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Lot Essay
A virtually identical clothes-press of slightly differing proportions but with identical profile of cornice moulding was supplied to Sir Lawrence Dundas (1712-1781) either for Aske Hall, Yorkshire or for Argyle Square, Edinburgh by the St Martin's Lane cabinet-maker Thomas Chippendale (d. 1779). Chippendale was employed by Dundas between 1763-1766 and whilst it is not possible to ascertain for which of Dundas' several houses the furniture was destined, Moor Park, Arlington Street and Aske were to be furnished in a grand manner but the Edinburgh house he wished to be furnished in 'a Plain Genteel Taste as neat as possible'. One of two clothes-presses supplied to Dundas was invoiced on 13 August 1763 as 'A large Mah: Cloaths press in two parts with folding doors and sliding shelves cover'd with Marble paper and a bays apron' and on 1 February 1764 the second was invoiced as 'a Mahogany Cloths-press to Match the above' each was invoiced at a cost of £10 (C. Gilbert The Life and Work of Thomas Chippendale, vol. I, London, 1978, p. 159 and vol. II, p. 135, fig. 243). The clothes-presses supplied to the Earl of Dumfries for Dumfries House, Ayrshire in 1763 are remarkably similar.
Dundas' wealth was created through his business as an army contractor in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. He was appointed commissary for Stores in Flanders from 1747-48 and for Scotland until 1757. The labels 'Quebec' and 'Gibraltar', which appear to be in an eighteenth century hand, on the interior of the drawers of this clothes-press may refer to Dundas' papers relating to army supplies in relation to those provinces. On 13 September 1759, General James Wolfe's victory against the French on the Plains of Abraham paved the way for France ceding Quebec the following year and eventually ceding all her territories in North America in the 1763 Treaty of Paris, ending the Seven Years War. Gibraltar was taken by Admiral Rooke in 1704 and recognised as a British territory in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht since when it has remained a militarily important Mediterranean base in British hands.
Dundas' wealth was created through his business as an army contractor in the wake of the Jacobite rising of 1745. He was appointed commissary for Stores in Flanders from 1747-48 and for Scotland until 1757. The labels 'Quebec' and 'Gibraltar', which appear to be in an eighteenth century hand, on the interior of the drawers of this clothes-press may refer to Dundas' papers relating to army supplies in relation to those provinces. On 13 September 1759, General James Wolfe's victory against the French on the Plains of Abraham paved the way for France ceding Quebec the following year and eventually ceding all her territories in North America in the 1763 Treaty of Paris, ending the Seven Years War. Gibraltar was taken by Admiral Rooke in 1704 and recognised as a British territory in the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht since when it has remained a militarily important Mediterranean base in British hands.