytical study is the composition of the decorated vignettes. In the original Nantgarw Duke of Cambridge dessert service, for example, the eight vignettes have a constant ratio of 4:2:2 for landscapes:exotic birds:fruit and this never varies, whereas similar copies of this service that were ordered later by other clients from the Nantgarw China Works had a different ratio, such as 2:3:3 for landscapes:exotic birds:fruit and this now differentiates items from the copy services from those which were part of the original Duke of Cambridge service. Today this difference is used by connoisseurs to distinguish between pieces from the original service and later copies. Here for the Farnley Hall service, only the larger items, namely the large circular serving plate and the range of oblong serving platters, show a consistency of presentation of the flowers:fruit:exotic birds ratio in the vignettes as 5:0:1, which clearly shows that only flowers and birds are represented in the vignettes with the absence of fruit. Elsewhere, the deep dessert dishes do not exhibit an exotic bird decoration at all and the ratio of flowers:fruit is either 4:1 or 5:0, there being four examples of the former and one of the latter from the five deep dessert dishes available for analysis. This is doubly interesting as it also reveals that the ratio in decoration of flowers:fruit:birds is not constant within an identical group of pieces from the same service and that this can be subject to a significant variation! A similar case exists for the three small tureen stands which offer a vignette decoration based upon flowers:fruit:birds of 5:0:1 (one) and 4:1:1 (two) from the three exemplars presented for analysis. The dinner plate has a corresponding ratio of 4:1:1 for flowers:fruit:birds. This variation in vignette composition was totally unexpected and has not seemingly been identified hitherto in a Nantgarw service; it is clearly not a function of the Nantgarw manufactory and can thus can only be attributed to the responsibility of the particular London decorating atelier concerned. ● Another unexpected variation was found when the design of the embossed beribboned moulded motif was studied: this too was found to be not of a constant and unvarying composition. The primary difference between the Swansea and Nantgarw embossed motif designs as deduced by Jones and Joseph (Swansea

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Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988) was that the Swansea motif exhibited one floret encompassed by the acanthus leaf C-scroll on the right hand side whereas the Nantgarw analogue showed two florets in the same region. The implicit assumption upon which this didactic and definitive differential criterion was based for distinguishing between unmarked Swansea and Nantgarw pieces is that there was no change observed in the embossed motifs presented on these pieces from both manufactories. It appears this assumption is now misplaced as the Farnley Hall service analysis revealed the following distribution of these florets and their observed changes among the different pieces as demonstrated below in the same service: Tureen stands, deep dessert dishes, dinner plate: 2 florets. Circular serving plates, small oblong serving platters: 2, 1 and 0 florets. Medium serving platters: 1 floret. Large serving platters: 0 florets. This is not, therefore, an interservice variation, which may also exist (!), but rather an intraservice one. The consequence of this discovery clearly is that even within the same service the Nantgarw embossed edged motif displays a variation which occurs within the border of each piece and this can only be attributed to the different mould designs used for the production of the service items in the Nantgarw China Works manufactory. Forensically, therefore it is patently incorrect to rely upon merely the observation of the number of florets encased within the left or the right hand Cscroll acanthus moulded embossment to differentiate between unmarked Nantgarw and Swansea pieces as it is compromised by this potential design variation which emanates from the actual moulds that were used to create the individual pieces in the Nantgarw manufactory. It is not possible to say whether this also occurs in the Swansea embossed motifs at this stage without undertaking a similar comparative exercise on surviving Swansea embossed and beribboned services. The situation is exacerbated for attribution purposes in that the major variation in design occurs for the larger Nantgarw flatware pieces, which are generally also unmarked: only one of the ten pieces represented here in this category bears an impressed NANT-GARW C.W. mark and also carried a 2:1:0 variation in the embossed motif design—namely, the small oblong platter which is in two pieces, being cited as number 12 in Table 3.1 and shown here in Fig. 3.18. The other nine exemplars are thus not marked with the manufactory impressed mark in this way and they only bear impressed numerals which presumably relate to the manufactory stock mould sizes. Hence, it would be perfectly reasonable for a connoisseur, when presented with some unmarked large pieces which purported to be of Nantgarw porcelain to reject their provenance and attribution when using the apparently didactic criterion, to which they do not actually conform, proposed by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, p. 162, 1988) for an assessment of their formal identification. In fact, because of the variation in the floret distribution within the embossed motif of each individual piece, it would be even more reasonable to conclude that the piece was a complete mismatch to either factory and therefore perhaps could even be adjudged to be a fake! The evidence of the superb translucency that is the hallmark of the

6.2 The Presence of the “Bearded Tulip”

169

finest Nantgarw porcelain also would not be of great significance here as the rather thickly potted larger items under investigation do not have the superb clarity that one normally associates with Nantgarw porcelain and which is exhibited by the smaller items in the same service, such as the tureen stands, deep dessert dishes and the dinner plate. The two largest items of Nantgarw porcelain in this service, the large oblong serving platters, cited as numbers 18 and 19 in the list of Table 3.1 and shown here in Figs. 3.24 and 3.25, are magnificent and important pieces of Nantgarw porcelain but the embossed design motif contains no florets at all encompassed in the usual and expected position and would most certainly otherwise be regarded as highly conjectural for their assignment as Nantgarw porcelain on the basis of the border composition criterion that has been proposed in the literature by Jones and Joseph.

6.2 The Presence of the “Bearded Tulip” The only agent acting for the acquisition of Nantgarw porcelain from the Nantgarw China Works in London was John Mortlock, with showrooms in 47, Oxford Street, who received Nantgarw porcelain in the white directly from William Billingsley at the Nantgarw manufactory site. Mortlocks was an established retailer of porcelains which was founded in 1747 and which later acquired the Royal Warrant from Queen Victoria as “Artists and Designers to HM the Queen”, until the family business closed down in 1933. They apparently kept meticulous records in an archive which was sadly completely destroyed in the Blitz bombing of London during 1941–1944, when the records of the details of the commissions that they had received from clients for Nantgarw and other porcelains were irretrievably lost. The author believes, however, that Dr William John was probably able to consult these records at some time before their destruction when he was researching his book on Nantgarw porcelain (Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948) in the 1930s and 1940s and, thereby that he acquired some information relevant to the provision of the Farnley Hall service to Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, especially relating to its size and location. It is hard to imagine how else he could have secured this information as there is no mention at all of the existence of this service elsewhere. From 1817, John Mortlock sent the Nantgarw porcelain that he received from William Billingsley for decoration to two London ateliers, namely Richard Robins and Thomas Martin Randall of Barnsbury Street, Spa Fields, Islington and John Sims of Five Fields’ Row, Pimlico, who each employed several esteemed ceramic artists for its decoration. These London ateliers were both significant decorating operations, and in the case of Robins and Randall it has been recorded that over 40 artists were employed in their atelier decorating porcelain for Mortlock and other retailers. Both ateliers operated a strict code of practice forbidding the individual artists’ placement of signatures on their painted works of art and the input of experienced connoisseurs towards the recognition of the styles of the artists that were known to be working in these ateliers is now invaluable. Thus far, the names of Moses Webster, James Plant, James Turner, Charles Muss, Robert Bix Gray and Thomas Randall himself have been identified on Nantgarw porcelains painted in these

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6 Analysis of the Composition of the Farnley Hall Service

two ateliers. In addition, to this established list we can now add the name “de Junic” or “de Juinnie”, who was for a long time a mysterious artist whose painting style was recognised on locally decorated Swansea porcelain, but his actual existence had been disputed by some ceramic historians (John, Swansea Porcelain, 1958). Following on from the initial investigative research of Jimmy Jones and Sir Leslie Joseph carried out at the Royal Sevres Manufactory (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration,1988) where they discovered in the Musee de National de Sevres archives that de Junic was indeed an “artist extraordinaire” working there around 1808, it is now confirmed that de Junic left Sevres before 1810 and was employed at Swansea until about 1815/16, when he then apparently disappeared from the local scene. Henry Morris certainly mentions him in his reminiscences of the Swansea China Works made to Colonel Grant Francis in 1850, which was published in the Cambrian newspaper on 3rd January 1896 and then the following year in William Turner’s account of the Swansea manufactory (Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of The Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon Etc., 1897). In Edwards (Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021; Appendix IV), the full transcript of this interview is reproduced with amendments made for the incorrect dates and statements. In part of his interview statement with Henry Morris, Colonel Grant Francis notes that: The following information I take down viva voce from Mr Henry Morris, of Swansea, who was duly apprenticed to Mr Lewis Weston Dillwyn as a pottery painter in the year 1813. When Morris first went to work, porcelain china was not manufactured at the Cambrian Pottery but the ordinary earthenware only. A kiln was soon constructed on the Nantgarrow model and much larger than the one used previously for porcelain at the Swansea Pottery. From this time commenced the make and body and glaze which has given such celebrity to “SWANSEA CHINA”. The truly beautiful paintings which adorn this manufacture were executed by or under the direction and superintendence of a Mr Bailey (Author: William Billingsley); by the artist Baxter, who had been a student at the Royal Academy; by de Junic from the Royal Manufactory at Paris and other artists, several of them natives of Swansea, amongst whom was my present informant.

Later research by this author (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021) places de Junic in London from about 1817, painting Nantgarw porcelain in the atelier of either John Sims or Robins and Randall and incorporating his signature bearded tulip enamelled in his floral groups, as exemplified in the Sir John and Lady Williams Nantgarw dessert service which is illustrated in Fig. 4.16 here, which is also accompanied by de Junic’s effusive and baroque French Empire style of revived rococo gilding which was then so much in vogue with the London Georgian clientele and was associated with the Sevres manufactory where he had worked hitherto. Examination of the flower groups painted centrally on the Farnley Hall service reveals that several of them contain this bearded tulip, which has now been established to be the floral signature of de Junic (de Juinnie), and which is rather akin to that of William Billingsley’s pink rose and of Henry Morris’ auricula, Thomas Baxter’s Greek border curlicues and Thomas Pardoe’s gilt garter star, which are also now

References

171

recognised as characteristic signatures of these other Swansea ceramic artists. A good example of this style of decoration is seen in the small oblong platter in Fig. 3.18, and in the tureen stand (Fig. 3.8), the deep dessert dish (Fig. 3.10) and the large circular serving plate (3.16). Reference to Table 3.1 indicates that the “bearded tulip” features on at least 8 of the 19 floral groups on the surviving Farnley Hall service pieces, representing some 40% of items that were so decorated. It seems reasonable, therefore, to propose that at least some of the Farnley Hall service was painted by de Junic: it would be forthright and incorrect to assume that he painted all of the service as it was by all accounts a very large commission and it would have been quite normal for the proprietors of the atelier concerned to assign several painters to execute this task to ensure its completion by a due date. The author suggests that in his opinion the medium oblong platter in Fig. 3.22 and the large oblong platter in Fig. 3.25 are distinctively different in the style of representation of the central floral groups compared with what has been assigned already to the hand of de Junic. It is not possible at this stage to allocate definitively a particular London atelier to the decoration of the Farnley Hall service but it is very likely that it was carried out in the atelier of either Robins and Randall or John Sims, both of whom were the preferred decorating establishments of John Mortlock’s Nantgarw client commissions. It is apparent that although the presence of the characteristic dentil edge gilding is only prevalent for about some 25% of London decorated Nantgarw services in the literature, the author was unable to attribute it conclusively to one or other of these ateliers preferentially (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021; Edwards, Welsh Armorial Services: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China, 2022). In support of the hypothesis that de Junic was a decorative enameller at a London atelier the picture of a London decorated spindle-handled Nantgarw sauce tureen and cover portrayed in Fergus Gambon’s book (Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw, 2016; illustration N3, page 54) shows a floral group on an apple green ground which displays clearly a bearded tulip extending outwards from the main group in the characteristic de Junic style and this has been illustrated here in Fig. 4.17. Fergus Gambon has definitively attributed the decorative style to John Sims’ atelier: The style of the flower painting is typical of the Sims workshop

A combination of these two pieces of evidence clearly then would associate de Junic as a decorator in the John Sims workshop in Pimlico, London.

