Virginia issued peace medals to leaders of its Native American communities during the Revolutionary War-the only state so to do. Governor Thomas Jefferson ordered the three-and-a-half-inch brass ornaments in 1780. Likely cast in Richmond or Williamsburg, they were based on designs by Pierre Eugène du Simitière and Daniel Christian Feuter. One face depicts an Indian and a Virginian of European descent seated with a peace pipe under the motto 'HAPPY WHILE UNITED.' The other employs elements from Virginia's seal in which Virtue triumphs over a crownless king encircled by the legend 'REBELLION TO TYRANTS IS OBEDIENCE TO GOD.' Recipients wore the disks on a ribbon around the neck. Colonial Williamsburg recently acquired this example, one of five that survive, and it can be seen at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum. Its purchase was partially underwritten by the Lasser Family Fund of the Jewish Communal Fund. Williamsburg merchant James Tarpley purchased a lot on the corner of Duke of Gloucester and Botetourt Streets in 1759 and erected 'a new storehouse.' A partner in the English firm of Tarpley, Thompson and Company, he engaged in retail trade at the site until his death in 1766. This recently acquired broadside, printed in England about 1760, lists for sale a dizzying array of luxury goods 'Just imported from London and Bristol.' The merchandise included all manner of household furnishings, from Wilton carpets to ornamental china, and exotic-sounding dress fabrics such as 'Bombazeen,' 'Prunelloes,' and 'rich Peruvian Tissues.' Like his 21st-century counterparts, Tarpley said, 'Discount will be allowed for ready Money on any Sum exceeding £5.' The Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections funded the purchase of the broadside, an apparently one-of-a-kind survival. Made about 1850, this quilt is a riot of flowered, striped, plaid, and plain cottons. It consists of hundreds of precisely cut and stitched pieces assembled into sixteen compass stars, no two of which are exactly alike. Still bright and colorful after 150 years, the quilt has seen little use and must have been put away for safekeeping by its early owners. Mary Wright Williams was likely its maker. Born in Ireland in 1794, Williams and her husband immigrated to America in the early nineteenth century and took up residence in New York City. Williams's quilt became a heirloom and remained with her descendents until shortly before its acquisition by Colonial Williamsburg. It will be exhibited periodically in the Foster and Muriel McCarl Textile Gallery at the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum. Sheldon Peck executed the double likeness of this Aurora, Illinois, couple-Mr. and Mrs. Vaughan-about 1845, when photography had begun to threaten the livelihoods of traditional face painters. The few artists who clung to the craft generally strove to emulate the novel effects of the camera. Peck, who was born in 1797 and died in 1868, reacted by more fully embracing the potential of the oil medium by painting larger, more colorful canvases and, often, enclosing them in flamboyant, grain-painted frames. His full-length, multiple-figure, horizontally formatted portraits of the 1840s reveal his heightened ambitions and showcase his compositional genius, here epitomized by the subjects' poses and stage-like setting. Peck's image of the Vaughans displays an unprecedented level of theatricality. A recent gift of Juli Grainger, it is among the most important portrait additions to the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum-where it may be seen-in years. Ann Cary Selden Breckinridge of Botetourt County, Virginia, was the first owner of this elegant gown. It was made about 1810 of fine East Indian cotton decorated with cotton embroidery and silk tassels at the back. According to an old handwritten note, Ann Breckinridge wore the gown 'at a Congressional Ball in D.C.,' where her husband, Colonel James Breckinridge, served in the United States Congress from 1809 to 1817. Such thin, diaphanous garments were the height of women's fashion. This fragile example descended from Ann Breckinridge to Mrs. Richard S. Aldrich, who recently gave it to Colonial Williamsburg. This engraving depicts Cunne Shote, a chief of the Cherokee Nation, who visited Williamsburg in 1762 to see the governor of Virginia. Later that year, Cunne Shote and two Cherokee leaders traveled to London to visit with King George III and sign the 'Articles of Friendship and Commerce with His Majesty.' During that visit Francis Parsons painted Cunne Shote's portrait, which served as the model for this print by James McArdell. Like many Native Americans of his day, Cunne Shote wore a mixture of European and Indian clothing. Among his ceremonial belongings were the crescent-shaped European gorget hanging from his neck and the scalping knife in his right hand. The English silver medallions at his collar are similar to examples excavated in Williamsburg on the site of the John Custis House. Ornate glass sweetmeat stands were used in the eighteenth century for the service of elaborate dessert courses on special occasions. A preserved orange-an extravagant treat-was placed in the topmost bowl, and the remaining baskets and dishes were piled with such delicacies as candied fruit, nuts, and crystallized edible flowers. Cakes, puddings, fresh fruit and other sweets were arranged