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Lot Essay
The Smith and Walrond Families
The ownership of the porringer by the Walrond family, later Barons Waleran, has been somewhat of a mystery. No direct link could be established between the Smith family of Exeter and the Walrond family until the recent discovery in the will of William Walrond (d.1746) of a gold cup. This will states:
'I give and bequeath unto my dear and loving wife £100 and the use of all the plate and gold cup which I had with her and from and from [sic] and after her decease I give and bequeath the said plate and gold cup unto Courtney Walrond my son...' (PRO B11 744/Q33)
An examination of the Smith pedigree published in J. L. Vivian's The Visitation of Devon, London, 1895, p.694-5, records Sir Nicholas Smith Kt. (d.1622) as having five sons; however the youngest James is omitted, as the pedigree was produced in 1620 just before his birth (College of Arms Mss. 1C1/62b). As the most illustrious of the sons he is immediately the most likely owner of the porringer. Moreover his close connections with both the Walrond and Courtney families confirm the later known provenance of the piece. This is evident in his will published in V. L. Oliver, The History of the Island of Antigua, London, 1896, vol. II, p.203:
'To my friends Sir Wm Courtenay Bart., Jacob Lucie, & Richd Osborne, Esq., of the Inner Temple the Prebend of Stt Eath al's Teth, co. Corn., the barton of Trenneck, & the 2 grist mills late in the possession of Wm Carminow, Esq., in Trust, & all my lands in Cornwall, Devon, Som, Midx Kent & London to sell & all residue to wife Anne & Ex'trix. Witnessed by Fra. Godfrey, Abraham Adderley, Jo. Whitaker, Humphrey Walrond' (PRO B11 368/Q147).
His chattels including the gold porringer would have passed to his wife, Anne and on her death to her daughter Mary and subsequently to her daughter Anne. On the younger Anne's marriage to William Walrond the porringer entered the Walrond family being recorded in the latter's will.
Sir James Smith
Sir James Smith's date of birth is unclear but is thought to have been about 1621. The sixth son of Sir Nicholas Smith (d.1622) of Larkbeare, near Exeter, and his wife Dorothy, daughter of Sir Ralph Horsey of Clifton Maybank, Dorset, he inherited considerable property, and was knighted at the age of 23, on 30 July 1644. He married two heiresses, firstly Bridget, daughter of Sir Reynold Mohun, 1st Baronet of Boconoc, Cornwall, and widow of John Nicholls of Trewarne, Cornwall, on 27 April, 1648.
Both his father and grandfather, as prominent landowners, had sat in Parliament. His grandfather was also thrice mayor of Exeter. Sir James was a kinsman of the royalist hero Sir Bevil Granville. During the Civil War, when Exeter was captured, Sir James took up arms for the King, and served until the western army disbanded at Truro. At the Restoration he signed the Declaration of the Devon Cavaliers. He commenced his military career as Royalist Colonel of Horse 1643-6. He was subsequently Lieutenant Colonel, Tangier Regiment (2 Queen's Foot) 1661-5, and finally Duke of Albemarle's Foot (Coldstreams) from 1665.
His entry in the History of Parliament notes that he remained under suspicion throughout the Interregnum, and during Booth's rising in 1659 it was reported that he 'rode away armed with six horses and skulked in Devonshire.' Shortly thereafter he began his parliamentary career.
With his second marriage, on 16 September 1663, 'with £16,000', to Anne (d. 7 Nov 1698) daughter of John Lucie, merchant of Antwerp and London, and widow of William Boeve of Little Chelsea, Middlesex, Sir James acquired a house in Chelsea in addition to his demesnes in Cornwall and Devon. He held various parliamentary positions and was appointed to no less that 125 committees. He most lucrative post was almost certainly 'farmer of excise' for Devon. His connection with his cousin the Duke of Albemarle was both useful and time consuming. He was tacitly charged to intercede with his relative on behalf of the city of Exeter in various proceedings, and both his army commission and the title to his Devon farm are likely to be owed, at least in part, to the Duke. Sir James carried the banner at the Duke's funeral.