References H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Services: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China (SpringerNature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2022) F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016)

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W.D. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, 1948) W.D. John, Swansea Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, 1958) A.E.J. Jones, S.L. Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration (David Brown Publishers, Cowbridge, 1988) W. Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of The Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon etc. (Bemrose & Sons Ltd., The Old Bailey, London, 1897)

Chapter 7

Resume of the Research Undertaken on the Farnley Hall Nantgarw Porcelain Service

Abstract This final chapter summarises the results of the analytical study of the composition of the Farnley Hall service, involving both the embossed moulding and the decorative compositions. The discovery of this missing porcelain service, which was manufactured 200 years ago, is a modern detective story in the preservation of cultural heritage, whilst its physical analysis has identified some new data that need to be incorporated into correcting and expanding the literature that is used for the differentiation of porcelains by ceramic historians and museum conservators. The importance of the Farnley Hall service discovery is that it provides the only example of such a Nantgarw porcelain service that still resides in its original place of usage from its manufacture 200 years ago: it is a unique example and is, therefore, a very important part of our national cultural heritage. Correlation with potential Swansea porcelain analogues is also undertaken. Keywords Summary · Discovery and properties · Uniqueness · Preservation of cultural heritage · Swansea porcelain analogues It is appropriate here to summarise the salient features of the research that has been undertaken on the Farnley Hall service described in this text so that it may be placed in context with the history and future identification of Welsh porcelains, especially in the provision of assistance with the attribution of unmarked and larger examples of potential Nantgarw porcelain that may appear in the future. Firstly, from an exhaustive research survey of the existing literature it appears that the Farnley Hall service is the only survivor of a large Nantgarw porcelain service with a known commission that is still resident in its original place of usage, namely Farnley Hall, North Yorkshire, 200 years after its manufacture in the Nantgarw China Works and its subsequent decoration in London. It has a provenance which places its original commission with Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes MP, who inherited the estate of Farnley Hall from his father in 1792 and who lived there until he died in 1825; he was a lifelong and personal friend of the artist Joseph MW Turner, who spent many summer seasons at Farnley Hall painting and sketching local scenes and enjoying conviviality with his host. An example of Turner’s painting locally is shown in Fig. 7.1, which was painted by JMW Turner in 1816 whilst staying at Farnley Hall © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3_7

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Fig. 7.1 Oil Painting entitled Grouse Shooting on Beamsley Beacon, 1816, by J.M.W. Turner, painted whilst he was staying at Farnley Hall, Yorkshire, with Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, who is depicted in the painting as the figure on the far right. Public domain

and shows his friend Walter Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes, his host at Farnley Hall, on a grouse shoot on Beamsley Beacon. Secondly, although it is now much reduced from its original size through heavy domestic usage, the Farnley Hall service still contains several pieces that are unusually large dimensionally and which appear rarely if at all in other known Nantgarw service complements. It is proposed that the two large oblong platters (shown in Figs. 3.24 and 3.25) in the Farnley Hall service could be excellent candidates for the largest surviving single pieces of Nantgarw porcelain manufactured in size and they also weigh in at approximately 2.2 kg each, compared with a standard Nantgarw dinner plate weighing about 500 g. Thirdly, each piece of the Farnley Hall service has been decorated in London, bearing the associated dentil edged gilding at the rim that is a characteristic indicator of London atelier decoration, and it is thought that most probably this was accomplished at the atelier of either Thomas Robbins and Martin Randall in Islington or John Sims in Pimlico. An artist who contributed materially to the decoration of the Farnley Hall service has been identified as the Frenchman “de Junic” (or de Juinnie), who trained at the Royal Manufactory at Sevres, Paris in the first decade of the 19th Century and was listed in their archives as an “artist extraordinaire” (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988). His signature bearded enamelled tulip is to be found on several pieces of the Farnley Hall service as part of the central floral bouquets which are illustrated in this book. In the author’s opinion,

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some of the 19 surviving pieces of the Farnley Hall service also show evidence for another decorative enameller. Fourthly, the embossed beribboned edge design that has been labelled as a “characteristic” Nantgarw feature historically with an assumed invariability was found surprisingly to vary significantly within the Farnley Hall service (this is, therefore, an intraservice variation) and was seen to be dependent upon the size and dimensions of the pieces concerned: certainly, for the more usual dessert and dinner plates and smaller flatwares the embossed Nantgarw design preserved its integrity and expected characteristics as cited and expected in the existing literature but the larger serving plates belonging to the Farnley Hall dinner service complement possessed a distinctly different embossed design composition which implied that several moulds of a subtly different design were in use for its creation in the Nantgarw China Works manufactory. An explanation of the modus operandi for this situation is not clearly forthcoming at present but the design alterations would have been introduced and become manifest at the formation and construction of the biscuit porcelain prototypes before their kiln firing commenced at the Nantgarw China Works site and, hence, before their glazing and subsequent despatch to London for decoration. Forensically, this now casts some doubt upon the long-standing and apparently objective criterion which was established in the literature over 30 years ago by Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) for the visual differentiation between Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains that have similar edge embossed moulding designs based upon the number of embossed florets encompassed in the C-scroll mouldings adopted by each manufactory. A natural result from this current study now would be to urge caution in the attribution or otherwise of an unknown, unmarked piece whose source factory would be decided by connoisseurship alone on the basis perhaps purely of the embossed design to the exclusion of other factors, which would of course include the characteristic blue-green translucency of Dillwyn’s Swansea duck-egg porcelain and clear whiteness of Billingsley’s Nantgarw porcelain. It could be surmised that if some of the larger pieces were to be removed from the Farnley Hall service and considered independently then their non-standard edge embossed design, their relatively poor translucency consequent upon the associated thickness of their potting, the absence of the NANT-GARW C. W. factory mark usually seen on the flatwares and the non-standard decoration employing hitherto unseen ratios of flowers, exotic birds and fruit in the vignettes at the border would all conspire to facilitate a possible rejection of the piece in question as being genuine Nantgarw porcelain. This latter point confirms the appeal of Dr William John that services should not be dispersed piecemeal with the preferential selection of only perfect pieces whilst discarding for disposal the badly damaged items, and that even badly damaged pieces should be preserved for the information they can provide about the style of decoration and factory shapes. This is perhaps more easily wished for than achieved in reality as services that now appear at auction are normally split into several lots, from which the badly damaged pieces have already been discarded. A particularly relevant example of Dr John’s advocated practice and appeal is seen to be applicable here, where one of the four small oblong platters of the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service is cracked into two pieces along the minor axis (Fig. 3.18), yet this piece alone of the ten

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larger pieces comprising the surviving pieces of the service is clearly marked with an impressed NANT-GARW C. W. on one fragment and the impressed numeral 7 on the other—whereas the other nine larger items of porcelain in this service are unmarked except for impressed numerals such as 2, 3, 4 and 7 which are presumably designated according to the size of the piece concerned. Additionally, one fragment of the same cracked small oblong platter displays the bearded tulip in an orange enamel and this occurs on the factory unmarked half (but containing the impressed numeral 7), which characterises importantly the artist enameller on our thesis as being “de Junic” (Fig. 7.2); the other fragment contains the factory mark NANTGARW C. W. The importance and verification of Dr John’s plea for the preservation of damaged Nantgarw china is realised in this one example alone and it is fortunate indeed that this badly damaged piece was retained by the Fawkes family and not discarded some time ago as being unusable (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). The taking of minimal samples for destructive chemical analysis as well as a provision for the non-destructive analysis of the exposed biscuit porcelain will also be facilitated by this piece for the provision in the future analytical chemical compositional data, which will be reported in detail in the forthcoming scientific literature. Other larger pieces of the Farnley Hall service, such as the large circular serving plate, have also been damaged but have been professionally riveted and repaired from their underside. Fifthly, the decoration undertaken in the vignettes of the Farnley Hall service that were formed at the edge of the pieces, created by the boundaries of the C-scroll mouldings comprising acanthus leaves, foliage and ribbons, were found to adopt various ratios of flowers, exotic birds and fruit that would perhaps normally cause concern amongst experts that the individual pieces could possibly not belong to the same service and suggest that they may even have become associated as interlopers from elsewhere at a later stage. There seemed to be a general characteristic 4:1:1 vignette ratio for flowers:exotic birds:fruit that was perceived to have been adopted for the smaller pieces as a service “standard” but the 10 larger pieces of the Farnley Hall service deviated from this vignette ratio significantly which would certainly have occasioned some comment upon comparative inspection in isolation by a ceramic expert or connoisseur. It was indicated earlier that one of the most difficult and intractable questions to address forensically in an analytical investigation is the reason for which something has been done—effectively posing the question, “Why”? Such a situation can certainly be claimed for the changes that were incurred in the decoration and in the embossed edge designs within the same service (an intraservice phenomenon) as observed for the Farnley Hall service. One scenario worthy of consideration implies a freedom of action regarding the detailed composition relating to the decoration that was afforded to individual artists on the part of the atelier or decorating establishment where they were employed. This can be appreciated especially where a precise instruction for the decoration has not been forthcoming or has not been relayed from the client or agent to the atelier, but the use of different edge design moulds for pieces comprising the same service during their manufacture and preparation at the Nantgarw China Works site cannot be envisaged in this scenario. Was this a functional

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Fig. 7.2 Left hand piece of cracked small oblong serving platter from the Farnley Hall service illustrated together with its accompanying right hand section in Fig. 3.18: overall length 28.5 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.2 cm. This section has the dimensions of length 14.8 cm, width 21.7 cm and depth 3.2 cm and is impressed with a Figure 7 near the footrim on the major axis and shows the characteristic Nantgarw edge-moulding of foliage and ribbons and dentil edge gilding. Three vignettes are shown, one with an exotic bird on a branch and two of flowers, one with a bearded tulip. The central bouquet of garden flowers is disrupted but clearly shows a large bearded tulip and a passiflora. The retention of this badly damaged piece of porcelain for the information it provides to the researcher and analyst is noteworthy. Reproduced with the permission of Guy Horton-Fawkes Esq., Farnley Hall, Otley, North Yorkshire

opportunity that was applied by the mould makers at the Nantgarw China Works and in that case why should it affect just the larger set pieces: there seems to be no obvious reason for the Nantgarw China Works to employ significant design changes of this sort and to carry them out to effect in the composition of a very large service? A possible reason could be that the Farnley Hall service was one of the largest Nantgarw dinner-dessert services made, with an apparent complement as Dr John has stated of over 100 plates, which would have been accompanied with the appropriate number of larger general and special tableware items giving perhaps a realistic estimate of 200 pieces or more in all, then possibly some older trial moulds needed to be brought out from storage, or perhaps a few newer ones created but not necessarily of the identical pattern, to feed the biscuit kiln firing charges. This situation could have arisen from the necessity to complete to a finite deadline the order placed for

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Fig. 7.3 Nantgarw porcelain coffee cup and slop bowl from the large Hensol Castle breakfast service, simply decorated with cobalt blue flowers and berries and gilt sprigs with a plain gilt edging band. The service was probably commissioned by Benjamin Hall Sr, an ironmaster, who was resident at Hensol Castle between 1815 and 1824, after which the estate passed to the Crawshay dynasty of Merthyr ironmasters (Benjamin Hall was married to Charlotte Crawshay in 1800), who occupied it briefly before moving to Cyfarthfa Castle, Merthyr. Benjamin Hall’s son, Benjamin Hall Jr (1801–1862), is noted for giving his name allegedly to “Big Ben”, the 14-ton bell in the clock tower at Westminster. In a Private Collection

the delivery of the service to John Mortlock, the London agent for the Nantgarw China Works. The fact that all of the larger pieces involved, i.e. some 10/19, representing 52% of the surviving Farnley Hall service items, possess this non-standard edge embossed moulding is an important percentage figure but brings us no nearer a solution as to the reason for it having occurred. On a related topic, the Hensol Castle breakfast service (John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948), another large Nantgarw service, was possibly commissioned at a similar time and probably the decoration was arranged locally, but the design of the individual pieces is very different—these have been executed in a much plainer style with a non-embossed edge and the decoration comprises simple scattered random flower sprigs in blue and gold (Fig. 7.3). Hensol Castle, Pendoylan in the Vale of Glamorgan, was of an ancient foundation and became the home of Samuel Richardson, a banker, in the second decade of the 19th Century and then passing to William Crawshay of Cyfarthfa Castle, Merthyr, via Benjamin Hall, who was at Hensol Castle between 1815 and 1824, when the service was probably commissioned. The service was offered at auction many years ago at the dispersal of the estate and only individual pieces now tend to surface at auction sales: a comparison with the Farnley Hall service would, hence, not be appropriate here mainly because of the totally different type of porcelain pieces and designs involved in a breakfast service and a dinner-dessert service. It has been remarked that the two largest oblong platters of the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service could be considered to be potentially the largest pieces of Nantgarw porcelain produced at the manufactory with the characteristic embossed beribboned moulded border. Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988, p. 104) have made a detailed study of the analogous Swansea China Works porcelain service components and have noted seven sizes of oblong meat platters

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ranging from the smallest with a length of 27.2 cm, a width of 19.8 cm and a depth 2.3 cm, to the largest with a length of 50.7 cm, a width of 37.2 cm and a depth of 6.0 cm. The largest of these, which is very rarely encountered in Swansea porcelain, is illustrated on page 105 of Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) accompanied by its perforated strainer with a central large hole for removal purposes—suggesting that it functioned as a meat or carving joint platter. These large Swansea platters are not embossed moulded at all; in contrast, an attractively decorated large Swansea oval cabaret tray with acanthus leaf edge moulding and an applied beaded decoration has the dimensions of: length 45.3 cm. width 30.5 cm and a depth of 4.7 cm. In comparison, therefore, the largest Nantgarw platters of the Farnley Hall service, shown here in Figs. 3.24 and 3.25, are clearly moulded with the “characteristic” embossed beribboned pattern; dimensionally, these large platters would correspond with their Swansea plainer analogues as a type (iii) as given in the Jones and Joseph notation, with the Nantgarw measurements being length 36.5 width 27.3 cm and depth 3.9 cm versus the Swansea measurements of length 36.7 cm, width 27.0 cm and a depth of 3.5 cm for this platter type. It could be argued that we might then expect an even larger platter to have been manufactured at Nantgarw but the measurements of the largest Swansea platter or dish with a corresponding moulded embossed border is not given in Jones and Joseph, so this argument might not strictly apply here. The small and medium sized oblong platters of the Farnley Hall service have no correspondence at all in size with their Swansea exemplars and are bracketed dimensionally by the Swansea type (ii) platter given in the Jones and Joseph notation, which has a length of 31.4 cm, a width of 23.1 cm and a depth of 3.4 cm, and the Swansea type (iii) platter of length 36.7 cm, width 27.0 cm and a depth of 3.5 cm. The large circular serving plate of the Farnley Hall service, with its dimension of diameter 31.9 cm and a depth of 4.0 cm, has no parallel at all in the Swansea shapes portfolio and the nearest non-embossed Swansea China Works unmoulded equivalent would be the largest Swansea circular vegetable tureen stand from a dinner service with measurements of 31.0 cm diameter and a depth of 4.0 cm. Research is an iterative process and is dependent upon the construction of a credible database for future amplification and development. As an extension of this current research, it would be appropriate to attempt a similar study of Swansea porcelain analogues which possess the embossed moulded and beribboned border to correlate any observed changes that may have occurred through the potential adoption of new moulds in the production process there, especially for the larger items. A cross—correlation would then be possible with the findings of this work on Nantgarw porcelain which may illuminate some discrepancies that are currently inexplicable.

