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拍品專文
George, Baron Anson (1697-1762) was born on 23 April 1697, at Colwich, Staffordshire, the second son of William Anson (d.1720) and his wife Isabella, daughter and co-heir of Charles Carrier of Wirksworth, Derbyshire. Sent to sea at the age of fourteen, Anson had perhaps a more rapid climb than many young naval officers as he was the nephew of Thomas Parker, Lord Chief Justice and later Lord Chancellor and 1st Earl of Macclesfield. He saw action in the Mediterranean early in his career in Sir George Byng's fleet. His first command as master and commander was of the sloop Weasel in the North Sea; he subsequently spend a total of nine years in the 1720s and 1730s on a station ship in South Carolina where he was a popular figure who seized the opportunity to invest in local property.
From the Americas he was ordered to West Africa and the West Indies and thence to England. His orders were to command a squadron against the Spanish off the Pacific coast of South America and if possible capture the galleon from the annual treasure fleet from the Philippines to Mexico. This command became an adventure in which he virtually circumnavigated the globe in 1740-44. The journey was so perilous that his passage around Cape Horn reduced his squadron from six ships to just one, the sixty-gun Centurion. Continuing across the Pacific alone, the Centurion seized a Spanish treasure ship, the Nuestra Señora de Cavadonga, enroute from Manila to Acapulco. Anson sold the captured ship at Canton (Guangzhou) and set sail with his surviving complement of 145 men, all that remained of the initial crews of six warships.
Their return to England in 1744 was celebrated by a parade of the Spanish booty through the streets of London. A contemporary account described '2,600,000 Pieces of Eight, 150,000 ounces of plate, 10 bars of Gold, and a large quantity of gold and silver dust', the whole to the amount of £1,250,000, requiring 32 wagons. Anson's personal share was prodigious, allowing him to make improvements to the family estate at Shugborough and to amass a vast dinner-service in silver. From 1744 to 1750, he commissioned some 45 or more articles of silver of magnificent quality from Paul de Lamerie, including oval dishes, sideboard-dishes, salvers, sauce-boats, soup-tureens and candelabra, much of which was later dispersed in a single-owner sale at Christie's London, 8 June 1893, in which the present pair of cruet-frames was sold as lots 5 and 6.
Throughout the ensuing years Anson combined active command with duties at the Admiralty, from rear-admiral in 1745 to acting as First Lord of the Admiralty from 1751 in tandem with his close friend the Earl of Sandwich. The rehabilitation of the Royal Navy, its ships and crews was their main concern. Anson preferred active command to desk duties and served on his last ship in 1758 at the age of sixty-one. He was created Baron Anson of Sobertton, Hampshire in 1747 and the following year married the Hon. Elizabeth Yorke (1725-1760); though she was twenty-eight years younger, it was evidently a very happy match. She died childless in 1760 and Anson two years later at his home, Moor Park, Hertfordshire, the setting for much of the silver purchased with part of his share of the treasure. He was buried in the family vault at Colwich.
From the Americas he was ordered to West Africa and the West Indies and thence to England. His orders were to command a squadron against the Spanish off the Pacific coast of South America and if possible capture the galleon from the annual treasure fleet from the Philippines to Mexico. This command became an adventure in which he virtually circumnavigated the globe in 1740-44. The journey was so perilous that his passage around Cape Horn reduced his squadron from six ships to just one, the sixty-gun Centurion. Continuing across the Pacific alone, the Centurion seized a Spanish treasure ship, the Nuestra Señora de Cavadonga, enroute from Manila to Acapulco. Anson sold the captured ship at Canton (Guangzhou) and set sail with his surviving complement of 145 men, all that remained of the initial crews of six warships.
Their return to England in 1744 was celebrated by a parade of the Spanish booty through the streets of London. A contemporary account described '2,600,000 Pieces of Eight, 150,000 ounces of plate, 10 bars of Gold, and a large quantity of gold and silver dust', the whole to the amount of £1,250,000, requiring 32 wagons. Anson's personal share was prodigious, allowing him to make improvements to the family estate at Shugborough and to amass a vast dinner-service in silver. From 1744 to 1750, he commissioned some 45 or more articles of silver of magnificent quality from Paul de Lamerie, including oval dishes, sideboard-dishes, salvers, sauce-boats, soup-tureens and candelabra, much of which was later dispersed in a single-owner sale at Christie's London, 8 June 1893, in which the present pair of cruet-frames was sold as lots 5 and 6.
Throughout the ensuing years Anson combined active command with duties at the Admiralty, from rear-admiral in 1745 to acting as First Lord of the Admiralty from 1751 in tandem with his close friend the Earl of Sandwich. The rehabilitation of the Royal Navy, its ships and crews was their main concern. Anson preferred active command to desk duties and served on his last ship in 1758 at the age of sixty-one. He was created Baron Anson of Sobertton, Hampshire in 1747 and the following year married the Hon. Elizabeth Yorke (1725-1760); though she was twenty-eight years younger, it was evidently a very happy match. She died childless in 1760 and Anson two years later at his home, Moor Park, Hertfordshire, the setting for much of the silver purchased with part of his share of the treasure. He was buried in the family vault at Colwich.