Object Details
Object Essay
This is among the earliest of the large matched coffee and tea sets made in the United States. The locked tea caddy, in particular, is a most unusual addition to the set. Before the Revolution, American coffee and tea services were usually assembled over a period of several years and could consist of stylistically diverse pieces, possibly even produced by different smiths in different cities. For another twenty years after this set was made, few Americans possessed the affluence or advanced taste to purchase a silver coffee and tea service all at one time. This splendid set glorifies the neoclassical style of the 1790s. The urn-shaped coffeepot, ornamented with restrained, bright-cut borders, is particularly characteristic of the Philadelphia taste for elegant, attenuated forms. Fluted bodies or walls are not as frequently seen in Philadelphia silver as in silver made in Boston and New York, but they add structural strength to the relatively thin walls of rolled sheet silver made possible by machining (available in Philadelphia as early as the 1760s), as well as providing a decorative play of light and shadow. The fluted, pedestal plinth and fluted, or faceted, urn finial of this piece are exceptional refinements. Typical of neoclassical coffeepots, the most conservative form in the set, this piece retains rococo elements in its cast shell handle sockets and curved, shell-ornamented spout.
None of the pieces of the set has the narrow bands of minute beading so common on Philadelphia neoclassical tea and coffee pieces of the 1780s and early 1790s. Instead, repetitive bright-cut engraved borders incorporating a half-daisy motif define the top and bottom of each body, presaging the milled borders used after 1800. The fluted, pedestal-based slop bowl is typical of the neoclassical style in its relatively large size and wide, spreading form. Instead of large, ornamental script initials, the conjoined “CC” on each piece is simple and contained within a rather small, squarish shield reserve. The initials are those of the fashionable Cornelius and Catherine Comegys of Philadelphia and Chestertown, Maryland, who married in 1794 and may have received the set as a wedding gift. It is thought to be similar to one made by LeTellier for President James Madison but lost when the British burned the White House in 1814.
LeTellier is listed in numerous books as also working outside of Philadelphia. He may simply have solicited work in Chester County, Pennsylvania, and Wilmington, Delaware, during the 1790s rather than actually operating a shop in those locations. It is likely that he maintained his business in Philadelphia, where his obvious talents could reach a large and fashionable clientele. LeTellier had a son, also named John, who may have used the same marks.1This set is marked in the following manner: “I.LT” in block letters within a rectangular reserve, is struck twice on the bottom of the coffeepot and once on the sugar bowl, “I.LETELIER” once in the same manner on all other pieces except the cream pot, which is marked on the outside of the plinth “I.LT” Dimensions and weights for the other objects in the service are given in Conger and Rollins, Treasures of State, cat. no. 213 (Acc. No. 82.38).
Jennifer F. Goldsborough
Excerpted from Jonathan L. Fairbanks. Becoming a Nation: Americana from the Diplomatic Reception Rooms, U.S. Department of State. New York: Rizzoli, 2003.