It was so easy to go bankrupt if clients took years to pay their bills, so enticing to dodge duty and fudge the marks on a recently-made piece, so tempting to risk transportation by stealing a teaspoon if you were hungry. And, once an antiquarian interest developed in old silver, it was a simple matter to work late and make a few fakes to sell to the unwary.
The bad news for the culprits is that hallmarking regulations are upheld by statute, and the melt value of the raw material made burglary and pickpocketing a high-risk strategy. The good news for present-day researchers is that those who were caught are recorded in court proceedings, newspapers and the archives of livery companies. Many of the finest eighteenth-century silversmiths went bankrupt: some continued working and prospered again, others never quite recovered.
And why is the bowl chosen to illustrate this page? When examining any piece of silver you should always cross-question yourself about it and hope that, like this piece, you can prove it innocent of any malpractice. This is a good, honest object, of typically Scottish form.
Selection of relevant articles in back issues of the Society’s Journal:
Judy Jowett, The Warning Carriers, special issue, no18 (2005)
Gale Glynn, Criminal proceedings involving silver and silversmiths, no15 (2003)
Anthony Adolph, Thomas Hickin, Catholic goldsmith, no14 (2002)
John Forbes, Eighteenth century ’duty dodgers’, no13 (2001)
Karel Citroen, The faking Feeterses, no13 (2001)
John Culme, Trade of fancy: new findings from eighteenth century London, no12 (2000)
John Culme, The embarrassed goldsmith, eighteenth century failures in the London jewellery and silver trades, no10 (1998)
Jan Gadd and Ronald Homer, Fake and pseudo silver marks on pewter, no10 (1998)
Ronald Grant, Drawback and smuggling, no4 (1993)
John Culme, ’The most shocking fakes’, no2 (1991)
Paul Johnson, The Lyon and Twinam Forgeries, (Proceedings vol III) 1983
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Photo: J.H. Bourdon Smith Ltd.
Sugar bowl, Ker & Dempster, Edinburgh 1729/30.