Teaspoons with missing city mark

[cristobal_moreno]

Greetings all, from a newbie to silver. I've recently acquired some mixed pieces of cutlery. Thanks to the wonderful reference material available online I've managed to identify most of it.
However I have 2 teaspoons with no city mark.





The hallmark is as follows:



- maker's mark: SL with serifs (I've drawn in the unclear part of the image)

- what appears to be a very worn George III head duty mark, though I could be wrong about this

- lion rampant

- year: simple lower case e

The only SL mark I can find is a 20th C mark for Suckling Ltd in Birmingham. However, the spoons seem a lot older than that.

I tentatively ID them as London 1780 because of the head and the e.
Am I right, and can anyone suggest a maker?

Many thanks for any help.
Chris
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[Granmaa]

The assayers only started putting the town mark on teaspoons in the 1820's, there may be an exact date for this.
Your spoon was made in 1820, I'm not sure of the maker, perhaps Samuel Littlewood.

Miles
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[cristobal_moreno]

Ah, the shape of the cartouche. I get it.
Thanks, Miles.
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[Granmaa]

Sorry, I forgot to tell you that your spoon was made in London.
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[dognose]

Hi Chris and Miles,
I have to say this spoon confuses me somewhat, if it were Littlewood's mark then he would probably be in his 70's, possible but unlikely, I cannot find a closer fit to a London maker.
The cartouche for the date mark seems wrong for London 1820, I know there are variations found but the shield usually found as an alternative has a rounded base. The closest fit to the date mark i think is Sheffield 1828 but I have never knowingly found a Sheffield spoon of this date and size without a town mark.
Does anyone have a comphensive list of Sheffield manufacturers for this period?
Regards Trev.
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[Granmaa]

The Littlewood attribution is tentative, but I'm certain it's not a Sheffield piece. I believe the cartouche on early Sheffield pieces is a straight sided rectangle; also, with teaspoons, they used the date letter and crown single punch.

Here is an 1818 Sheffield mark from a fruit knife.


Miles
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[Granmaa]

I've just found this 1827 mark, and the sides aren't straight, but still irregular compared to London marks.



Miles
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[dognose]

Hi Miles and Chris,
I agree that the marks on this spoon do look like a set of London marks and not provincial ones, and I would not hesitate if it were not for the attribution of the maker, I'll keep searching on that one, but one possibility is that this is a badly struck mark of Thomas Streetin (upside down).
The combined date and town mark I have only ever found on smaller teaspoons, on the larger fiddle pattern types I have always found them separately, but the square shield with clipped corners on this example does leave me wondering,
Regards Trev.
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[Scotprov]

possibly Thomas Sheckleton of London (2932 in Grimwade)?
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[dognose]

Hi Richard,
Thomas Shekleton was my second choice, presuming this is a London spoon, I went for Thomas Streetin as a first choice purely because he was a known spoonmaker,
Regards Trev.
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