He remained a noted royalist and, acting on behalf of his constituents, he occasionally represented their more pressing interests directly to the King. In 1662 he was one of an embassy to ask the King to suspend the monopoly of the London Merchant Adventurers in the export of cloth. Flagellum Parliamentarium lists him as 'Major of the King's company and farmer of excise in Devon' a position he lost in 1674, being compensated with a pension of £500 per year. On 24 May 1679, he gave the moiety of Great Tregarth, in the Parish of Lanteglos by Camelford, to be used as a school, (Sir J Maclean, FSA, The Parochial and Family History of the Deanery of Trigg Minor in the County of Cornwall, London, 1876).
Sir James died in October, 1681 and was buried at Chelsea on 18 November, the last of his family, having left his paternal estate to the descendants of his brother George, and his residual effects to his widow, Anne, from whom, through her daughter Mary, the present porringer descended to the Waleran family.
English Gold Porringers
Philippa Glanville notes in her article "The Bowes Gold Cup: a Stuart Race Prize?", Burlington Magazine, vol. CXXXVII, no. 1107, June 1995, p.387-8, that it was the influx of 'Guinea gold' into England, triggered by the Royal Portuguese marriage alliance of 1662, which fed the Restoration enthusiasm for gold throughout the 1660s and 1670s. Certainly the shape now known as a 'porringer' was already a familiar one, although whether these gold examples were actually intended for food use is open to question. The case is made that the Bowes Cup, a covered porringer of 1675 by Jacob Bodendick, was a racing trophy. Although the English standard for gold was fixed at 22 carats in 1575, assay marking of gold wares was not required by the Goldsmiths' Company until 1676 and the hallmarks were often omitted on specially ordered pieces; the Minute Book could not in 1664 provide requested statistics on gold plate as 'it is soe Seldome that any is made.' Thus the full marks on the present piece which allow it to be precisely dated identify it as an outstandingly rare survivor.
The ownership of the porringer by the Walrond family, later Barons Waleran, has been somewhat of a mystery. No direct link could be established between the Smith family of Exeter and the Walrond family until the recent discovery in the will of William Walrond (d.1746) of a gold cup. This will states:
'I give and bequeath unto my dear and loving wife £100 and the use of all the plate and gold cup which I had with her and from and from [sic] and after her decease I give and bequeath the said plate and gold cup unto Courtney Walrond my son...' (PRO B11 744/Q33)
An examination of the Smith pedigree published in J. L. Vivian's The Visitation of Devon, London, 1895, p.694-5, records Sir Nicholas Smith Kt. (d.1622) as having five sons; however the youngest James is omitted, as the pedigree was produced in 1620 just before his birth (College of Arms Mss. 1C1/62b). As the most illustrious of the sons he is immediately the most likely owner of the porringer. Moreover his close connections with both the Walrond and Courtney families confirm the later known provenance of the piece. This is evident in his will published in V. L. Oliver, The History of the Island of Antigua, London, 1896, vol. II, p.203:
'To my friends Sir Wm Courtenay Bart., Jacob Lucie, & Richd Osborne, Esq., of the Inner Temple the Prebend of Stt Eath al's Teth, co. Corn., the barton of Trenneck, & the 2 grist mills late in the possession of Wm Carminow, Esq., in Trust, & all my lands in Cornwall, Devon, Som, Midx Kent & London to sell & all residue to wife Anne & Ex'trix. Witnessed by Fra. Godfrey, Abraham Adderley, Jo. Whitaker, Humphrey Walrond' (PRO B11 368/Q147).
His chattels including the gold porringer would have passed to his wife, Anne and on her death to her daughter Mary and subsequently to her daughter Anne. On the younger Anne's marriage to William Walrond the porringer entered the Walrond family being recorded in the latter's will.