7.1 Topical Analogy with the Swansea China Works Several years ago the author published his first book of this series on Welsh and related porcelains (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal,

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2017) and in Appendix 7 he reviewed the results of research into the graphological identification of William Billingsley’s handwriting, which was first attempted by Sir Leslie Joseph and Jimmy Jones (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988). Jones and Joseph reviewed their analyses of the cursive script marks on Swansea porcelain in the extensive Sir Leslie Joseph collection of Welsh porcelain that was so marked, comprising mainly cabinet cups, tea cups and saucers, at Coed-ar-Rhyd-y-Glyn, Porthcawl, and thereby they were able to commence the identification of several characteristics of Billingsley’s handwriting, including the cursive capital S the trailing w and the contrived linkage between the a and the n in the Swansea script mark that accompanied artefacts which were unequivocally painted by William Billingsley and which were accompanied by a cursive Swansea script mark. This culminated in the reproduction of mark No. 3, assigned to Billingsley, given on page 29 in their book (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988). Naturally, the scope of the study was extremely restricted to the letters encompassed by the name Swansea but the authors did enlarge upon the database of their study by use of a letter that William Billingsley had written to John Coke of the Pinxton China Works on the 19th October, 1795 and the receipt provided for six Nantgarw Masonic beakers supplied in December 1819 from the Nantgarw China Works, possibly the last commission undertaken by William Billingsley at the Nantgarw China Works before he departed for Coalport in early 1820. One of these beakers is now in the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, and is illustrated here in Fig. 7.4. Actually, there were relatively very few pieces of Swansea porcelain available with script other than that the Swansea cursive script mark and this made the characterisation of Billingsley’s handwriting in a wider sense rather difficult: there is also the question as to whether the distinctive features taken from a handwritten letter script would be transposable to script marks used on porcelain, given the rather different spatial circumstances that were available forensically and practically under which both sets of writing would be initiated. The use of a quill pen for the freeflowing script in a handwritten letter involving straight lines on paper is technically a different scenario to that of a fine hair brush used for applying enamel onto glazed porcelain in restricted spaces, such as those matching the curved lines of a porcelain base inside a footrim. Hence, we really need technically to have a database of handwriting that is taken from a scientifically analogous situation, i.e. authenticated script writing on porcelain. Jones and Joseph summarise the situation which arose from their research as follows: the major problem, however, is that there were only a few pieces of verifiable Swansea porcelain that could be definitively attributed to Billingsley available at that time which had the characteristic red cursive Swansea script mark and even fewer with any accompanying descriptors of landscapes that were painted thereon. Jones and Joseph go on to say that: Billingsley’s painting is generally to be found on the Swansea glassy or finest duck-egg porcelain which he would have preferred as in many respects they are akin to the Nantgarw body ….. In consideration of Billingsley’s landscape painting on Swansea porcelain, we do not have the assistance, except in the case of a few pieces, of either the Swansea script mark associated with his painting or a written description of the landscape to compare with

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Fig. 7.4 A Masonic beaker displaying the square and compasses symbol, Nantgarw porcelain, attributed to William Billingsley’s decoration; an order/invoice is extant which was placed for six beakers of this type placed with the Nantgarw China Works in December 1819, probably the last personal work carried out by Billingsley before he departed Nantgarw for Coalport in early 1820. Illustrated in Ernest Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, Batsford, London 1942: Plate CLXC). Reproduced with permission from the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff

examples of his writing … until further research is carried out and new evidence brought to light the problem of authoritatively identifying William Billingsley landscapes on Swansea porcelain remains.

Also, the reliance that Jones and Joseph had to put upon single, often incompletely marked items, or upon putatively Billingsley decorated Swansea porcelain items, and a deficiency of more substantial and compatible component service items was summarised in another statement (Jones and Joseph, Swansea Porcelain, 1988, page 28): He is unlikely to have decorated complete services but there are only cabinet cups and saucers and other shapes too where by reason of the standard and quality of the painting we can attribute them to Billingsley’s hand.

The statement relating to the investigation requirement and the desirability of examining a service is to be noted. There was an opportunity for the putative handwriting criteria to be put to the test a few years ago by this author for a very early Swansea part tea service, ca. 1814/1815, comprising 9 teabowls, 4 saucers, 2 slop bowls and 2 two teapot stands in the experimental and rare glassy porcelain body which represented the first trial firings of porcelain manufacture at Swansea, when

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William Billingsley would have been expected to have adopted a very “hands-on” approach to all aspects of the compositional characteristics of manufacture of this early porcelain there, including perhaps the decoration. This very early Swansea service, which was fortunately photographed and recorded before it was consigned for dispersal at auction and its integrity lost thereafter, was in a badly damaged general condition but all of the component pieces were definitively attributed by connoisseurs to William Billingsley’s landscape decoration on stylistic and artistic grounds. The complete photographic record of this important Swansea service is shown in Appendix 7 of Edwards (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017) and comprises Figures 76–105 there. Following the work of Jones and Joseph, it then became possible to unambiguously assign William Billingsley’s responsibility for the cursive script Swansea mark on several items on this service as can be seen in the examples shown in Figs. 7.5 and 7.6. The white glassiness of the experimental porcelain body is evident, along with the speckled appearance and imperfections in the translucency of the glassy body arising from particulate matter embodied in the porcelain from mineral impurities and possibly decomposed carbonaceous organic matter, with the consequent formation of black particulate amorphous carbon at the operating temperatures of the kiln during the firing process. The bowls, saucers and teapot stands from this service are all decorated with landscape views enclosed in a single circular vignette drawn within a simple gold band; many pieces have a script Swansea mark written in a red enamel and an additional description of each view is written in black enamel following the contour of the footrim. It is interesting to note in passing that the only examples of this service illustrated here which do not possess the Swansea cursive script mark are the teapot stands (Figures 82 and 83 in the publication: Edwards,

Fig. 7.5 Teabowl from an early experimental Swansea glassy porcelain tea service depicting “Newark Castle”, cursive Swansea script mark, No. 4. Decorated by William Billingsley. In a Private collection

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Fig. 7.6 Base of teabowl shown in Fig. 7.5, with Swansea script mark in William Billingsley’s hand and “Newark Castle”. In a Private collection

Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017), where instead a clear impressed SWANSEA mark can be seen, which was not usually applied to flatwares at this time. A teapot stand and its base are shown here in Figs. 7.7 and 7.8. An important principle applies here in illustration of the point made earlier in that this service was dispersed for sale to collectors many years ago, so much of the associated synergistic historical context and research concerning the heritage of the pieces as an integral service is now missing from the separated individual items. From the surviving elements of this service alone an analysis of the handwritten script by the author at that time reveals that we are now able to assign 75% of William Billingsley’s characteristic script handwriting on porcelain, comprising all but 9 of his upper case letters and 4 of his lower case letters missing from the total of the 52 possible—these being respectively, E, F, O, P, Q, T, U, X Z and j, q, v and z. The appeal of Sir Leslie Joseph and Jimmy Jones (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988) in their comprehensive study of Billingsley’s script for more examples of this on Swansea china is therefore well addressed and answered by this Swansea glassy porcelain service alone, for which a very fortunate photographic record was taken at the time by the collector and was retained, even of the badly damaged and riveted pieces, before its dissemination and eventual dispersal at auction with the consequential loss of the historical and forensic context possessed by the whole. The complete list of recorded script descriptors for this service is as follows, maintaining Billingsley’s actual script spelling, which is sometimes intriguingly, grammatically incorrect (the Figure numbers refer to the initial record in Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017): No. 1: Amberley Castle, Sussex (Figure 85)

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Fig. 7.7 Teapot stand from an early experimental Swansea glassy porcelain tea service depicting a “View at Waltham, Hertfordshire”, impressed SWANSEA mark, No. 17. Decorated by William Billingsley. In a Private collection

Fig. 7.8 Base of teapot stand shown in Fig. 7.7, showing “View at Waltham, Hertfordshire”, impressed SWANSEA mark. In a Private collection

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No. 3: Kenilworth Castle, Warwickshire (Figure 87) No. 4: Newark Castle (Figure 77) No. 6: De-La-pre Abbey (Figure 89) No. 7: Forge Bridge, Westmorland (Figure 79) No. 8: View in Cumberland (indistinct??) (Figure 81) No. 9: Isleworth Middlesex (Figure 91) No. 10: Kirkham Priorey Yorkshire (Figure 93) No. 11: Langollen Vale (Figure 95) No. 12: Cros of the Black Friers Hereford (Figure 97) No. 14: Remains of Sir Henry Vanes house Lincolnshire (Figure 99) No. 15: A View in the Isle of Wight (Figure 101) No. 17: View at Waltham, Hertfordshire (Figure 83) No. 20: View near Hertford (Figure 102). In particular, attention is directed to item number 11 in the above list of descriptors, which has the curious mis-spelled phrase “Langollen Vale” written on the base: Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain, 1988, page 223, Colour Plates 3 and 3a) show a Swansea baluster vase with a scenic rural landscape which has been attributed to William Billingsley with an identically mis-spelled phrase “Langollen Vale” written on its base. Here, the key letters are of an identical shape, especially the capitals L and V, to those in the glassy porcelain tea service studied, and these match exactly Billingsley’s writing in his letter to John Coke alluded to above. The mis-spelling of the Welsh place-name Llangollen is easily explained because it is recorded by Richard Milward, who worked at the Nantgarw China Works as a young apprentice, that Billingsley could not speak Welsh and had to communicate his directions and instructions to his predominantly Welsh-speaking workforce at Nantgarw and Swansea through a bilingual interpreter. Another point of interest regarding the subject landscape of this illustration in Figure 94 of the earlier book (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017) that is illustrated here in Fig. 7.9, is that Morton Nance cites a similar example (E. Morton Nance, Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942, Monochrome Plate CXLVIIA and C, facing page 333): this again features a Swansea baluster vase having two landscape scenes with the same mis-spelled phrase “Langollen Vale” inscribed beneath along with “View in Cumberland” and a Swansea script mark, showing the Llangollen landscape view. It can be assumed that a scene shown on the other side of the vase shows the alternative landscape in Cumberland. Closer examination of the Morton Nance baluster vase indicates it cannot be identical with that shown in Jones and Joseph and discussed earlier; the script Sw of the Swansea mark in the latter is in a different position relative to the descriptor although the “S” is similar in style and corresponds with Billingsley’s script number 1 in Jones and Joseph (Swansea Porcelain, 1988, page 33). A close perusal of the three landscapes, however reveals that although the Jones and Joseph landscape example is completely different from that given in Morton Nance (namely, comprising two mountains instead of one, the absence of a bridge, the presence of a farm in the near field, the presence of a fence and barred gate, a different tree arrangement and domed buildings in the far field)

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Fig. 7.9 Teabowl from an early experimental Swansea glassy porcelain tea service depicting “Langollen Vale”, No. 11. In a Private collection

the view shown in Fig. 7.9 here on the Swansea tea bowl from the glassy porcelain tea service has a marriage of both scenes and now contains the farm in a near field, domed buildings in the far field, a bridge, no fence and barred gate and a significant difference in arrangement of the surrounding trees. Hence, although all three scenes can be confidently attributed to the hand of William Billingsley, and confirmed by his written descriptors in each case, they are definitely not simple copies of each other and probably were thus conceived from his artistic memory rather than being copied individually from a sketch or print made of the same scene. In summary, therefore, the documentary record for this early Swansea Billingsley tea service alone, where every surviving example of each landscape has been described in his own hand, does much to establish his alphabetic cursive script—in all 52 words have been written and 75% of the full complement of 52 upper case and lower case script letters has been identified, which can definitively be claimed to advance our knowledge of his writing script as first proposed by Sir Leslie Joseph and Jimmy Jones in their authoritative work on Swansea porcelain set patterns and shapes (Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration, 1988). It is still a matter of conjecture as to the identification and definitive attribution of Billingsley’s gilding on Swansea or Nantgarw porcelains—unlike his Derby work, which has an assigned gilder’s number of “7”—but it seems to be a reasonable proposition that, at least for this glassy porcelain tea service discussed here, since Billingsley did execute the landscape painting and the Swansea marks and descriptors then he would probably in all likelihood have also carried out the gilding! It is also interesting that this service flies in the face of the statement made by Jones and Joseph that William Billingsley never signed and wrote on a complete Swansea service … here, all photographs extant show an appropriate Swansea mark and a descriptor … so we must conclude that this service was something of which Billingsley was rather proud personally and maybe was an early success story for the Swansea manufactory, occurring after

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possibly some initial production failures they had experienced, just immediately after the first phase of his porcelain production at Nantgarw had come to an untimely end? It has already been noted that a similar embossed beribboned edge moulded Swansea service has not been accessible for comparison to be made with the analogous Nantgarw Farnley Hall service reported here, but the discrepancies noted in the evaluation of the moulding characteristics seen in the deep dish and the oval comport which apparently form two pieces from the same or extremely similar Swansea service decorated locally by William Pollard does suggest that an analogous situation could possibly apply here too and this needs further investigation when more pieces from this or similar services become available for study. As a comparator, the only Swansea named porcelain service of a known commission origin that is still retained by family descendants is that which was ordered and retained by Lewis Weston Dillwyn as part of his separation deal with the Bevingtons upon his departure from the Swansea China Works in 1819/1820: this is the famous Garden Scenery dessert service of 43 pieces that was made in duck-egg porcelain to Dillwyn’s own commission and decorated locally at Swansea by Thomas Baxter. It would have been used initially at Dillwyn’s residence in Sketty Hall and at Penllergaer House, thereafter passing to his familial descendants; it is now preserved intact, apart from one piece that was donated to the Victoria & Albert Museum by the widow of John Dillwyn Llewellyn late in the 19th Century (Private Communication) and another damaged piece which was acquired and restored by Sir Leslie Joseph and now resides in the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Collection (Fig. 7.10). The existence of this service does not compromise the uniqueness held by the Farnley Hall service amongst Welsh porcelains as the Garden Scenery service is no longer maintained at its original family place of usage or location. Unfortunately, for direct comparison purposes in this particular instance regarding a Swansea analogue of the Farnley Hall service, the Garden Scenery service, despite its 96% state of completeness and beautiful condition, does not conform to our comparison requirement of having an embossed beribboned moulding and instead has a plain, cruciform moulded construction for the pieces of which it is comprised. It has been demonstrated that the important Farnley Hall Nantgarw porcelain service is a unique survivor over two hundred years from its original manufacture of what has been claimed justifiably to be “the world’s finest porcelain” and the 19 pieces of which it is now comprised have provided novel information about the practices operating in its construction at Nantgarw and decoration in London of these superb works of ceramic art. It is also believed to be unique amongst Nantgarw porcelains as being still retained in its original home, although it has been severely depleted in size from the original service that was supplied presumably through heavy domestic usage, by the descendants of the family member who commissioned it first between 1817 and 1819, namely William Ramsden Hawksworth Fawkes. Although the Farnley Hall service obviously shows signs of damage through use, the wisdom of its owners and of their predecessors in retaining some of the damaged pieces has facilitated materially the research undertaken in this project. The author has always maintained that research is an iterative and ongoing process, which can generate many questions for future work and study: it is to be hoped that the current

