5 William Adams 1847 Coin Silver Spoons

This is a set of 5 coin silver spoons I purchased about a year and a half ago and I'm trying to find out if the W. Adams on the back of the spoons is the same William Adams from New York that made the Mace for the House of Representatives between 1841 & 1842 and continued working until 1850 in New York.

I posted these awhile back somewhere else and when given a choice it was narrowed down to W. Adams from New York who worked as a Silversmith and not W. Adams from England but I was not able to determine if it was the same W. Adams that made the Mace.

The 5 spoons I think are monogrammed with "MJW" or "MTW" and are made from coin silver from the mid 1800's but I'm not positive. The spoons are about 6 inches in length and weigh about 30 grams each.

All the spoons have "Patent 1847" "W. Adams" and 2 of the spoons have the letter "C" further up the handle. The "47" of 1847 looks like it has been stamped over another date. I'm not even sure if the 47 is a 47 or not.

Does anyone know if the W. Adams who made these spoons was the same W. Adams (William Adams) that made the Mace for the House of Representatives, when they were made, what they are made of and does the letter "C" on them denote Coin silver or are they another silversmiths initial or something else?

Thanks!
Kevin

 

Your coin silver spoons are John Polhamus' 'Louis XIV' pattern, 1847 design patent #114 issued to John C. Moore. The simple incuse 'W. Adams' mark is much more typical of a retailer's mark - not where I check any references at the moment, but New York silversmith William L. Adams' mark was 'W. Adams' and 'New.York', two separate marks, struck intaglio in serrated edge cartouche. Suppose he could have been acting as retailer, but may have been a different 'W. Adams' entirely...

~Cheryl

 

Wow Cheryl, Thanks! I think you have nailed the 1847 design and patent #114 and John C. Moore. It looks like that in 1851 Tiffany Company enlisted John C. Moore to make hollow-ware pieces. Based on your information I was able to find this link with a reference and images of the patent for that spoon and also another spoon I purchased with them that I have now been able to identify as a spoon with a design patent for Michael Gibney, July 10 1946 Design Patent #59.

The image below is the spoon I have designed by Michael Gibney and it is monogrammed with what looks like "CG", I wonder if the "G" stand for "Gibney" and is somehow related to Michael Gibney? The spoon is stamped on the back "Palmer & Bachelders". The last few images is a small pile of coin silver spoons I've purchased over the last few years...

https://queenofsienna.wordpress.com...atents-it-would-be-an-interesting-collection/

 

The Moore shop produced for Tiffany, Young & Ellis prior to 1851, they just entered an exclusive arrangement then, eventually their shop became a part of Tiffany & Co. - John C.'s son Edward C. Moore and his descendants were integral to the company...

The next spoon, like the Louis XIV, is an 'Olive' variant, and the Gibney Olive/Tuscan pattern was also produced by William Gale - seems unlikely that the 'G' would be connected to either family, would think if that were the case, they'd have gotten it directly from their relative rather than from the retailer (without reliable provenance, pretty much impossible to assign former ownership through a simple monogram). The 'Palmer & Bachelders' (importers, wholesalers and retailers) mark should date from 1846 to 1853, when the firm name became 'Palmers & Bachelders'.

The A & W. Wood pattern is 'Dew Drop'.

~Cheryl

 

Thanks Cheryl for that analysis of the spoons, I really appreciate that! Yes, no way to attribute or give ownership to just a monogram, was just throwing that possibility out there while wondering aloud... Thanks for adding the A & W. Wood Pattern too!

Kevin

 

I posted the same spoon here a few weeks ago. Mine had a different name on the back which turned out to be a retailer.

https://www.antiquers.com/threads/teaspoon-with-worn-name-wriggins.8810/

 

Amazing, the odds of the same spoon... Looks like there were a lot of retailers for this spoon.

 

Many of the coin silverware that I was researching had the retailer's name instead of the silversmith's name. I wonder if it was required or just popular as a form of advertising?