R H on pre duty Scroll back teaspoon

1700 - 1830

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jok23
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Location: UK

R H on pre duty Scroll back teaspoon

Post by jok23 »

spobby
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Re: Scroll back teaspoon RH

Post by spobby »

It looks like an RH in a rectangular cartouche, therefore a picture back spoon made by Robert Hennell II, who worked in London between 1827 & 1832 (registered Nov 1809). Willing to be proved wrong though :).
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John
MCB
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Re: Scroll back teaspoon RH

Post by MCB »

Hello

Robert Hennell II’s working life seems to me a little late for him to have put his mark on this spoon. Admittedly, although the Hanoverian pattern was most in vogue in the period to the 1770s, later ones are seen. Here however we have an item marked close to the bowl rather than at the terminal end of it, a practice so called “bottom struck” prevalent to 1780.

There is no Duty Mark on the spoon. Leaving aside the question of whether this and the date letter omission were errors at an Assay Office the Duty Mark ought to have appeared on spoons assayed 1784-1890.

A G Grimwade’s publication covering London Goldsmiths Marks 1697-1837 records three other makers registering RH in a rectangular shape without any pellets (dots) in the period to 1780:
Robert Higgs registered 1721, Richard Holder registered 1726 and Roger Hare registered 1738. None of the marks are an exact match to the one on the spoon. Ruling out Higgs who is recorded as a watchmaker you are left with Holder who was recorded as a goldsmith (although this doesn’t always signify that is the only metalwork he did) and Hare to whom flatware has been attributed in the past.

There are no makers to my knowledge who registered this style of RH mark at other Assay Offices in the Hanoverian period to 1780 however the mark could be one which appeared in the two London registers which were lost (see post at the head of this Section) or not registered at all.

Mike
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