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Fig. 7.10 Swansea porcelain dessert plate from the 43-piece Garden Scenery dessert service which was commissioned by Lewis Weston Dillwyn, proprietor of the Swansea China Works between 1817–1819 for use at his residences in Penllergaer House and Sketty Hall. Decorated by Thomas Baxter at Swansea with flowers in a landscape and gilded with a curlicue pattern and plain gilt edging. It featured in the court case in 1820 when the assets and stock of the Swansea China Works were examined before transfer of the lease was made to Timothy and John Bevington. The service has passed through inheritance to descendants of Lewis Dillwyn who still retain 41 pieces; the plate illustrated was damaged and then acquired by Sir Leslie Joseph and after restoration it now resides in the National Museum of Wales Collection, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff. Reproduced with permission from Andrew Renton, The National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff

research will inspire further work to be undertaken on Welsh porcelains, the personnel involved in their manufacture and decoration and their interaction with contemporary manufactories so that we shall then understand a little more about the Nantgarw and Swansea porcelains and their impact upon society in the second decade of the 19th Century. In this context, the following quotation seems quite appropriate; Learn from yesterday, live for today and hope for tomorrow. The important thing is not to stop questioning; curiosity and the thirst for knowledge is simply a desire to know, understand and learn something new. Albert Einstein.

Finally, allusion has been made at the start of this investigation to the historical art detective aspect of the research work which has been realised by the discovery of the Farnley Hall service and it seems appropriate to refer to the annals of that noted

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detective of literature, Sherlock Holmes, and appropriately to one of the earliest cases that invoked his inductive reasoning, which he associated strongly with his analytical protocols, namely the Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual, which appeared first in The Strand Magazine, number 25, of 1879.

7.2 The Musgrave Ritual The world famous detective creation of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Sherlock Holmes, first appeared in serialised print in The Strand Magazine in May, 1893 in a series of short stories which later became collected under the mantle of The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (Doyle 1893): the cover of this issue of The Strand Magazine is shown in Fig. 7.11. The Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual appears as one of these 11 short stories which is regarded as unusual in the genre because it is related personally by Sherlock Holmes as a “story within a story” and not dictated by Dr Watson, and was one of the first cases that he worked on after his graduation from Oxbridge in 1879, which pre-dated his later meeting in London and long association with Dr Watson. The basis of the case under investigation was the mysterious 17th Century question-and-answer riddle that formed the Musgrave Ritual, which evolved into the deaths of two employees of Sir Reginald Musgrave, and the discovery of an ancient long lost treasure. An extract from The Musgrave Ritual is as follows: Whose was it? His who has gone. Who shall have it? He who will come.

It transpired that The Musgrave Ritual referred to the long lost mediaeval crown of St Edward in the time of King Charles I, which would be intended for his successor, King Charles II, some 17 years later after the Commonwealth interregnum of Oliver Cromwell. It seems to have some parallel resonance with the Farnley Hall service, in that it started from a reference to an initial document whose source was now lost, the subsequent research into who made it and who inherited it, which then was lost and then found again, and that the “treasure” underlying The Musgrave Ritual was indeed of an inestimable value historically but also had not been fully appreciated when it was first discovered until its historical significance became known. A quotation from the great fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, relating to Watson and his reliance upon inductive reasoning as the foundation of his analytical method, has relevance here to our approach adopted for the Farnley Hall service investigation. In solving a problem of this sort the grand thing is to be able to reason backwards. That is a very useful accomplishment … but people do not practise it much. In the everyday affairs of life it is more useful to reason forwards. There are few people who, being told a result, would be able to evolve from their inner conscience what the steps were that led to that result. This is what I mean when I talk of reasoning backwards… Analytically Sherlock Holmes to Dr Watson, A Study in Scarlet, Chapter 7: Conclusion.

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Fig. 7.11 Cover of The Strand Magazine, issue containing the short Sherlock Holmes story of The Adventure of the Musgrave Ritual, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Volume 5, no. 29, May 1893, ed. Herbert Greenhough Smith, published by George Newnes Ltd., Southampton Street and Exeter Street, London WC, with illustrations by Sidney Paget. The Strand Magazine collectively published the whole literary canon of Conan Doyle comprising 121 short stories, 70 articles, 9 novels, 2 interviews and 1 poem between 1891 and 1930. These have been collated by the Conan Doyle Encyclopaedia Team headed by Alexis Barquin

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Beeton’s Christmas Annual, 1887.

The correlation with the Musgrave Ritual, the activities of Sherlock Holmes, and the parallel modern day discovery and unearthing of the Farnley Hall Nantgarw service is thus truly worthy of mention here in this context.

References

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References Sir A. C. Doyle, S. Arthur, The adventure of the musgrave ritual, in The Strand Magazine, vol 5, no 29, ed. by H.G. Smith (George Newnes Ltd., Southampton Street and Exeter Street, London WC, with illustrations by Sidney Paget, 1893) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature International Publishing AG, Cham, Switzerland, 2017) W. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) A.E. Jones “Jimmy”, S.L. Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration (David Brown Publishers, Cowbridge, 1988) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (B.T. Batsford Ltd., North Audley Street, London, 1942)

Appendix

The Rev. William Williams Service—A Nantgarw Service or Cabinet Set?

Abstract The existence of a group of Nantgarw dessert plates, decorated by William Weston Young with landscapes on a central theme which can be related to landmark events in the life of the Rev. William Williams has generated some controversial descriptors, especially regarding the gilding designs, which suggests that they should better be classified as cabinet pieces rather than a service. Using the Farnley Hall service pieces as a comparator it is possible to re-define what comprises a cabinet piece and a service for inclusion in a database. From genealogical research input of the Rev. William Williams to the Rev. William Williams Nantgarw cabinet set and correlation with its theme some potential locations for the scenes of missing members of the set are proposed. Keywords Rev. William Williams · Cowbridge free school · William Weston Young · Gilding design differences · Dentil-edge gilding · Genealogical research

Of all the documented Nantgarw services tabulated in Table 2.1. one that can be singled out for further investigation here is that commissioned by the Rev. William Williams, which currently comprises eight plates, each decorated with a landscape scene by William Weston Young. What makes this service so unusual and distinct from the Farnley Hall service is that it seems to be based superficially on a rather random selection of landscapes, which upon further examination and research actually do have a theme: it was decided to investigate this particular porcelain group holistically to better define it as a service of porcelain. If one compares the locations and movement of the Rev. William Williams during his lifetime career then a pattern emerges in the selection of the landscapes chosen as subjects for the Nantgarw plates illustrated. Hence, it is vital that one studies the genealogy of the Rev Williams and his family to correlate the events that potentially can be matched with the scenes represented on this Nantgarw porcelain service.

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3

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A.1 Genealogy of the Rev. William Williams (1765–1847) William Williams was born in Dolgellau, Merioneth, on 14th January 1765 and attended Dolgellau School. He entered Jesus College, University of Oxford, matriculating on the 11th December 1784, aged 19, and read Literae Humaniores, taking his BA degree with First Class Honours in 1788 and MA in 1792 (Foster, Alumni Oxoniensis, 1715–1886, 1891–1892). He was also awarded the BD and DD degrees later in 1814. Immediately upon leaving Oxford at the age of 22 he became headmaster of Cowbridge Free Grammar School in 1787 (although the date of his appointment actually was the 13th August 1786) and five years later in 1792 he married Elizabeth Williams of Breach Farm, Llanblethian, the eldest daughter of a predecessor at the Cowbridge Free School, the Rev Thomas Williams, who was headmaster there from 1763–1783, being succeeded by the Rev John Walters (1783–1784) and the Rev. Daniel Walters (1785–1787) (Davies, A Certaine Schoole, 1967). They had nine children, three of whom, Thomas, Elizabeth and Mary, died in infancy. Elizabeth Williams was born in 1768 and died at the age of 46 on December 14th 1814: William was heartbroken and remained in mourning for her for the rest of his life. Their children were Robert, who followed his father into Jesus College, took holy orders and a Fellowship there, but died in Madeira on October 2nd 1822 at the age of 28 of a chest infection. Thomas William also died young at the age of 19 as a midshipman on board HMS Jasper which sank with all hands in Plymouth Sound on 20th January 1817 in a fierce storm. Their sister, Harriet Anne (born 24th October 1804) married firstly the Rev. Rees Howell, vicar of Llancarfan in 1829 and was widowed the following year, and secondly, the Rev. Thomas Edmondes, Rector of Llanblethian in the Vale of Glamorgan in 1838. Harriet died on the 17th November 1885. William became a wine merchant in London and nothing is known about another son John, but the youngest son Charles (born 1806) also followed his father into Jesus College in 1823, where he read Classics, became a Fellow in 1829 and eventually Principal in 1857 until he died in October 1877 in office in the Principal’s Lodgings of Jesus College. Charles also took his BD in 1837 and DD in 1838. The largest memorial plaque in the Church of the Holy Cross at Cowbridge, namely The Williams Memorial, records many of these family deaths. The Rev. William Williams became the longest serving headmaster of Cowbridge School, being in post for almost 60 years from 1787, until he died in 1847 (Davies, A Certaine Schoole, 1967). According to the Clergy of the Church of England Database (CCEd, 1999), he was ordained on the 27th June 1790 at Llandaff Cathedral by Bishop Richard Watson (1782–1816) and then inducted as curate of Llantrithyd on the same day; he became Canon and Prebendary of Llandaff Cathedral (Henry III St Nicholas) on the 19th March 1799, Vicar of Pentyrch on the 1st March 1806, Vicar of St Mellons with Llanedeyrn on the 31st January 1807, Vicar of St Cadoc’s Church, Pendoylan on the 4th February 1808, Rector of St Mary Hill, Coychurch on the 2nd June 1810 and finally Vicar of St Teilo’s Church in Llantilio Grossenny with Penrhos on the 2nd February 1814. Thereafter, he was appointed Bishop’s Proctor to Bishop Edward Copleston (1828–1849) at Llandaff Cathedral until his death on

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the 16th January 1847 (The Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle, 1847). The Cowbridge Grammar School, which started as the Cowbridge Free School, was founded by Sir John Stradling in 1608 and was owned by Jesus College, Oxford between 1685 and 1918, providing a source of well-educated students and a line of Principals for the College, including Sir Leoline Jenkins (Baker, Jesus College, 1571–1971, pp. 57–60, 1971).

A.2 The Rev. William Williams Nantgarw Service It is now relevant to correlate the surviving pieces of the Rev. William Williams Nantgarw service with his genealogical history and particularly his appointments and locations where he spent important parts of his life: it is apparent from the enamelled descriptors which accompany the scenes portrayed on the pieces of porcelain on their reverse that these must have adopted a special significance in his life. The surviving pieces have the following scenes depicted (Andrew Renton, personal communication, 2022) along with their National Museum of Wales Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, inventory numbers: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

Church of St Mary Hill (NMW A 31413) Free School, Cowbridge (NMW A 31414) Dolgellau (NMW A 31415) Cadair Idris (NMW A 31416) Llandaff Cathedral (NMW A 31417) An unidentified church (NMW A 31418) An unidentified church (NMW A 31419) Cowbridge Church (NMW A 31420)

These appear illustrated here in the order of presentation given above, namely inventory numbers 31413, 31414, 31415, 31416, 31417, 31418, 31419 and 31420, in the Figs. A.1, A.2, A.3, A.4, A.5, A.6, A.7 and A.8. A comparison with the historical genealogy for the Rev. William Williams assembled above immediately indicates that these scenes do have a resonance geographically with landmarks of his life spent at different locations and therefore comprise a vade mecum of his life preserved in porcelain! Firstly, the order as presented in the list numbers 1–8 above needs some amendment to provide the required matching and correct chronology for these landmark events and it is suggested that these artefacts would better then be assembled according to the sequence: 3, 4, 2, 5, 1, 6, 7, 8, to compare with their landmark chronology. However, when this has been achieved it is clearly apparent that several locations associated with his early life and ministry are still potentially missing from the series—and these can be summarised as follows. 1. Dolgellau Grammar School 2. St Mary’s Church, Dolgellau 3. Jesus College, Oxford

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Fig. A.1 NMW A 31413. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “The Church of St Mary Hill”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

4. 5. 6. 7. 8.