symmetrically around the stand, and its faceted glass pendants and gilt metal mounts caught and reflected the candlelight. George Washington, John Marshall, and other early Virginians owned such stands, but few survive. Made in England about 1760, this well-preserved example was recently presented to Colonial Williamsburg by John Rowan, Jr., in memory of Winifred Draco Shrubsole. This well-preserved black walnut desk bears original chalk inscriptions confirming that Willis Williams, who was born about 1710 and died about 1765, and John Wright, born about 1705 and died about 1753, made it in Southampton County, Virginia. Although the desk is not dated, Southampton County's creation in 1749 and Wright's death date neatly define the specific four-year period during which the desk was made. Williams and Wright were related by marriage and were probably Quakers. Both were descendants of shipbuilding and woodworking families in Norfolk and Isle of Wight County. The desk's William and Mary styling would have been distinctly old-fashioned for the time of its production, but may well be a reflection of the Quaker community's conservative tastes. It is part of Colonial Williamsburg's permanent collection. By the middle of the seventeenth century, Virginia was active in the busy North Atlantic trade. This brown stoneware mug, made in Frechen, Germany, about 1664, represents the colony's early international ties. Five inches tall, it bears the seal of Jan op de Kamp, a Dutch merchant based in London and a participant in the wine and stoneware commerce between Germany and England. Archaeologists unearthed fragments of stoneware vessels bearing op de Kamp's seals at the German pottery that produced the wares, London's commercial district, and an isolated seventeenth-century site on the rim of the Chesapeake Bay. This 1809 map of Virginia looks like ink on paper but is silk thread on linen. A map sampler, it is the handiwork of schoolgirl Helen E. Edmonds, who lived in northern Virginia's Fauquier County. Eighteen inches high, the map is remarkably detailed and contains the names of nearly every city, county, and river in the commonwealth as it then existed. Edmonds may have learned the art of 'working maps' from one of two needlework instructors who advertised their services in nearby Alexandria. Stitching a map sampler offered a young woman the advantages of improving her needle skills while gaining a practical knowledge of geography. Helen Edmonds's Virginia map sampler is by far the earliest known. This miniature painting, one of a pair, depicts the 1781 surrender of British troops to American and French forces at Yorktown, Virginia, an action that effectively ended the Revolutionary War. Few contemporary views of the event are known. Louis-Nicolas van Blarenberghe or his son Henri-Joseph painted this one and its mate in Paris in 1785. Both pictures likely were based on sketches by draftsmen Louis-Alexandre and Charles-Louis Berthier, brothers who served under the French General Rochambeau and were eyewitnesses. The Berthiers' sketches were sent to the French court, where they were available to the van Blarenberghes. The painting shown here is just over three inches in diameter, but meticulously illustrates hundreds of figures. Its acquisition was made possible in part by the Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections. Colonial Williamsburg has acquired two nearly identical portraits of John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore and Virginia's royal governor at the outbreak of the Revolution. One other image of Dunmore is known. A heroic, full-length, near life-size portrait at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, it depicts him in 1765 as a vigorous man in his thirties a few years before his arrival in Virginia. The two images now at Colonial Williamsburg are miniature portraits three-inches high. Painted in watercolors on ivory panels about 1809-1820 by two unidentified artists, they depict Dunmore, a Scotsman, at or near the end of his life. Slouched in a large chair and wrapped in voluminous tartans, his lined face shows the world-changing events of his 77 years. Colonial Williamsburg recently acquired this silver basket made and marked by Asa Blansett in Dumfries, Virginia, about 1795. Most of the known examples of his work were used in the service of tea and coffee. Under five inches in height, this basket originally held small, course lumps of sugar chopped from a large loaf or cone and used for sweetening hot beverages. Blansett may have based the basket's solid form on contemporary English models made of much less substantial silver plate. Little is known of the artisan's history before his arrival in Dumfries, which was a prosperous northern Virginia port until accumulating silt made Quantico Creek impassible for ships around 1800. The basket was acquired for the foundation with funds contributed by the Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections. Colonial Williamsburg's collection encompasses thousands of examples of eighteenth-century fine and decorative arts, but is equally rich in once-common utilitarian objects that people needed for everyday tasks. This set of scales and weights carries the label of 'scalemaker' Richard Brock, who trained in London but returned to his home in Chester in northwestern England by 1702. Brock produced these scales by 1707. They