Sir James Smith
Sir James Smith's date of birth is unclear but is thought to have been about 1621. The sixth son of Sir Nicholas Smith (d.1622) of Larkbeare, near Exeter, and his wife Dorothy, daughter of Sir Ralph Horsey of Clifton Maybank, Dorset, he inherited considerable property, and was knighted at the age of 23, on 30 July 1644. He married two heiresses, firstly Bridget, daughter of Sir Reynold Mohun, 1st Baronet of Boconoc, Cornwall, and widow of John Nicholls of Trewarne, Cornwall, on 27 April, 1648.
Both his father and grandfather, as prominent landowners, had sat in Parliament. His grandfather was also thrice mayor of Exeter. Sir James was a kinsman of the royalist hero Sir Bevil Granville. During the Civil War, when Exeter was captured, Sir James took up arms for the King, and served until the western army disbanded at Truro. At the Restoration he signed the Declaration of the Devon Cavaliers. He commenced his military career as Royalist Colonel of Horse 1643-6. He was subsequently Lieutenant Colonel, Tangier Regiment (2 Queen's Foot) 1661-5, and finally Duke of Albemarle's Foot (Coldstreams) from 1665.
His entry in the History of Parliament notes that he remained under suspicion throughout the Interregnum, and during Booth's rising in 1659 it was reported that he 'rode away armed with six horses and skulked in Devonshire.' Shortly thereafter he began his parliamentary career.
With his second marriage, on 16 September 1663, 'with £16,000', to Anne (d. 7 Nov 1698) daughter of John Lucie, merchant of Antwerp and London, and widow of William Boeve of Little Chelsea, Middlesex, Sir James acquired a house in Chelsea in addition to his demesnes in Cornwall and Devon. He held various parliamentary positions and was appointed to no less that 125 committees. He most lucrative post was almost certainly 'farmer of excise' for Devon. His connection with his cousin the Duke of Albemarle was both useful and time consuming. He was tacitly charged to intercede with his relative on behalf of the city of Exeter in various proceedings, and both his army commission and the title to his Devon farm are likely to be owed, at least in part, to the Duke. Sir James carried the banner at the Duke's funeral.
He remained a noted royalist and, acting on behalf of his constituents, he occasionally represented their more pressing interests directly to the King. In 1662 he was one of an embassy to ask the King to suspend the monopoly of the London Merchant Adventurers in the export of cloth. Flagellum Parliamentarium lists him as 'Major of the King's company and farmer of excise in Devon' a position he lost in 1674, being compensated with a pension of £500 per year. On 24 May 1679, he gave the moiety of Great Tregarth, in the Parish of Lanteglos by Camelford, to be used as a school, (Sir J Maclean, FSA, The Parochial and Family History of the Deanery of Trigg Minor in the County of Cornwall, London, 1876).
Sir James died in October, 1681 and was buried at Chelsea on 18 November, the last of his family, having left his paternal estate to the descendants of his brother George, and his residual effects to his widow, Anne, from whom, through her daughter Mary, the present porringer descended to the Waleran family.
English Gold Porringers
Philippa Glanville notes in her article "The Bowes Gold Cup: a Stuart Race Prize?", Burlington Magazine, vol. CXXXVII, no. 1107, June 1995, p.387-8, that it was the influx of 'Guinea gold' into England, triggered by the Royal Portuguese marriage alliance of 1662, which fed the Restoration enthusiasm for gold throughout the 1660s and 1670s. Certainly the shape now known as a 'porringer' was already a familiar one, although whether these gold examples were actually intended for food use is open to question. The case is made that the Bowes Cup, a covered porringer of 1675 by Jacob Bodendick, was a racing trophy. Although the English standard for gold was fixed at 22 carats in 1575, assay marking of gold wares was not required by the Goldsmiths' Company until 1676 and the hallmarks were often omitted on specially ordered pieces; the Minute Book could not in 1664 provide requested statistics on gold plate as 'it is soe Seldome that any is made.' Thus the full marks on the present piece which allow it to be precisely dated identify it as an outstandingly rare survivor.