St Illtyd’s Church, Llantrithyd, Cowbridge St Catwg’s Church, Pentyrch St Mellon’s Parish Church with Llanedeyrn St Teilo’s Church, Llantilio Grossenny St Cadoc’s Church, Pendoylan

It is appreciated that there are two scenes depicting unidentified churches on the porcelain plates illustrated and it is possible these are representative of two of the six descriptors itemised as numbers 2 and from 4 to 8 in the above list. Furthermore, although the town of his birthplace is already shown as number 3 in the above list (NMW A 31415), it is reasonable to suppose that his place of baptism into the Christian faith and his school would be also represented as potentially significant markers in his development—a later school founded in Dolgellau is named after him, the Dr Williams School (1878–1975), which pioneered girls’ education in Wales. The scene of Cadair Idris is interesting as this could have been a favourite place for his walks in his youth but it also features prominently on the badge or escutcheon of the Dolgellau Grammar School which he attended, where Cader Idris is represented upon it symbolically as a triangular mountain peak. Heraldically, it is described as “ Or a pile reversed sable ensigned on the top a fire beacon proper on a chief of

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Fig. A.2 NMW A 31414. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “The Free School, Cowbridge”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

second three mullets of six points of the first” and the motto “Ardua semper”, which translates as “Always steep”. Bearing in mind the affection that the Rev. William Williams had for his wife Elizabeth, it is also conceivable that he might have recorded her family home and birthplace, Breach Farm, Llanblethian, in this repertoire: it has been commented upon that he maintained their entwined initials on engravings of his family silver plate for the rest of his life and that this continued for over thirty years after her death. An inclusion of a scene of Breach Farm would not be considered unlikely, therefore, and this could mean that the total number of plates that may have been originally commissioned would have been possibly 14 or perhaps 15, still being really well short of a normal dessert service complement of 24 plates and without any of the complementary dessert dishes or sauce tureens. With the knowledge derived here about the scenes depicted on these plates and their purpose we can pose the question as to whether or not this group is then truly a porcelain service as such … or is it perhaps a collection of cabinet plates which effectively record the important aspects of the life of the Rev. William Williams? Clearly, items such as dishes, platters, tureens and comports which would properly be incorporated into a household dessert or dinner service are not present here and it is thus probably much more correct to consider this group of artefacts as a “cabinet service” or series of cabinet plates that is designed for display rather than practical household usage. The “missing” members of this

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Fig. A.3 NMW A 31415. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Dolgellau”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

cabinet series, if it is in fact incomplete as the landmark chronology survey does suggest might be the case, may not have been recognised individually for what they are if they ever appeared later singly at auction and it could be that somewhere these artefacts do exist and now need to be reunited or recorded alongside their surviving exemplars from the existing cabinet plate series?

A.2.1 Detailed Analysis of the Rev. William Williams Nantgarw Cabinet Plates With the knowledge of the Rev. William Williams’ milestones and landmark locations from his genealogy it is possible to examine critically the scenes portrayed upon the eight cabinet plates in the National Museum of Wales collection and to match them with the intended locations. The first feature of this series of plates that is worthy of comment is that each one displays a different gilding pattern: this certainly negates their being considered as being part of a service as such, as then the en suite decoration which normally applies in such cases is obviously violated. A description of the gilding on each specimen plate according to its inventory number is now given here:

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Fig. A.4 NMW A 31416. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Cadair Idris”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

NMW A 31413: Plain edge single gilding and also a double gilding band to the cavetto with six stylised urns placed alternately and surrounded by complex swags of foliage and decorative leaves. NMW A 31414: Plain edge double gilding with 25 anthemion—like motifs supporting pendant foliage. NMW A 31415: Dentil edge gilding only. NMW A 31416: Dentil edge gilding, but very much finer in execution and smaller than what appears on NMW A 31415. NMW A 31417: Plain edge double gilding with 24 elliptical motifs holding fiveleaved branches and surmounting crescents of gilt dots and foliage. NMW A 31418: Plain double edge gilding and 12 swags of foliage linked by crescents of gilt dots and alternating four-leaved necklaces. NMW A 31419: Plain double edge gilding and double edge gilding to the cavetto with six pairs of seven-leaved anthemions arranged symmetrically around the plate indentations and supporting stylised geometric motifs and foliage. NMW A 31420: Plain single edge gilding with continuous band of vine leaves and creeper foliage.

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Fig. A.5 NMW A 31417. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Llandaff Cathedral”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

Hence, it is seen that each plate has a distinctly different gilding pattern about which two comments can be made: firstly, the gilding is universally much more extensive than that which is usually encountered upon locally decorated Nantgarw artefacts, which has generally been ascribed to economic circumstances operated by young and Pardoe and their desire to keep the decorating cost down. Generally, in the Young and Pardoe era, the edge gilding was often replaced with chocolate or green enamels and elsewhere is found to be rather sparsely executed. Secondly, the presence of two specimen plates with dentil edge gilding is an extremely unusual occurrence for locally decorated Nantgarw pieces as this was generally observed to be the preserve of the London enamellers (Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens, 2021; Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelains: Swansea and Nantgarw Crested China, 2022; John, Nantgarw Porcelain, 1948). It now remains to examine the scenes presented for the presently unidentified churches, namely NMW A 31418 and NMW A 31419, in Figs. A.6 and A.7, and to match these with the landmark locations that have been determined from the genealogy of the Rev. Dr William Williams. In this, it is apparent that a good match is achieved between NMW A 31418 and St Illtyd’s Church, Llantrithyd, his very first

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Fig. A.6 NMW A 31418. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with an unidentified landscape scene of a church. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

curacy appointment in 1790 and NMW A 31419 which correlates with his appointment as Vicar of St Cadoc’s Church, Pendoylan, in 1808. Then we can catalogue those potentially remaining missing landmark appointment scenes as follows: St Catwg’s Church Pentyrch 1806, St Mellons with Llanedeyrn 1807 and St Teilo’s Church in Llantilio Grosseny with Penrhos 1814. The first and last of these scenes should be readily distinguishable from the others in the series because they both have spires surmounting their church towers and the St Mellons Church has an additional gabled roof structure built adjoining the church tower on the opposite side to the nave, which none of the others possesses. Pictures of these churches which may provide an aid to their identification on a cabinet plate in this series are shown in Fig. A.9 (St Catwg’s Pentyrch), Fig. A.10 (St Mellons with Llanedeyrn) and Fig. A.11 (St Teilo’s in Llantilio Grosseny). Individual cabinet plate church scenes, therefore, should be readily identifiable with these locations on this basis. The scene depicting Dolgellau (NMW A 31414, Fig. A.3) clearly shows St Mary’s Church and the Grammar School would perhaps be already represented by the Cadair Idris scene (NMW A 31416, Fig. A.4) in the existing set of plates. Hence, the only other possibility for inclusion as a missing scene feature from this series would be that of Jesus College, Oxford, where William Williams studied for four years to take his BA and MA degrees and later took his

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Fig. A.7 NMW A 31419. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with an unidentified landscape scene of a church. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

BD and DD. Two scenes from this location are shown in Figs. A.12 and A.13 which may also provide an aid to their identification. This means that perhaps there could be additionally four individual plates missing from this particular cabinet series, bringing its full complement to 12 plates, which is exactly half that of the number of plates that would comprise a standard dessert service in Nantgarw porcelain.

A.3 William Weston Young and Cowbridge Between January, 1815, and January,1817, after the collapse of the Nantgarw China Works Phase I enterprise following the unsuccessful bid (entitled The Memorial) from Billingsley, Walker and Young for financial support from the government, William Weston Young turned to his other activities and interests and Nantgarw is not mentioned at all in his Diaries (William Weston Young, Diaries). Young accepted full responsibility for the debts of the failed enterprise and he was declared a bankrupt in December 1814 and called to account for it in Bristol in January 1815; he was not discharged from this bankruptcy until 1818 (Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942). His surveying business was nevertheless

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Fig. A.8 NMW A 31420. Nantgarw porcelain plate from the Rev. William Williams cabinet plate series, ca. 1817–1822, decorated with a landscape scene and inscribed “Cowbridge Church”. Reproduced with courtesy of the National Museum of Wales, Amgueddfa Cymru, Cardiff, and Mr Andrew Renton

successful and obviously took him through the County of Glamorgan, where he was engaged in drawing up plans and surveying land and estates for some wealthy patrons and landowners, but he also used his artistic drawing skills to good effect in an arrangement with the Cowbridge Free School, where he taught up to nine pupils regularly at various times and often weekly over several months for three years. He was an accomplished draughtsman and this was utilised to good effect by Lewis Weston Dillwyn when he took over the management of the Swansea China Works in 1804, employing Young to sketch botanical subjects for his research into the British Confervae in the Vale of Neath, which brought a Fellowship in the Linnaean Society for William Weston Young. He was obviously very enamoured of this aspect of his life and he describes his meetings at Cowbridge in some detail in his Diary entries, which often occurred on the way to and from other meetings involved with his estates survey and mapping duties in the County of Glamorgan from his residence at Nottage, Porthcawl. The first record of this art tutoring activity appears in a Diary entry for July 21st 1817, when he enters a statement that he attended “Miss Williams for her first lesson in drawing and that she was the daughter of Dr Williams, headmaster of the Cowbridge Free School”; we now know this pupil was Harriet, who was born in 1804 to William and Elizabeth Williams, and therefore she would have been

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Fig. A.9 St Catwg’s Church, Pentyrch. Public domain

Fig. A.10 St Mellons Church with Llanedeyrn. Public domain

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Fig. A.11 St Teilo’s Church, Llantilio Grosseny with Penrhos. Public domain

13 years old at this time. Elizabeth Williams had died in 1814, some three years prior to this. Young prefaced this Diary entry with entries for earlier meetings in Cowbridge on July 10th and 14th 1817, where presumably he came to an academic arrangement with the Rev. Dr Williams regarding the provision of these art classes to his pupils and specifically his daughter, Harriet. He regularly notes these meetings with his students of the Cowbridge Free School, naming several others in Diary entries along with Miss Williams such as Miss Edmondes, Mr Taynton, Mr John Williams (possibly Elizabeth’s brother?), Mr Warlow, a Mr O. Jones and a Mr J. Jones, and these meetings frequently occurred, often regularly on a weekly basis, until 1819. In November 3rd 1818, he recorded nine pupils as attending his drawing class as a full complement but does not provide their names. At the meeting on August 13th 1817, he teaches three pupils drawing skills at the Cowbridge Free School on his way to paying Samuel Walker and William Billingsley some of their first expenses at the Nantgarw China Works—so, their differences now reconciled, the kiln manager and master porcelain producer and decorator were now clearly reunited again at Nantgarw for potentially the opening of Phase II of the Nantgarw China Works later that year. This chronology is itself interesting as it confirms that Walker was still in touch with Billingsley, who was now based at Nantgarw, before he officially left Dillwyn’s employ at Swansea in September 1817, when the Bevingtons took over the Swansea China Works management. The visits of Young to Nantgarw as recounted in his Diaries then continue steadily recorded until November 1817, often presaged

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Fig. A.12 Jesus College, Oxford, Second Quadrangle. The College was founded by Queen Elizabeth I in 1571. Public domain

by art drawing class commitments at Cowbridge. On January 6th, 1818, the final payment was recorded from Young to Walker and Billingsley of £20-0s-0d which was made at the Nantgarw site and after which the most welcome support from “the ten gentlemen of Glamorgan” was then received (Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal, 2017) and payments then were continued to Billingsley and Walker for the Nantgarw China Works from this new source. We should not forget that William Weston Young was still an undischarged bankrupt until 1818 from taking on the debts of the Nantgarw China Works Phase I operation in 1814—yet he was able to support Walker and Billingsley financially and solely from his own funds during the start-up of Phase II at Nantgarw in 1817 until the £1000 awarded by the ten sponsors, who had each contributed £100 to the scheme, was actioned and running. This bankruptcy issue possibly explains why the actual collection of the financial support for this second phase of the Nantgarw China Works was not overseen by William Weston Young personally—as an undischarged bankrupt he would have been legally liable to handing over any monies he collected from this activity to his creditors—hence, the Hon. William Booth Grey of Duffryn St Nicholas was nominated to collect the money from the ten supporters on his behalf for presentation to the Nantgarw China works. The author can estimate from Young’s Diary entries that he made over 50 visits to the Cowbridge Free School between 1817 and 1819 in his art tutoring capacity: the Diaries also indicate payments received from

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Fig. A.13 Jesus College, Oxford, First Quadrangle, in Memorials of Oxford by James Ingram DD, 3 Volumes, Published by J. H. Parker, H. Slatter and W. Graham, Charles Tilt, London, 1837. Engraved by John Le Keux from a drawing by Frederick Mackenzie, 1837. Public domain

Dr Williams and other parents of pupils for his art tuition services and also list fees paid by him for rental of the rooms required for these tuition lessons from a Mrs Cook, the housekeeper at Cowbridge Free School, so we may infer that the art classes were in effect an extra-curricular arrangement between Young and Dr Williams and not part of the normal school timetabled activities. The last mention of his art tutoring duties at the Cowbridge Free School was on June 1st 1819: after this, he does still refer to visits to Cowbridge for his surveying duties in his Diaries but he never mentions attending at the School. He now seems to be very involved with his estate surveying duties and mentions employing a Jno. Crouch as his surveying assistant in January 1820, although there are additionally several occurrences of entries in the Diaries that mention several new art tuition classes provided to a Miss Jenkins at Llanharan House, Llantrisant, that are ongoing to May 1821! Although not a name that appears in the “Ten True Men of Glamorgan” listed by William Weston Young, Richard Jenkins of Llanharan House is nevertheless mentioned as a gentleman supporter of the Nantgarw China Works, so this provides yet another link between the activities of Young and his efforts to maintain the viability of the Nantgarw China Works as an enterprise after the departure of Billingsley and Walker in 1820. What does now appear intriguingly in his Diary entries at this time, between 1818 and 1821, are comments relating to his personal decoration of porcelain and the use of his own muffle furnace for this purpose at Nottage, Porthcawl, coupled with payments made to a William Bedford for its maintenance and running. On October 24th 1820,

