BEAUCHAMP, John (Grimwade p.435, 737)

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BEAUCHAMP, John (Grimwade p.435, 737)

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He married Ann Stone (born 1796) at St Andrew, Holborn in 1815. The bride was from Clerkenwell.
Christening records for 10 of their children at St Andrew 1816-32 show their parents’ address as Holborn or 94 High Holborn and their father as a silversmith.
One of their children was christened at St Mary, Lewisham in 1823 and the record shows her parents’ address as Forest Hill.
He entered his only maker’s mark at Goldsmiths Hall in 1828 as a plateworker from 14 Holborn.
The family were recorded at Hornsey Lane, Islington East in 1841 and Green Lane, Tottenham in 1851. On both occasions John was noted as a British Plate manufacturer.
His burial in 1852 aged 71 years is recorded at St James, St Pancras. His last address was Clay Hill, White Hart Lane, Tottenham.
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Re: BEAUCHAMP, John (Grimwade p.435, 737)

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New Manufacture J Beauchamp, Silversmith No 14 Holborn , begs to introduce to the notice of Captains, tavern Keepers and the public in general his Soup Ladles Fish Knives, Skewers, Forks etc , plated on Steel which for beauty and durability entirely excel anything ever yet offered. As J B now has license to use a mark similar to Silver it is impossible (in many of the articles) for the most scrutinizing eye to discover the difference.

Source: Morning Post - 24th December 1807
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Re: BEAUCHAMP, John (Grimwade p.435, 737)

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Image
J. Beauchamp - London - 1814

ARTICLES PLATED UPON STEEL. J. Beauchamp respectfully informs the Public, that he is the original Manufacturer of Spoons, Forks, Ladles, Skewers, Nutcrackers, Snuffers, Fish, Cheese, and Butter Knives, Dessert Knives and forks, Vegetable Forks, Tongs, &c. plated upon Steel, which the experience of Seven Years has evinced to he the most durable, as well as decidedly the very best similitude to Silver ever produced.

J.B. manufactures, in Silver and Plated, Venison open and covered Dishes, Covers, Warmers, Soup and Sauce Tureens, Canteen Articles, Bread and Cake Baskets, Wine Coolers, Epergnes Plateaux, Urns, Kettles, Tea Sets, Liquor, Cruet. Soy. and Egg Frames, Bottle Stands, and an infinitude of other articles; and has always a greater, more elegant, and varied an assortment than is generally to be met with; and he trusts to retain, by the superiority of his articles and the moderation of his prices, the patronage he has by those means acquired. J. B. has some excellent New Pattern Waiters (with solid Silver borders, &c ), and has got up, for the present, season, a larger and more novel assortment of all kinds of Candlesticks than has ever been exhibited.

Families furnishing. Officers out-fitting, and country Gentlemen, will find many things worthy : at No. 14, corner of Castle-street, Holborn.


Source: The Repository of Arts, Literature, Commerce, Manufactures, Fashions and Politics - Rudolph Ackermann and Frederic Shoberl - 1814

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Re: BEAUCHAMP, John (Grimwade p.435, 737)

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John Beauchamp: Plater on Steel

An interesting comparison can be made with William Hutton’s contemporary John Beauchamp (1781-1852), who was also advertising himself ‘plater upon steel’ and subsequently a British Plate Manufacturer in London, which provides an illuminating glimpse into how manufacturers of close-plated steel articles expanded their business offering to develop the market for German silver in Britain. John Beauchamp is little known now, even by antique metalware scholars or collectors, and is better remembered by literary scholars as the great-grandfather of the novelist Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923). As the patriarch of a family of four sons that emigrated to New Zealand she wrote of him as the ‘Original Pa Man,’ but John Beauchamp could trace his family business far back to London goldsmiths visited by Samuel Pepys in 1660. ‘I went to Cheapside to Mr. Beauchamp’s, the goldsmith, to look out a piece of plate,’ recalled Pepys, ‘…and did choose a gilt tankard.’

His earliest business advertisement on his own account appears in London’s Morning Post on Thursday 24th December 1807, ‘New Manufacture. J. Beauchamp, Silversmith, No, 14 Holborn, begs to ntroduce to the notice of captains, tavern keepers and the public in general his soup ladles, fish knives, skewers, forks &c., plated on steel which for beauty and durability entirely excel anything ever yet offered. As J.B. now has license to use a mark similar to silver it is impossible (in many of the articles) for the most scrutinizing eye to discover the difference.’ Despite coming from a family tradition of silversmiths, the advertisement promotes the 26-year-old Beauchamp as newly established in the plated goods trade. Moreover, although he was clearly advertising close-plated steel utensils he still styled himself a silversmith. Again, this reveals the status anxiety that manufacturers and retailers of plated goods had in relation to traditional silversmiths. The advert’s primary message was the similitude of Beauchamp’s close-plated articles to ‘real’ silverware, with the aim of convincing consumers that they were difficult to discern from [sterling] silver. Beauchamp was also risking rebuke by the Goldsmiths’ Company Assay Office by advertising that the mark stamped on many of his articles was so similar to a silver hallmark that ‘… it is impossible … for the most scrutinizing eye to discover the difference.’

