Important Set of Four Very Fine and Rare Chippendale Carved Mahogany Side Chairs, Possibly the shop of Thomas Tufft, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Circa 1770

The Smith-Marsh Family, Philadelphia;

Israel Sack, Inc., New York;

Sotheby's, New York, Important Americana: Furniture and Folk Art, January 17, 1999, sale 7253, lot 843;

The Marvill Collection, White Plains, New York;

Northeast Auctions, Manchester, New Hampshire, August 15-16, 2015, lot 508;

Christie's New York, Important American Furniture, Silver, Maritime, Folk and Outsider Art, September 19, 2017, sale 14970, lot 121.

The Tyson and Fitzhugh families, Maryland;

Probably Henry Maynadier Fitzhugh (1815-1900) and his wife, Lucy Tyson (1833-1910), Michigan and Baltimore, Maryland;

Dr. Henry M. Fitzhugh (1875-1935), "Sunset Hill," Westminster, Maryland;

Bernard and S. Dean Levy, Inc., New York;

The Marvill Collection, White Plains, New York;

Northeast Auctions, Manchester, New Hampshire, 15-16 August 2015, lot 508;

Christie's New York, Important American Furniture, Silver, Maritime, Folk and Outsider Art, September 19, 2017, sale 14970, lot 122.

American Antiques from Israel Sack Collection, vol. 8, (Washington, DC: Highland House Publishers Inc, 1983), pp. 1712-1713, P4876.

Edgar G. Miller, Jr., American Antique Furniture: A Book for Amateurs, vol. 1 (Baltimore, 1937), pp. 151-152, no. 115 (one chair).

Bernard and S. Dean Levy, Inc., Gallery Catalogue IX, Fall 1997, p. 12.

Displaying a Gothic design inspired by patterns illustrated in The Gentleman & Cabinet-Maker’s Director (London, 1762) by Thomas Chippendale, these four side chairs represent the height of fashion in Philadelphia during the Rococo era. Two of the chairs descended in the Smith-Marsh family and appear illustrated in a nineteenth-century photograph of the Smith-Marsh family’s parlor with another chair from the set.¹ The two other chairs descended in the Tyson-Fitzhugh family of Maryland from the nineteenth century to 1997 when they were sold out of the family. They were owned in the late nineteenth century by Henry Maynadier Fitzhugh (1815-1900) and his wife Lucy (Tyson) (1833-1910), who married in 1872, and appear illustrated in a 1901 photograph of the parlor of their home in Baltimore. One chair is illustrated in 1937 as the property of “Dr. H. M. Fitzhugh.”² Lucy Fitzhugh was the great granddaughter of Andrew Ellicott (1733-1809), the renowned surveyor, and the set of chairs may have originated in the Ellicott family of Ellicott Mills, Maryland. The four side chairs were reunited in the Marvill Collection, White Plains, New York and have remained together since that time. 

At least four other chairs from the same set are known: a pair that sold in these rooms, January 18, 2003, lot 909; the single chair mentioned above that also descended in the Smith-Marsh family;³ and a side chair formerly owned by Joe Kindig.⁴ Closely related carving is seen on furniture labeled by and attributed to Thomas Tufft. A high chest and dressing table labeled by Tufft feature knees with opposing C-scrolls and leafy clusters. Two sets of side chairs made for Richard Edwards and documented to Tufft exhibit seat rails with C-scroll edged shaping and knee returns that terminate in scrolling leafage, all of which are found on the present chairs. Furthermore, the Edwards chairs, a side chair labeled by Tufft at Winterthur Museum and the chairs offered here all have side seat rails with shaping that is integral to the rail (rather than applied) and splats seated in the shoes, construction similarities that support an attribution to the Tufft shop.⁵

¹ See Israel Sack, Inc., American Antiques from Israel Sack Collection, Volume VII, P4876, p. 1712.

² Edgar G. Miller, Jr., American Antique Furniture: A Book for Amateurs, vol. 1 (Baltimore, 1937): no. 115, pp. 151-52.

³ See Sack, p. 1712.

⁴ Joseph K. Kindig III, The Philadelphia Chair, 1685-1785 (York, PA, 1978): no. 57.

⁵ The labeled case pieces are now at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. For the high chest, see Christie’s, June 25, 1991, lot 276. For the Edwards chairs, see Christie’s, Important Philadelphia Furniture from the Edwards Family, May 28, 1987, lot 201 and Carl M. Williams, “Thomas Tufft and His Furniture for Richard Edwards,” The Magazine Antiques (October 1948): p. 247. For the Winterthur side chair, see John Kirk, American Chairs: Queen Anne and Chippendale (New York, 1972): fig. 91, p. 92.