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Young records that he engaged William Bedford to re-generate the Nantgarw China Works muffle furnace in preparation for decoration of the porcelain stocks that he was about to take over from Billingsley and Walker stored there on lease from the landlord of Tyla Gwyn, Edward Edmunds, after they had both departed for Coalport earlier in April of that year. The conclusions from this research, therefore, can be summarised as follows. ● In 1817 William Weston Young met with the Rev. Dr William Williams at the Cowbridge Free School and he certainly made many visits there over the next three years, often regularly at weekly intervals. His first pupil was Miss Hattie Williams, daughter of the Rev. William Williams, at the age of 13, but no mention is made of the absence of Mrs Elizabeth Williams, who had died in 1814 at the age of 46. William Williams had married Elizabeth in 1792 when he was 27 years of age and Elizabeth was 24. ● It is inconceivable that during his many visits to Cowbridge at this period, which in his Diaries are recorded as being undertaken in conjunction with several being made also to the Nantgarw China Works, that William Weston Young did not mention the start-up of the Nantgarw China Works for its Phase 2 operation and the production of Nantgarw porcelain there to the Rev. Williams. If the Rev. Williams wished to have a porcelain service or series of plates painted with scenes that featured the salient landmarks of his life then this would have been a very appropriate opportunity to commission it locally from William Weston Young in the finest local porcelain that was by then so much in demand in London. Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942) has hypothesised that Young would have been in a very suitable position to advertise the commencement of porcelain production at Nantgarw in the second phase of operations at the Nantgarw China Works between 1817 and 1820 to the clientele that he came into contact with through his estate surveying business. It will be seen later that the Rev. Williams mentions a service of Worcester porcelain that they used in the household but whether this was already in existence at that time we cannot know. ● There are several statements which appear in Young’s Diaries that he was “painting at home” and using his muffle furnace there, commencing with an entry on April 23rd 1819; it is hence relevant to enquire where his porcelain was coming from to enable this activity to be carried out—and it is not inconceivable that this was sourced at Nantgarw on his several visits made there, travelling to and from Cowbridge at this time. Morton Nance (The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw, 1942) has expressed an opinion that Young from his Diary entries was not staying at Nantgarw long enough to do much decoration on site at the Nantgarw China Works during this period: he rarely stayed there overnight, for instance, and it seems that he only visited the Nantgarw China Works site when he was en route elsewhere. So, we can postulate that he could have received a commission from the Rev. Williams around 1817–1818 and then proceeded to undertake the decoration of this special order perhaps at his residence in Nottage on Nantgarw porcelain plates using his own muffle furnace there. This would imply that the

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Rev. William Williams cabinet service was commissioned and decorated by Young during the Billingsley/Walker tenure of the Nantgarw China Works. An alternative hypothesis would be that Young undertook the decoration of this Rev. William Williams service after the departure of Billingsley and Walker in 1820 and possibly in the hiatus just before or after the arrival of Thomas Pardoe in January 1821. A key factor here would be the type of glaze used on the specimens: a Nantgarw No. 1 glaze could be indicative of either scenario as it is known that Billingsley and Walker did leave some remnant stock already glazed at Nantgarw and, of course, if decorated before their departure it would have this same glaze anyway. On the other hand, pieces of biscuit porcelain in the remnant stock that were decorated at Nantgarw after January 1821 would very likely have received the Nantgarw No. 2 glaze, as, perfected by Young and Pardoe, which is sensibly different from that used by Billingsley and Walker and is much creamier in appearance than the Nantgarw No.1 glaze. A close inspection of the artefacts might reveal the answer visually or this could possibly be confirmed by the use of non-destructive Raman spectral analysis, as has been demonstrated hitherto to differentiate between the two Nantgarw glazes (Edwards, 18th and 19th Century Porcelain Analysis, 2020) on several perfect porcelain pieces. ● What is still not clear is who provided the gilding on the Rev. William Williams Nantgarw cabinet set: several specimens are very simply gilded with a plain edge gilding or dentil edge gilding whereas others have gilding designs of the highest quality and artistry. Did William Weston Young himself sub-contract the gilding or did he accomplish this task himself? A survey of two recent publications which exhibit Nantgarw porcelain that has been locally decorated and decorated in London between 1817 and 1822, namely Gartre’n Ol (Gartre’n Ol:Coming Home Exhibition, 2019) and Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Gambon, 2016), yields the following data in this context: Gartre’n Ol: 85 pieces described; 46 plus 9 cabinet pieces decorated in London, with 26 plus 4 cabinet pieces decorated locally in Nantgarw. Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw: 81 pieces described; 72 plus 2 cabinet pieces decorated in London, with 7 decorated locally in Nantgarw.

It is clear that the gilding schemes adopted by the London ateliers on these pieces were more profusely executed and more visually extensive compared with those used locally, as expected perhaps from the London clientele vogue for the baroque French Empire styles than prevalent in society. Two points need to be made here: firstly a comment in the Gartre’n Ol catalogue (pp. 113 and 117) draws attention to Young’s “enthusiasm for working at home decorating and using his muffle furnace at Newton Nottage” and, secondly, a comparison of the gilding on the spill vase locally decorated at Nantgarw by “Kitty” (illustrated in Fig. 4.18 here) which shows a remarkable resemblance to the design and execution of the vine leaves and creeper gilding decoration on the plate shown here in Fig. A.8 (NMW A 31420), so that these could be potentially have been executed by the same local gilding hand, which may well have been William Weston Young himself!

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Appendix: The Rev. William Williams Service—A Nantgarw Service or Cabinet Set?

A.4 Conclusions It seems clear that the Rev. William Williams Nantgarw porcelain “service” is probably mis-classified as a household service and that it should now better be considered as a group of cabinet plates in a series which depicts scenes of the landmark appointments in his life. Genealogical research has established the basis for the assignment of the individual pieces concerned, has identified the credible locations for the two hitherto unidentified scenes in the existing series and has indicated that several more scenes could possibly have been originally commissioned to complete the set. The confirmation of William Weston Young as the probable artist involved in the decoration of these cabinet plates has been established through his close contact with the Rev. Williams at the Cowbridge Free School, although the gilder is still unknown, and a hypothesis has been advanced for the chronology of their completion. The individual gilding on each plate has been documented and shown to be very unusual for Nantgarw porcelain groups and services, even to the extent of identifying the presence dentil edge gilding on two of the plates in the cabinet set series, which normally has been taken by connoisseurs as an exclusive characteristic indicator of their London-based atelierdecoration: the dentil edge gilding in Fig. A.3 is different from that in Fig. A.4. In a related genealogical search, the Will of the Rev. William Williams was found and was shown to have been proved on the 27th February 1847, some six weeks after his death on January 14th. In this Will he bequeaths several items from his estate to his children, grandchildren and gifts to his servant, Margaret Morgan. Of particular interest in the Will, he states that he leaves his Worcester porcelain service to his son Charles, his silver breakfast coffee and tea sets to his son William and “ My Nantgarw plates … and other china I request my children to divide amicably among themselves”. In this statement the Rev. William Williams therefore confirms that he did own a Nantgarw set of plates and that he did not consider them to be per se a service! The possibility of some of this series of Nantgarw plates being divided amongst his surviving children as mentioned in the Will would also explain the “missing items” that have been referred to above: perhaps one or more of the nominated inheritors of the Rev. Williams decided to take a cabinet plate or two as a keepsake of their father? Secondly, although William Weston Young does make many references to his art tuition classes at Cowbridge and indeed also to his decoration of ceramics in his Diaries, in only two instances does he actually record specific payments being made to him for this ceramic decorative work—one by Robert Jones of Fonmon Castle on March 31st 1817 for £5. 5 s. 0d (probably for his decoration of the racehorse depicted on the famous Poulton Plate) and the other by a Captain John Langley for the decoration of his china (unspecified) on the 23rd January 1821 for £1. 18 s. 6d. Several payments of varying amounts are recorded in the Diary entries as being received from the Rev. William Williams between 1817 and 1819 but it is not clear whether these refer to the provision of art tuition classes for his children, Harriet and John, or for the supply of decorated china from William Weston Young which would have then placed an incontrovertible chronology for the delivery of the

Appendix: The Rev. William Williams Service—A Nantgarw Service or Cabinet Set?

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cabinet plate set to Cowbridge. To place a measure upon these amounts in current times, £1 in 1818 is equated to approximately £100 now; another measure would be to compare the salary of £120 for a Church of England Vicar in 1818 to that now of approximately £30,000 (median salary), which gives a ratio of approximately 1:250 for the relative spending power of the pound sterling between then and the present day. So, the sums involved in the Diary entries made by William Weston Young would have been quite significant at that time; for example the single plate decorated by Young for Robert Jones of Fonmon Castle would be in the region of £1350 today.

References

J.N.L. Baker, Jesus College, 1571–1971 (Oxonian Press, Oxford, 1971) CCEd, The Clergy of the Church of England Database, 1540–1835, Arts and Humanities Research Council, Record 6135 (1999) I. Davies, A Certaine Schoole: Headmasters of the Cowbridge Grammar School, 1608–1967 (D. Brown & Sons, Cowbridge, 1967) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (Springer -Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2019) H.G.M. Edwards, 18th and 19th Century Porcelain Analysis (Springer -Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2020) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer -Nature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelains: Swansea and Nantgarw Crested China (SpringerNature, Dordrecht, The Netherlands, 2022) J. Foster, Alumni Oxonienses; The Members of the University of Oxford, 1500–1714 and 1715–1886, vol 4, djvu/381 (Parker & Co., Oxford, 1891–1892), p. 1573 F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (The John Andrews Collection at Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016) Gartre’n Ol, A Coming Home Exhibition of the Finest Nantgarw Porcelain, July–September 2019 (Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw China Works Museum, Catalogue, Nantgarw China Works Museum Trust, Tyla Gwyn, Nantgarw, 2019) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (Batsford & Sons, London, 1942) A. Renton, National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, Amgueddfa Cymru, personal communication, 2022 The Gentleman’s Magazine and Historical Chronicle, vol 28, Sylvanus Urban Gent., Edward Cave at St John’s Gate, London, i.663, 1847 W.W. Young, The Diaries of William Weston Young, 1776–1847 (1802–1843), vol 30 (West Glamorgan Archive Service, Swansea), SA1 3SN. https://arcgiveshub.jisc.sc.uk/data/gb216-d/dxch/ ddxch/i/hub

Glossary

Armorial china High-fired ceramics decorated with the heraldic achievements of an arms-bearing family which could constitute the full coat-of-arms comprising the escutcheon, motto, supporters, helm, lambrequins, crest and torse or any number of these or more usually just consisting of a crest and torse. In some cases, the crest and torse, with or without a motto, is encompassed in other decoration and may be accompanied by additional gilding and other geometric motifs. There are only seven known exemplars of armorial porcelain manufactured by the Nantgarw China Works and the two examples discussed in this text are the crested dinnerdessert service commissioned by Baron Phipps of Normanby, Earl Mulgrave, and the tea and coffee service commissioned by Homfray of Penllyne Castle. Biscuit porcelain The unglazed product of the high-temperature firing process used in the manufacture of porcelain using a “biscuit kiln” which operated typically at a temperature in the region of 1100–1400 C. The Nantgarw China Works kiln temperature had to be maintained in the narrow temperature region of 1400– 1420 C to achieve the correct fusion of the raw material components comprising the prototype porcelain paste. The resultant porcelain is of a pure creamy-white or ivory colour and possessed a texture which, if blemish-free and perfectly shaped, was very highly prized by ceramic artists and modellers particularly for the construction of ornamental figurines in simulation of marble statuary, as first perfected by the Meissen manufactory in the mid-18th Century. In the mid- to late-18th Century, the finest biscuit porcelain artefacts were commonly placed on dining tables for admiration by the guests and to stimulate conversation during dinner. Generally, the biscuit porcelain, after cooling from the kiln firing process, was painted, glazed and gilded—during which process any small defects or blemishes in the body or in the glaze could often be masked by strategically placed enamelling: hence, painted and enamelled figurines are found much more commonly than their biscuit analogues, which if found to be imperfect after their firing, were usually destroyed or sent to be decorated and glazed. The figures were designed by a “modeller” or sculptor and assembled in the workshop by a “repairer”. Evidence is seen here in the Farnley Hall service of the use © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3

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of enamelled insects, butterflies or moths to mask small visual imperfections in the porcelain, which generally appear as carbon particles or small bubbles in the glaze. Blemish A blemish is a fault in the fired porcelain, whether this is in the biscuit or glazed form, arising from several problems which could arise during the firing process such as inadequate kiln temperature control leading to firing cracks, the introduction of contaminants such as carbonaceous matter which then burned to leave soot deposits and the emission of gases during the firing process which created bubbles in the vitrified paste or the glaze. Serious blemishes resulted in porcelain items being unsaleable, whereas it was a common practice to mask minor blemishes, such as small spots of soot or little bubbles in an otherwise perfectly shaped piece, by the shrewd and strategic placement in the enamelling of small devices or motifs such as insects, butterflies or moths prior to a final glazing process taking place. These can be observed here on the underside of several pieces in the Farnley Hall service and occasionally on the uppermost surface. Body paste The wet mixture of raw material components which comprise the formulaic recipes for porcelain bodies. Texturally moist to the touch, the paste could be moulded or formed into shapes preparatory to the firing process taking place in the biscuit kiln. This term is also applied to the fired porcelain body prior to its chemical analysis, when of course it is then not a wet “paste” at all but rather a hard ceramic material. Burnishing The gentle polishing of gilt decoration on a glazed ceramic surface to a highly polished reflective coating. Early gilding was accomplished using “honey gilding” whereby 24-carat gold leaf was applied to the surface with an adhesive medium of honey, or with the use of applied resins such as gum arabic, which were both replaced in the late 18th Century by mercury gilding using an amalgam of mercury which had been triturated with the gold leaf. During the final firing of the ceramic piece in the “glost” kiln at low temperatures the organic adhesive carrier component or the mercury in the amalgam was volatilised off into the atmosphere, leaving a dull golden finish which was then hand-polished by skilled gilders using a finely powdered jeweller’s rouge, iron (III) oxide Fe2 O3 , to give a brilliant finish. The skill of the gilder was much admired in porcelain workshops as it offset and complemented the applied enamelling decoration but it was always an expensive part of the finishing process. Some service commissions received only a gilded decoration without accompanying enamelling decoration whereas others were not gilded at all. In some manufactories, such as Derby, the gilder was a recognised artistic master and was allowed to place an assigned numeral indicative of their work on the underside of the piece normally just inside the footrim. In the third phase of the Nantgarw China Works, Young and Pardoe chose to eliminate the gilding on some of their work on remnant stock pieces from the Billingsley and Walker era to economise upon the decorating costs and the simple edge gilding usually employed on locally decorated pieces in the earlier era was then generally replaced with enamelled colours, especially a chocolate brown and deep green.