survive in excellent condition, retaining their original wooden case and many of the variously sized weights. Almost every tradesman owned such scales in the eighteenth century because it was necessary to weigh coins before accepting them. Colonial Americans readily took coins from England, Mexico, Peru, France, Holland, and other countries, and these were frequently cut into smaller pieces to make change. Denominations consequently meant little to buyers and sellers, who were more interested in the weight of the gold or silver. This pair of steel, iron, and silver pistols were made by John Campbell of Doune, Scotland, between 1750 and 1770. All-metal pistols are among the most distinctive of Scottish-made objects. Most mid 18th-century examples are of this form, with ram's horn butts and extensive engraved ornament. Major John Pitcairn, a Scot in the British Marines, carried a nearly identical pair during the American Revolution. His pistols were captured at the Battle of Lexington by the colonials and are on view at Buckman Tavern in Concord, Massachusetts. John Murray, Fourth Earl of Dunmore and the last royal governor of Virginia, owned a similar pair. One of the pistols appears in Sir Joshua Reynolds' 1765 portrait of Dunmore, which depicts him full-length and dressed in a kilt. Purchase of the pistols was funded by a gift from John A. Hyman and Betty C. Leviner. Ornately painted formal furniture was made in several American cities from 1800 to the 1830s, but Baltimore led in the production of what was commonly called 'fancy' or imaginative furniture. This couch is typical of those made in the Baltimore shop of Hugh Finlay. The frame was first painted to resemble rosewood. Paint, gold leaf, and tinted varnishes were applied to simulate gilded, three-dimensional metal mounts akin to those excavated at ancient Greek and Roman sites. Costly wool and silk upholstery, including tasseled cushions, completed the effect. Fancy furniture often was made in suites; this couch was accompanied by matching tables and chairs now in the foundation's collection. Originally owned by Josiah and Ann Bayly on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, the furniture remained in the Cambridge house they purchased in 1832 until the contents were dispersed in 2002. Bridget and Al Ritter funded Colonial Williamsburg's acquisition of the couch and four chairs in honor of Deanne Levison and Milly McGehee. This elegant and diminutive tea table bears all the hallmarks of mid 18th-century Irish furniture. The bandy cabriole legs, sharply pointed feet, and deep, exuberantly shaped sides are identical to those on tables and other furniture from Dublin, Limerick, and Shannon. Yet this object was never in Ireland. It was made on the shores of Tidewater Virginia's Rappahannock River about 1750. Research has demonstrated that at least two still unidentified Irish cabinetmakers settled in or near one of the small towns on the Rappahannock shortly before that time. The artisans' surviving works confirm that each continued to make furniture in the Irish manner. As with the other products of their shops, only the table's Virginia associations and its execution in North American black walnut reveal its origin. Archeological excavations at the sites of soft-paste porcelain factories in Liverpool, England, suggest that this teapot was made in that city by potter Philip Christian between 1765 and 1768. That Christian and his competitors supplied Liverpool porcelain in this and other pattern to customers in eighteenth-century Williamsburg has been confirmed by the retrieval of matching shards from sites throughout the town. Fragments of tea and coffee wares, including cylindrical coffee cups, tea bowls, and saucers in the blue and white bird pattern seen here have been recovered from the Governor's Palace, the Brickhouse Tavern, and the home of blacksmith James Anderson. The acquisition of this well-preserved teapot was funded by the Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections. The curatorial staff is seeking additional pieces of this design for eventual display in the Governor's Palace parlor. This fashionable silver box was used for storing loose tea and would have been brought to the table along with the teapot and other tea drinking accoutrements. Under four inches high, it is meant to resemble the large wooden chests in which tea was shipped from China. Dated 1765-1766, the box was retailed by the London silversmithing firm of John Parker and Edward Wakelin. Between 1766 and 1770 Parker & Wakelin turned to at least 75 outside craftsmen to fill more than 7,000 orders. Silversmiths James Ansill and Stephen Gilbert probably made the body of this box, and engraver Robert Clee likely crafted the decoration. The box was a gift to Colonial Williamsburg from donor John A. Hyman. Silver-gilt badges akin to this one were worn in the 18th century by members of the Loyal and Friendly Society of the Blew & Orange, a fraternal group composed mostly of British army officers. Their mission was to commemorate two landmark events in the history of the English monarchy: the Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the Hanoverian succession. Members met regularly to carry out their charge of drinking toasts to the king and firing their muskets. Writing about a January, 1775 meeting in Boston, Lieutenant Barker of the King's Own Regiment confirms that the