Plate

1785-1790

Measurements

1 in x 9 in (dia)

Materials

Enameled and gilded porcelain

Credit Line

Historic Odessa Foundation, The David Wilson Mansion, Inc.

Accession Number

1971.721

Inscription

A label once attached to the underside of the plate and now removed states in ink on paper: “From Set of China / of Chase Mansion / in Annapolis, Md / Chief Justice Chase / about 1776 / Chase coat of arms."

Provenance

Mrs. E. Tatnall Warner (Mary Corbit) Warner

Comments

This exceptionally well-decorated plate belongs to one of the largest Chinese export porcelain services surviving from late eighteenth-century America, surpassing 250 pieces.  Most are owned by the Metropolitan Museum of Art; others are at the Maryland Center for History and Culture and the Dietrich American Foundation.  The arms are those of the Townley family.  British-born Margaret Townley (d. 1741) married the Rev. Richard Chase (1692–1742) in 1714, and they settled in Maryland.  Their nephew Samuel Chase (1741–1811) probably ordered the porcelain set when in England in 1783 and 1784.  It was listed in his estate inventory as “dinner service of china, white and gold with a coat of arms."  How this plate came into possession of Mrs. Warner is unknown.

Bibliography

Arlene M. Palmer, Winterthur Guide to Chinese Export Porcelain (New York: Crown, 1976), 111.

Zimmerman, A Storied Past, 231-232.