A George IV silver soup tureen, cover and stand, Robert Garrard for Robert Garrard & Brothers, otherwise R., J. & S. Garrard, London, 1824

Fletcher Norton, 3rd Baron Grantley of Markenfield (1796-1875)

Sotheby’s New York, 30 April-1 May 2003, lot 240

Christie’s New York, 11 December 2014, lot 38

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Fletcher Norton, 3ème Baron Grantley of Markenfield (1796-1875)

Sotheby’s New York, 30 avril-1 mai 2003, lot 240

Christie’s New York, 11 décembre 2014, lot 38

The arms are those of Norton quartering 11 others for Fletcher Norton, 3rd Baron Grantley of Markenfield, who was born on 14 July 1796 and succeeded to the title upon the death of his uncle, William Norton, 2nd Baron Grantley on 12 November 1822. He was married on 26 July 1825 to Charlotte Earle (3 August 1800 – 1 May 1878), daughter of the artist Sir William Beechey (1753-1839). Upon his death on 28 August 1875 he was succeeded by his nephew, Thomas Brindley Norton, 4th Baron Grantley (1831-1877).

Lord Grantley was educated at the Military College Sandhurst. He subsequently served in the Grenadier Guards during the Napoleonic Wars and saw action in 1815 in the Battle of Quatre Bras and again at Waterloo, where he was wounded. He lived at Wonersh, Surrey, and also owned Grantley Hall and Markenfield Hall, near Ripon, North Yorkshire, the latter a rare, surviving 14th-century manor house.

This tureen, stand and cover is one of a pair, the other having found its way into the Campbell Collection of Soup Tureens, the brainchild in 1966 of John T. Dorrance Jr. and W.B. Murphy, then respectively the chairman and president of the Campbell Soup Company. The Collection was transferred to the Winterthur Museum, Delaware, where a dedicated gallery was opened in 1997.¹

Both tureens were part of a service of plate supplied to the 3rd Baron Grantley by Garrard’s between 1824 and 1826. The group included a pair of candelabra, 1826, with male and female Bacchanal figures,² and a set of six figure salts, 1824, comprising three male and three female Nubians resting on rockwork bases, cast and applied with sea shells.³

This pattern of soup tureen was described in a surviving 1819 Garrard ledger as ‘2 finely chased terrines, stands, with marine figures supported by dolphins.’⁴ The same design of tureen has been recorded bearing the mark of Paul Storr after severing his connection in 1819 as head of Rundell, Bridge & Rundell’s manufacturing silver department.

It was discovered some 45 years ago that before November 1822 Garrard’s leased part of Paul Storr’s new workshops in Harrison Street, Gray’s Inn Road.⁵ Such an arrangement would explain why tureens of the same pattern were hallmarked in 1819 and 1824 for Garrard’s, and also for Paul Storr in 1821 for the 6th Duke of Devonshire and in 1822 for Henrique de Sampaio, Conde da Povoa of Portugal.⁷

Another use of the triton and mermaid figures featured so prominently on these tureens has been noted on a centrepiece, Paul Storr for Storr & Mortimer, London, 1838, where they flank the central support.⁸ Furthermore, two matching candelabra, one marked by Garrard in 1824, the other by Paul Storr (Storr & Mortimer) in 1835, would appear to confirm that these firms shared designs and casting patterns throughout the 1820s and early 1830s.⁹

Notes

1. Donald L. Fennimore and Patricia A. Halfpenny, Campbell Collection of Soup Tureens at Winterthur, 2000, pp. 52-53, fig. 24

2. Alan and Simone Hartman Collection, Christie’s, New York, 20 October 1999, lot 198

3. Purchased in 1996 by Fairfax House museum, Leeds, Yorkshire

4. Joseph R. Bliss, The Jerome and Rita Gans Collection of English Silver on Loan to the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, [1994], p. 206

5. John Culme, Nineteenth-century Silver, London, 1977, p. 80

6. Chatsworth Collection, sold Christie’s, London, 25 June 1958, lot 24

7. von Buhlow Collection, sold Sotheby’s, New York, 28-29 October 1988, lot 218

8. John Culme, Nineteenth-century Silver, London, 1977, p. p. 146, illustrated

9. Christie’s, New York, 21 May 2014, lot 93