group gathered on both sides of the Atlantic. Most surviving Blew & Orange badges were cast or struck, but this one, made in England about 1760, was richly engraved. At two-and-a-quarter inches high, it also is larger than most known examples. A similar Blew & Orange badge appears in a mid 18th-century American portrait of an unidentified British officer. This mahogany, oak, and yellow pine bureau dressing table was the work of Williamsburg cabinetmaker Peter Scott. Born in Great Britain about 1695, Scott immigrated to Virginia and set up shop in the colonial capital by 1722. He was still making furniture at his Duke of Gloucester Street establishment in 1775-fifty-three years later-when the Virginia Gazette announced the death of 'Mr. Peter Scott, in the 81st year of his age.' A prolific artisan, Scott made a virtually identical table for his landlord, Daniel Parke Custis, in 1754. The receipt with Scott's signature survives in the Colonial Williamsburg collection. The table survives as well. Following the death of young Custis in 1757, his widow, Martha, married George Washington. The new Mrs. Washington took the table with her to Mount Vernon, where she used it in her bedchamber. It remains there today. This lead-glass chandelier, or 'lustre' in period parlance, was made in England about 1730. Nearly 30 inches tall, it has been installed in the Council Chamber at the Capitol, where a similar fixture hung in the 18th century. Fragile and costly, glass lighting devices were luxuries and appeared in only the most elevated of colonial American buildings. The Council Chamber, used for meetings of the governor and his councilors - a group analogous to the upper house of today's state legislature - was a richly appointed space, befitting the occupants' lofty rank. Similar chandeliers survive in situ at important historic sites in England, including Emanuel College, Cambridge, and Grimsthorpe Castle, Lincolnshire. Virginia's councilors evidently considered themselves worthy of such niceties; they agreed to purchase two glass chandeliers for use in and adjacent to their chamber. Eighteenth-century Britons and colonial Virginians called such seats as these smoking chairs. Men, primarily, used them. This one descended through the Ficklen family of Belmont plantation near Falmouth, Virginia. Made of black walnut and beech about 1755, it was thought to be the work of Williamsburg cabinetmaker Peter Scott. New research and recently discovered documents, however, make it clear that Robert Walker, a King George County, Virginia, artisan, made it and many other surviving pieces. Walker, working just down the Rappahannock River from Falmouth, arrived from Scotland by 1740 and made furniture for the colony's elite until his death in 1777. With his brother, master builder William Walker, Robert Walker established a dynasty that produced generations of notable Virginia cabinetmakers, clock makers, and carpenters. This simple, quickly-drawn image portrays the youngest member of the small group of Creek Indians who accompanied Georgia founder James Oglethorpe to London to meet the colony's board of trustees in 1734. About four inches square and drawn in pencil on velum, the sketch of the 15-year-old boy is attributed to Jonathan Richardson Sr., one of London's fashionable portraitists. Called Touanohoui, the young man also appears in two paintings done in London by Willem Verelst. One, now in the Winterthur collection, depicts the board's Common Council and eight of the Indians. The other was a double portrait showing Touanohoui with Tomachichi, his great-uncle and the leader of the traveling group. The location of the second painting is not known, but John Faber engraved the portrait. An imprint is in the Colonial Williamsburg collection. This small silver belt plate, just over two inches tall, was worn by a loyalist officer during the Revolutionary War. Though several loyalist belt plates survive from New England, this is the only known example from the southern colonies. Likely made in Charleston, it was affixed to the sword belt of an officer of the South Carolina Royalists. In addition to the name of the regiment, it is engraved with the letters GR, for King George III. The center features a sapling pine under a royal crown and the Latin motto 'SUB REGE FLORESCIT' (under the king it flourishes), an apt metaphor for the southern loyalist movement. A royal garter inscribed 'HONI SOIT QUI MAL Y PENSE' (shame to him who thinks evil of it) encircles the whole. An accomplished engraver made the decoration-probably Thomas Coram, the only such artisan to advertise for military business in British-occupied Charleston during the war years. This detailed watercolor drawing depicts a private soldier in the Light Infantry Company of the British army's 23rd Regiment. Lieutenant Richard Williams painted the fifteen-inch scene in the early 1770s. Williams came to the regiment at Boston in June 1775, just before the Battle of Bunker Hill. His illustration includes front and rear views of the light infantry company's uniform. The elite soldiers of this unit were less heavily equipped than their peers and became famous for their speed and mobility in the North American terrain. Williams detailed elements of their distinctive gear like the plumed leather helmet, half-gaiters-or short leggings-and blue detachable foul weather cape. Few illustrations of common soldiers