Glossary

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Occasionally locally decorated and gilded items are still found from the Young and Pardoe era. Cabinet porcelain This refers to artefacts that have been manufactured primarily for display purposes rather than for practical household usage. Cabinet pieces generally are different design versions of their household analogues with more complex features and are usually decorated in a more expansive style, sometimes with scenes, figures or landscapes that have a special significance. Chemical descriptors Care should be taken to differentiate between the descriptors of chemical compounds and their component elements. For example, silica is SiO2 and contains silicon and oxygen: likewise, calcia is calcium oxide CaO (lime), alumina is aluminium oxide Al2 O3 , magnesia is magnesium oxide MgO, potash is potassium oxide K2 O and soda is sodium oxide Na2 O. Other chemicals are described precisely as they occur, such as phosphorus pentoxide P2 O5 —also known as phosphorus (V) oxide or phosphorus pentoxide, relative to phosphorus (III) oxide P2 O3 —and sulfur dioxide SO2 . Iron oxide is troublesome as this can mean both ferrous oxide FeO and ferric oxide Fe2 O3 , where the iron is in the oxidation state (II) and (III), respectively, and the former is a green colour and the latter orange-red. Nantgarw porcelain is termed highly phosphatic because it contained more than 40% of calcined bone ash, represented by tricalcium phosphate, Ca3 (PO4 )2 , in its formulation, China A generic term for high-fired ceramics, which may be glazed or unglazed, and used for decorative or utilitarian purposes around the home. Believed to originate from descriptors of ceramics that were made in simulation of imported Chinese porcelain, this term covers a wide range of ceramics including porcelain, earthenwares, creamwares, stonewares, celadons, majolica and delftwares. The term “china” has been used freely to describe ceramic articles of a range of compositions since the importation of porcelain from China in the 16th Century even when some of the artefacts do not contain china clay (kaolinite). Chinese porcelain A generic term which historically describes the characteristic hard paste porcelain comprising kaolinite and petuntse as major raw materials fired at a high kiln temperature; termed “true porcelain” by some historians to differentiate it from “artificial porcelain” which is retained for the soft paste body variants which included synthetic components as raw materials, for example calcined bone ash, potash, lime and glass frit. During the early 18th Century, the Chinese perfected a soft paste body variant which has been recognised as a comparative rarity. Chinese porcelains have a range of compositions which varied both with their production sites geographically and also with the specified quality: the highest quality porcelains from the Imperial kilns at Jingdezhen were composed of an equal ratio of china clay (kaolin) and petuntse. Crested china A term reserved for a partial coat-of-arms depicted upon porcelain or earthenwares which may exhibit the crest solely, with or without its torse, and perhaps accompanied by a motto, usually placed in either the verge or reserve or centrally located on the artefact. It may be enamelled in polychrome pigments, or it is more usually found in gilt or occasionally and more rarely in a monochrome pigment.

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Glossary

Cullet Also known as glass frit, this is a glass additive in porcelain body recipes which is included to increase the transparency of the fired body. Generally purchased by porcelain manufactory proprietors from neighbouring glassworks (for example, as the “end of day glass” mixture) this was then added as a finely ground material to the second stage firing process of soft paste biscuit porcelain syntheses and was occasionally used also in glazes and as a carrier for pigments used in the decoration to provide a medium for interaction with the glaze and substrate in the firing kiln. Cullet is a rather indefinite term scientifically as it could contain either flint glass (a highly refractive glass containing up to 60% lead oxide, PbO) or crown glass (also known as soda glass, which contained either soda or potash, or both, as an alkaline flux, Na2 O and K2 O, but critically for analytical chemical interpretation of the elemental data, this soda glass is leadfree. Analytically the presence of a glass additive is important as in the absence of a lead—containing material from other sources in the recipes, the presence of a lead oxide signature in the analytical data derived from the body paste is a definitive indicator of the presence of a flint glass cullet additive. In several production notes from manufactories, proprietors did not refer to the addition of cullet in their raw materials composition, yet analytically this has been inferred from the presence of a lead oxide signature (from flint glass) or the presence of an abnormally high soda and potash content (arising potentially from a crown, or soda glass cullet additive). Also known as glass frit, a confusion occasionally occurs in terminology because of the use of the word “frit” which is used to also describe a ground calcined body paste after a first firing sequence, whether this contains glass cullet or not. Frit The result of a fine grinding process which is applied to the components of a ceramic paste and especially used to describe the compositional mixtures of bone ash, china clay, flint glass (cullet) and soaprock. The necessity of very fine grinding to produce a homogeneous mixture of components which originally may have very tangible differences in hardness was appreciated by the earliest porcelain manufacturers and a fine frit usually then required just the addition of a single component or water, perhaps with some additional alkaline flux or powdered china clay, to effect a suitable and tractable paste mixture for moulding and firing in a biscuit kiln. The term frit is also applied to a first-stage preparatory firing process of a component mixture which has been fired at a high temperature then ground, mixed with new components and then re-fired to produce biscuit porcelain in the two-stage process that is typical of most soft paste porcelain syntheses. Care must be taken in the understanding of the meaning of frit in recipes as it was used to describe both the finely ground porcelain body after its initial firing and also the ground glass component used as an additive synthetic raw material prior to its making up as a body paste. Gilding The application of a gilt decoration to fired porcelain involving 24-carat gold leaf in a carrier such as mercury, honey or an organic resin followed by burnishing, see under Burnishing. Gilding was a highly specialist task in decorator’s workshops, the best gilders being permitted to sign their work with a numeral on the

Glossary

217

underside of the piece or being mentioned specifically in the service commission documentation and gilding was an expensive component of the decorative process. Glaze The application of a coating to a fired porcelain biscuit body to seal the ceramic pores and to enhance the appearance with a glossy, smooth texture. Usually applied over the decorative pigments, it acted as a protectant for the decoration. Overglaze decoration, known technically as painting rather than enamelling in the ceramic workshops, was subject to paint loss and wear during usage. The glaze was usually applied as a slip, a thick suspension of clays, alkaline earths and other additives with lead oxide component (or a tin oxide additive, such as cassiterite, for a lead—free glaze). Fired at a lower temperature than the biscuit body, this final stage of preparation enhanced the beauty of the porcelain: it was essential that the glaze composition mechanically and chemically was compatible with the fired porcelain otherwise firing faults were created and an unsightly glaze “craquelure” could form, whereby the glaze physically separates from the porcelain substrate in contraction from the kiln upon cooling. Certain decorative pigments were favoured for their enhancement properties upon interaction with the glaze application, cobalt blue being one of these, and it was equally important that the pigment maintained its integrity and was able to resist “running” on application of the glaze. Glazing was sometimes undertaken before decoration, as in the case of the decoration of some glazed Nantgarw stock remnants left by Billingsley and Walker in 1820, although Young and Pardoe noted that they had to use their own glaze recipe for some items that had been left in the biscuit state. Glost kiln Used in the final stage of porcelain preparation before and/or after applying the enamelled decoration and involving the application of an alkaline “slip” containing china clay, soda, potash and a lead oxide component usually in the form of a powdered flint glass, which at lower temperatures will form a hard, transparent glaze coating. Occasionally, a glost kiln was used for the calcination of raw material components at lower temperatures and for the drying of raw materials in which variable amounts of water were found to occur. Initially, glazes were lead-based but in the first decade of the 19th Century, when the toxicity of lead compounds was fully appreciated, reversion to a less toxic, tin-based glaze was effected (as patented by John Rose at the Coalport China Works in 1820, using cassiterite, SnO2 , instead of lead oxide, litharge or massicot, PbO). China sold from manufactories “in the white” could be unglazed or glazed for decoration in ateliers, with subsequent glazing being undertaken by the enamellers. Minerals A mineral has a precisely defined chemical formulation and crystal structure and although it may occur along with other minerals in natural deposits it still retains its integrity and formulation. A rock, in contrast, is a mixture of minerals and materials of indefinite and varying composition, such as clays, and generally cannot be defined as a pure substance. A special classification of organic mineral is recognised in which the material, still naturally occurring, may be partially or completely defined as containing carbon, hydrogen and oxygen only, often in complexation with organic moieties and radicals: examples include, amber, jet, kladnoite, idrialite and may not be precisely described by a chemical formula or

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crystal structure. These tend to have occurred from degraded deposits of carbonaceous and fossilised material, coals and lignites geologically. Graphite is a special example. The creation of new minerals in the raw materials exposed to high temperatures in porcelain firing kilns is a key analytical indicator of the types of process being employed, for example, wollastonite, mullite and forsterite and fayalite. Moulding The shape and size of porcelain items can be a reliable stylistic indicator of a particular factory’s output and a clue to the attribution of unmarked pieces. Mouldings were generally unique to each manufactory and comprised individual and idiosyncratic cross-sections of flatwares such as saucers and plates, the shapes of cups, the presence and pattern of footrims, the shape of spill vases (e.g. cylindrical, fluted, tulip-shape, trumpet-shaped, flared), the impressed moulded and embossed verges of plates and the number and type of indentations at the rim. Many factories characteristically used the application of moulded flowers which were integral to the item and also applied reliefs such as feet, the heads of animals, floral decoration and beads, as well as knops or handles on tureens and comports. There is much conjecture in the ceramics literature as to whether or not mouldings were copied from other competitor manufactories which may have involved the manufacture of moulds from existing products. This would invariably have resulted in a diminution in size of the piece that was being copied because of the contraction that occurred of the moist porcelain paste from the copy mould upon firing in the biscuit kiln; this resulted in a significant reduction in dimension of the fired piece, estimated to be in the range of 13–14%. Named service A porcelain service which has been commissioned by a particular client or individual from the china factory or one of its agents, especially where factory records support the attribution and where occasionally a reason for its purchase may be stated, such as the Duke of Cambridge service in Nantgarw porcelain which was ordered from the Nantgarw agents, John Mortlock, Oxford Street, London, as a wedding present from George, the Prince Regent, for the marriage of his younger brother, Adolphus, Duke of Cambridge, to Princess Augusta, Landgravine of Hesse-Cassel, at Buckingham Palace in June, 1818. The term also includes services which have been purchased from the later sale of effects or estates and have thereby acquired the name of their new owners by association. Examples of the former are the Duke of Cambridge, Marquess of Anglesey and Baron Phipps of Normanby services in Nantgarw porcelain and of the latter type, Mackintosh, Edwards and Twyning services in Nantgarw porcelain, respectively. Occasionally, the named services do not bear the name of the person who commissioned them but rather the place where they were to be used or perhaps referred to even the decoration adopted: an example of the former is the Marino Ballroom service in Swansea porcelain commissioned by John Vivian for his residence in Sketty Hall, Swansea, and of Wyndham Lewis ’ Greenmeadow Nantgarw service used in his residence in Llantrisant, and of the latter, the Garden Scenery service of Swansea porcelain originally commissioned by Lewis Weston Dillwyn, proprietor of the Swansea China Works, which was later acquired and retained by his descendants.

Glossary

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Pigments In ceramics decoration, these are coloured minerals which are thermally stable at the operating temperatures adopted in the glost kiln after application of the glaze slip and firing up to 600 °C or slightly greater. Mineral pigments are usually metal oxides, sulfates and sulfides such as haematite, gypsum and orpiment. Care needs to be taken in the interpretation of old recipes for the decoration of ceramics as minerals were often confusingly assigned an incorrect nomenclature, such as minium, which has been used historically to describe both red lead, trilead tetroxide, Pb3 O4 , and cinnabar, mercury sulfide, HgS, and red oxide of lead can mean both red lead (2PbO.PbO2 ) and litharge (PbO). Analytically, the interrogation of pigments on enamelled porcelains is a fertile area of study as manufacturers often changed their pigment sources and the composition of their pigments with time and the presence of trace quantities of unusual elements such as zinc, niobium, rubidium and copper can indicate valuable information about the timelines of production and sources of the pigment by the manufactory concerned. For example, the presence of a minor elemental component of bismuth in a cobalt blue pigment on an Iznik glazed tile from the 16th/17th Century indicated that the source of the cobalt ore was European (from the Erzengebirge mine in Saxony) rather than the more usually encountered Asian mines. Arsenic traces in the cobalt blue pigment on Chinese 18th Century porcelains are indicative of the use of European cobalt ores in the preparation of the pigment rather than the Asian sources which are arsenic—free. Porcelain types commencing with hard paste and soft paste porcelains historically (also termed rather confusingly as “true” and “artificial” porcelains), this inadequate description generated a further differentiation into the porcelain as hard paste (highly siliceous), phosphatic, bone china, magnesian, glassy and hybrid types. The categorisation of a porcelain type is dependent not only upon the body composition but also upon the process methodology and firing sequences adopted. However made, all types of porcelain must possess a degree of translucency to qualify for its appellation and inclusion in the category. Raw Materials The raw materials are components comprising the body and glaze recipes used in porcelain syntheses. Mostly these were natural minerals and rocks which were sourced from precise mines and locations which gave rise to several alternative names. Natural raw materials include feldspars, china clays, ball clays and soapstone. Synthetic raw materials include bone ash, pearl ash, soda ash, smalt, lime and magnesia. By their very nature, raw materiala could be of varying purity and most porcelain proprietors sought to acquire supplies that were as highly pure as possible. The storage of raw materials was also very critical as several were prone to absorb moisture, which could affect their ability to react or which might cause problems for a quantitative recipe formulation; examples of raw materials that were particularly susceptible to moisture retention and potentially chemical change prior to their use are lime, calcined bone ash, soda ash and potash. Service A porcelain service could be commissioned directly from the factory, from an appointed agent, bought at auction from “chinamen” or acquired through an import agency such as the Honourable East India Company who traded with Chinese porcelain agencies and their brokers or factors (Hongs) through the port