The advertisement’s secondary message promoted the ‘beauty and durability’ of his close-plated steel articles to solicit large orders from ‘ships captains and tavern keepers,’ in what today we call the food service and catering sector, where articles saw heavy usage and real silver might be stolen.

By 1814, Beauchamp was placing regular advertisements in Rudolph Ackermann’s monthly periodical The Repository of Arts, which claimed that
after seven years in business the durability of his plated steel had stood the test of time and was ‘… decidedly the very best similitude to silver ever produced.’

‘ARTICLES PLATED UPON STEEL. J. Beauchamp respectfully informs the public, that he is the original manufacturer of spoons, forks, ladles, skewers, nutcrackers, snuffers, fish, cheese, and butter knives, dessert knives and forks, vegetable forks, tongs, &c. plated upon steel, which the experience of seven years has evinced to be the most durable, as well as decidedly the very best similitude to silver ever produced.’

By 1815, John Beauchamp was advertising himself as a close-plate manufacturer with premises at 14 Holborn, London. He registered a maker’s mark at Goldsmiths Hall in 1828 and styled himself a ‘plateworker,’ and was then also working in Britannia metal. On 20th January 1833, the painter John Constable wrote a letter to his friend, Charles Robert Leslie (1794-1859) describing a visit he had made with his sons to John Beauchamp’s ‘manufactory of British plate in Holborn’. Leslie had introduced Constable to Beauchamp and included the letter in his famous Life of Constable published in 1843: ‘My dear Leslie, I went with John and Charles to Mr. Beauchamp’s last evening ; their delight was great, not only at the very great kindness of Mr. and Mrs. Beauchamp and the boys, but at the sight of almost all that was to their heart’s content : forges – smelting pots – metals – turning lathes – straps & bellows – coal, ashes, dust – dirt - & cinders ; and everything else that is agreeable to boys. They want me to build them just such a place under my painting room; and had I not better do so, and give up landscape painting altogether?’

The 1840s London directories list Beauchamp as a British plate manufacturer, but like many others in the metalwork trade and unlike Hutton, he failed to make the technological leap to electro-plating and his business failed in around 1848. However, it is worth emphasizing that besides the sector-specific crisis caused by the scientific paradigm shift and commercial growth of electro-metallurgy in the 1840s, fused-plate and close-plate manufacturers were also hit hard by the general economic climate in Britain. In 1848, the metalwork trade was decimated by the ‘Panic of 1847,’ a relatively minor banking crisis caused by the collapse of the speculative bubble of the ‘railway mania’ in Britain during the late 1830s and early 1840s. However, the short-lived crisis in the money market was followed by a harsh recession known as the ‘Commercial Crisis’, which resulted in the widespread failure of many business houses. In the metalwork trade, thousands of workers were thrown out of employment into misery and starvation. John Beauchamp’s eldest surviving son Henry Herron emigrated to Mauritius before moving to Sydney, Australia. His next eldest son, Arthur, emigrated to Wellington, New Zealand to take advantage of land acquired as a speculative investment in 1839 by his aunt, Jane Beauchamp.


Source: A British history of 'German silver': part II: 1829-1924. - Journal of the Antique Metalware Society - Dr Alistair Grant - 2017

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Re: BEAUCHAMP, John (Grimwade p.435, 737)

Post by Heamatite »

I would suggest that John Beauchamp is well known among collectors and metalware scholars; however his promotion of the new ware raises a number of intriguing points. The advertised permission to use a mark similar to silver was was only used for a short period and it does seem curious that the advertising of pawnbroker and silversmith Beauchamp risked the attention of the Goldsmiths Company. Certainly the positioning of the vast majority of marks on plated steel items is identical to their solid silver counterparts, however I am not aware so far of the survival of any marking similar to a full set of official hallmarks. Date letters used by a number of markers and the occasional use of an anchor by the Birmingham maker Prime are seen but seem to be in use later than c 1807. Beauchamp offered potential customers a printed list of his new wares, although a copy of this has yet to surface.

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