of the Revolutionary War period survive. Williams' description of the uniform on the reverse magnifies the significance of this painting. The pewter trade was unknown in the great metalworking city Sheffield, England, until pewterer James Vickers opened his shop in 1769. Vickers worked with a new pewter formulation called Britannia metal, which he said he introduced. Unlike earlier cast pewter, Britannia metal was mechanically rolled into thin sheets that could be expeditiously shaped into tableware using steel dies. Vickers's firm produced this teapot, sugar basin, and cream ewer between 1785 and 1800. They are characteristic of early Britannia metal in their use of engraved neoclassical borders, cartouches, and incidental motifs, such as the trophies of archery bows and quivers. Similar forms appeared on the tea and dining tables of fashion-conscious middle-class households in Britain and America. Ornate shell-shaped dishes represent the pinnacle of mid-18th-century English porcelain tableware. Dubbed pickle or sweetmeat stands, these fanciful receptacles for the dessert course held such foodstuffs as preserved walnuts or candied fruit. The desired effect of the dish, piled high with such delicacies, was to delight diners with its intricate detail and lush marine-themed decoration. This example was made about 1755 at London's Bow Porcelain Manufactory. Bow is the only English porcelain maker specifically mentioned in a colonial American newspaper advertisement. Archaeologists unearthed a large fragment of a similar Bow dish in Williamsburg. Its purchase was made possible by a gift from Wesley and Elise H. Wright in memory of Mr. and Mrs. Henry Clay Hofheimer II, noted ceramics collectors, and in honor of their mentor, John C. Austin. In the early nineteenth century, the most stylish dresses were constructed of very thin fabrics cut to reveal the wearer's arms and neck, even in winter. This heavy cloak, made in England or America about 1830, was designed to be worn over such sheer gowns. The costly brown silk of the exterior was lined with bright pink silk. An inner layer of quilted wool batting added warmth. The padded collar could be worn down or up to shield the neck, and a short cape collar fell over the shoulders. Concealed slits gave the owner use of her arms when the garment was fully closed. Extraordinarily well preserved, the cloak was once part of the costume collection of children's author and illustrator Tasha Tudor. Potteries in Staffordshire, England, made these tea and coffee wares about 1765. With their earthenware bodies, black glazing, and gilt decoration, these pieces were meant to look like Japanese lacquered goods. The delicate hand-applied gilding over the glaze seldom survives, though it remains in these well-preserved examples. Archaeologists have found fragments of similar wares at Williamsburg sites. All are part of a gift of English pottery given to Colonial Williamsburg by Harry Coon. This miniature portrait of Lieutenant General Charles Cornwallis measures just under three and one half inches high. Most Americans recognize Cornwallis as the British commander who surrendered his forces at Yorktown, Virginia, losing the last major battle of the Revolutionary War in 1781. In 1786, Cornwallis was appointed governor general of India. His military and administrative successes there included victory in the Third Mysore War, for which he was granted the title of marquis in 1792, and promoted to full general in 1793. Credible images of him are scarce. Although Colonial Williamsburg's portrait is unsigned, it is closely related to three likenesses of Cornwallis done in 1792 by English miniaturist John Smart, who worked in India from 1785 to 1795. Williamsburg visitors admire St. George Tucker's spacious Nicholson street house, and legal historians revere his name, but few can conjure an image of the man. Tucker, who was born in Bermuda in 1752 and died in Virginia in 1827, was one of the town's most highly regarded citizens, yet few portraits of him are known. Before acquiring these 1799 miniature likenesses of Tucker and his second wife, Lelia Skipwith Carter, Colonial Williamsburg possessed only a small black and white profile print. The newly-acquired portraits are painted in brilliant watercolors by the gifted French-born artist Pierre Henri. Henri worked in Alexandria and Richmond, Virginia, as well as in Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, New York, and New Orleans. The Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections funded the purchase of the Tucker portraits. This mahogany chair probably is from the set of 12 commissioned by William Beverley for Blandfield, his Virginia estate, during a 1750 visit to Hull, England. Twenty years later, Beverley's son, Robert, built a Palladian-style mansion at Blandfield and moved the still-fashionable chairs to the new house. There they remained until the Beverleys sold the property in 1983. Known in the 18th century as back stools, such fully upholstered seating was costly. With acanthus-carved legs, ball-and-claw feet, and rich wool upholstery, the suite was intended to impress. This is one of the few survivors from the set. The Friends of Colonial Williamsburg Collections funded its purchase.

This online feature is an adaptation of the Colonial Williamsburg journal’s regular fixture “Just Arrived.” Both are updated quarterly.Close this box.