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of Canton (Guangzhou) for Chinese porcelain. A porcelain service was normally defined as a dinner, dessert or tea service, but combinations of dinner-dessert, tea-coffee and special breakfast services were quite commonly ordered. The usual dessert or dinner service comprised 42 pieces or more approximately in a standard service of 24 place settings (i.e. 24 plates plus central comports and serving dishes), but special orders expanded this to over 100 pieces, with the inclusion of soup dishes, tureens, centre fruit comports and stands, ice pails, spill vases, muffin dishes, guglets (water bottles), vegetable dishes, egg-cups and carrier, sauce boats and trios (coffee can/cup, tea cup and saucer). There are instances of very large services being commissioned, such as those from Meissen in the 18th Century of over 1000 pieces with some 50 or 60 place settings. The service was usually decorated according to the specific requirements of the commission and the inclusion of a coat of arms or heraldic crest centrally or at the verge would confer upon it the description of an “armorial” service. An armorial service is especially valuable for provenancing and historical purposes as it facilitates the assignment of the commission to a particular person in an arms-bearing family and often enables one to attribute a definitive date for a commission, such as the granting of arms or perhaps a family succession to a title or elevation in the peerage which may have been celebrated accordingly with the ordering of a porcelain service. Translucency This is perhaps the greatest achievable asset of porcelain manufacture to which every manufacturer subscribed and hoped to attain in emulation of the Chinese “eggshell” wares which were imported to Europe in the mid-18th Century. It describes the transmission of visible radiation, or light, through a solid object: at one end of the spectral scale is glass, which is usually transparent (100% transmission) and at the other is earthenware which is opaque (0% transmission). However, the occurrence of a milk glass is noted, with added opacifiers such as tin oxide, in which the transparency is less than 100% and the glass is then termed translucent. Early forms of this opacified milk glass were made in the 17th Century in simulation of porcelain. Porcelain is measured by its translucency, which is the clarity for transmission when viewed with background lighting. An intermediate descriptor is “semi-opaque” or even “semi-porcelain”, which was applied to some china during the mid-19th Century, which is rather indefinite and conveys little information about their true category. Other descriptors such as “vitreous china” and “ironstone china” likewise do little to assist in their classification. By definition, porcelain must be able to transmit light to some extent unlike stonewares, faience, terracotta and earthenwares.

Selected Biblography

D. Blayney-Brown, Joseph Mallord William Turner, 1775–1851, Artist’s Biography, in J.M.W. Turner: Sketchbooks, Drawings and Watercolours (The Tate Gallery Research Publications, London, 2012) H.G.M. Edwards, M.C.T. Denyer, William Billingsley The Enigmatic Porcelain Artist, Decorator and Manufacturer (Penrose Antiques Ltd. Short Guides, Neopublis, Berlin, 2016) H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2017) H.G.M. Edwards, Nantgarw and Swansea Porcelains: An Analytical Perspective (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2018) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776–1847) (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2019) H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain Analysis and Its Role in the Forensic Attribution of Ceramic Specimens (Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2021) H.G.M. Edwards, Welsh Armorial Porcelain: Nantgarw and Swansea Crested China (Preservation of Cultural Heritage Series, Springer-Nature Publishing, Cham, Switzerland, 2022) F. Gambon, Porslen Abertawe a Nantgarw (Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelain) (Oriel Plas Glyn-yWeddw, Llanbedrog, Abersoch, Gwynedd, 2016) W. John, Nantgarw Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1948) W. John, Swansea Porcelain (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1958) W. John, K. Coombes, G.J. Coombes, Nantgarw Porcelain Album (Ceramic Book Company, Newport, Gwent, 1975) A.E. Jones “Jimmy”, S.L. Joseph, Swansea Porcelain: Shapes and Decoration (David Brown Publishers, Cowbridge, 1988) E. Morton Nance, The Pottery and Porcelain of Swansea and Nantgarw (B.T. Batsford, London, 1942) W. Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw. A History of The Factories with Biographical Notices of the Artists and Others, Notes on the Merits of the Porcelain, the Marks Thereon Etc. (Bemrose & Sons Ltd., The Old Bailey, London, 1897) J. Twitchett, Derby Porcelain: An Illustrated Guide, 1748–1848 (The Antique Collectors Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2002) I.J. Williams, The Nantgarw Pottery and Its Products: An Examination of the Site (The National Museum of Wales/Press Board of the University of Wales, Amgueddfa Genedlaethol Cymru, Cardiff, 1932)

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3

221

Index

A Andrews, John, 88, 93, 99–103, 107, 108, 116, 117, 120, 122, 124, 151–153

B Banks, Sir Joseph, 7 Baron Phipps of Normanby, 22, 26, 27, 64, 138, 146, 213, 218 Barr, Martin, 3, 5, 6 Barry-Barry, Pendock, 2 Baxter, Thomas, 111, 112, 114, 170, 187, 188 Beddow, George, 114, 115, 123 Bevington, Timothy & John, 9, 94, 111, 187, 188, 205 Billingsley, William, 1–7, 9, 10, 14, 17–21, 26, 27, 33, 34, 36, 37, 47, 50, 54, 85, 90, 94, 100, 109–111, 113, 114, 116, 135, 148, 155, 166, 169, 170, 180–186, 205, 208 Bloor, Robert, 34, 95–98, 134, 135 Bone china, 33, 34, 39, 219 Booth-Grey, William, 206 Bradley & Co., atelier, 84, 85, 93–95, 102, 105–107 British Confervae, 13, 119, 203 Burdett-Coutts, Baroness Angela, 92, 93, 95, 96

C Calcined bone ash, 8, 14, 33, 41–43, 45, 46, 50–52, 215, 219 Cambrian Pottery, 1, 2, 7, 9, 13, 14, 106, 111, 114, 116, 119, 126, 135, 170

Coalport porcelain, 92, 156, 157, 160 Coke, John, 2, 94, 110, 180, 185 Coles, William, 1 Colomban, Professor Philippe, 12, 14, 52, 54, 138 Coutts, Sir Thomas, 92, 93, 95, 96 Cowbridge Church, Holy Cross, 26, 122, 123, 194, 195 Cowbridge Free School, 194, 195, 203, 205–208, 210 Crichton-Stuart, John, see Marquess of Bute

D De Junic, 23, 83, 104–108, 113, 114, 163, 170, 171, 174, 176 De la Beche, Sir Henry, 96, 135 Derby porcelain, 2, 4, 6, 34, 37–39, 95–98, 100, 110, 134, 156 Dillwyn, Lewis Llewellyn, 187 Dillwyn, Lewis Weston, 1, 2, 13, 34, 114, 119, 135, 187, 188, 203, 218 Duchess of Richmond service, 23, 89, 90 Duesbury, William, 2, 32, 33, 37, 71, 95, 110 Duke of Cambridge service, 64, 89, 165, 167, 218 Duke of Gloucester, 23, 89 Duke of Newcastle service, 24 Duke of Richmond, 23 Duncombe service, 17, 21, 23

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 H. G. M. Edwards, The Farnley Hall Service: A Unique Survivor in Nantgarw Porcelain, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-21816-3

223

224

Index

E Earl of Dunraven, see Wyndham-Quin, Henry Earl of Mulgrave, see Baron Phipps Eccles, Herbert, 190 Edmunds, Edward, 18–23, 208 Edwards service, 6, 19, 20 Evans, David, 9, 10, 114

Joseph, Sir Leslie, 105, 133, 136, 170, 180, 185–188 Juinnie, see De Junic

F Fawkes, William Ramsden Hawksworth MP, 23, 57, 58, 60–62, 66, 169, 173, 174, 189

L Lady Seaton of Bosahan, 145 Lewis, Wyndham MP, 22, 91, 218 Llandaff Cathedral, 26, 122, 194, 195, 200 Lord Dumfries, see Marquess of Bute Lord Frederick Thynne, see Viscount Weymouth Lord Ongley service, 96–98, 134, 135, 156

G Gambon, Fergus, 19–22, 25, 87–89, 94, 101, 102, 107, 115, 118, 151, 171, 209 Garden Scenery dessert service, 187, 188 Gilding, 2, 4, 11, 13, 18–20, 26, 27, 57, 69–80, 84, 87–91, 93, 94, 99, 100, 102, 103, 105, 107, 110, 111, 113–115, 120–124, 126–128, 130, 134, 138, 148, 156, 165, 170, 171, 174, 177, 186, 193, 198–200, 209, 210, 213, 214, 216, 217 Glamorgan Canal, 1, 25 Glass frit, 36, 41, 215, 216 Glaze, Nantgarw, 52, 53, 209 Grant Francis, Colonel G., 170 Grog, 36 Guest-Schreiber, Lady Charlotte, 24, 26, 27, 101, 121, 178

H Haslem, John, 71, 135 Homfray, John of Penllyne Castle, 18, 21, 22, 26, 27, 148, 213 Horton-Fawkes, Guy, 57, 61, 66, 69–81, 177

J Jenkins, Richard, 207 Jenkins, Sir Leoline, 195 Jenkins, W. Elis, 135, 195 Jesus College, Oxford, 194, 195, 201, 206, 207 Jewitt, Llewelyn, 23, 37, 155 John, Dr William, 18, 27, 84, 169, 175 Jones, Robert, 210, 211

K King George III, 5, 93, 95, 96 King George IV, 24, 121

M Mackintosh service, 110, 120 Mansel-Talbot, Thomas, 7 Margam Park, 7, 116 Marino Ballroom service, 218 Marquess of Bute, 20, 23, 24, 92, 116, 120 Marquess of Normanby, see Baron Phipps Memorial of 5th September, 1813 Men of Glamorgan, Ten True, 10, 206, 207 Morris, Henry, 97, 105, 111, 112, 114, 145, 146, 156, 170 Mortlock, John, Oxford Street, London, 10–12, 17, 19, 24, 25, 27, 60, 65, 66, 84, 85, 90–92, 94, 95, 106, 120, 121, 145, 148, 163, 164, 169, 171, 178, 218 Morton Nance, Ernest, 7, 8, 22–25, 28, 50–54, 84, 87, 97, 106, 181, 186, 202, 208 Muffle furnace, 128, 207, 208

N Nantgarw China Works Museum, 14, 54, 109, 141, 143, 144 National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, 11, 13, 26, 96, 122, 127, 129, 130, 136, 180, 181, 187, 188, 195–203 Nicholls, Sir John, 7

O Owen, Professor Victor, 12, 30, 34, 37–39, 51

Index

225

P Pardoe, Percival, 14 Pardoe, Thomas, 1, 11, 13, 17, 18, 20, 26–28, 34, 54, 87, 88, 91, 94, 100, 101, 104, 108, 109, 111–118, 124, 128, 138, 142, 144, 170, 209 Pardoe, William Henry, 14, 28, 100, 114–117, 124, 128 Pendock-Barry, see Barry-Barry, Pendock Penllyne Castle, 18, 21, 22, 26, 27, 142, 148, 213 Plant, James, 92, 93, 95–98, 114, 134, 166, 169 Plas Glyn-y-Weddw, 88, 93, 99–103, 107, 108, 116, 117, 120, 122, 124, 151–153 Pollard, William, 104, 114, 145–153, 187 Powell, John , atelier, 17, 93–95, 105 Priest Richards, Edward, 22, 24, 120 Prince of Wales, 2, 4, 110 Princess Charlotte, 24, 26, 27, 121

156, 167, 168, 170, 173–175, 178–181, 185, 186, 188, 189, 218 Swansea Pottery, see Cambrian Pottery

Q Queen Caroline, 5, 113 Queen Charlotte, 24, 26, 27, 101, 121, 178 Queen Victoria, 92, 169

V Viscount Weymouth, 22, 164

R Robins & Randall, atelier, 17, 37, 84, 92, 93, 95, 105, 107, 120–122, 166, 169–171, 174 Rose, John, 13, 155, 217

S Schreiber; Lady Charlotte Guest-Schreiber, see Guest -Schreiber Seaton, Lady of Bosahan, 23, 26, 64, 144, 145 Sevres porcelain, 47 Siliceous porcelain, 14, 36, 52 Sims, John, atelier, 84, 93, 95–98, 105, 107, 108, 134, 170, 171 Swansea porcelain, 8–10, 50, 84, 87, 88, 93–95, 97, 100–108, 112, 114, 119, 123, 125, 133–137, 141, 143–152,

T Ternary phase diagrams, 38–40 Thrale, Hester Lynch Thrale Piozzi Salusbury, 91, 106 Three Graces, 92–95, 126 Thynne, Lord Thomas, 22 Trident porcelain, 9 Turner, James, 92, 95 Turner, Joseph Mallord William, 23–25, 60–62, 84, 92, 95, 96, 114, 169, 170, 173, 174 Turner, William, 60, 84, 170 Twyning service, 218 Tyla Gwyn, 1, 10, 13, 14, 18–21, 33, 54, 109, 126–130, 141, 143, 144, 166, 208

W Walker, Samuel, 1, 3, 5–8, 10, 34, 37, 47, 50–53, 117, 135, 141, 155, 164, 205, 214, 217 Webster, Moses, 92, 95, 114, 115, 121, 169 Wedgwood, Josiah, 33 Williams, Isaac, 12, 136–141, 148 Williams, Rev. William, 25, 26, 122, 123, 127, 193–203, 208–210 Withers, Edwards, 2, 6 Worcester porcelain, 7, 208, 210 Wyndham – Quin, Henry, Earl of Dunraven, 22, 27

Y Young, William Weston, 1, 6–8, 10, 13, 14, 17, 18, 20, 24–26, 28, 34, 47, 50, 52–54, 100, 104, 113–116, 119, 122, 126, 127, 134, 153, 155, 193, 202, 203, 206–211