Hi all, my wife has this set and we are trying to identify exactly what she has. Any assistance appreciated.
Nice clear hallmark. London, 1837:
https://www.silvermakersmarks.co.uk/Dates/London/Date%20Letters%20B.html
Made by William Eaton:
https://www.silvermakersmarks.co.uk/Makers/London-WC-WE.html#WE
ETA: Oh, and, of course, solid sterling silver!
ETA: Interestingly, these can be dated to a specific three-week period in 1837. The monarch shown in profile is William IV, not Victoria. This hallmark was in use only from 29 May 1837 to 20 June 1837! Such precision is rarely possible. 
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That’s reassuring, I’d began some amateur sleuthing and arrived at the same date and maker. Really appreciate your assistance.
Having a look at a few more of the pieces in the box it’s not a complete set by the same maker, there are a range of hallmarks and dates so it looks like I have some research to do to catalogue what we have here. Thanks again!
The referenced site, https://www.silvermakersmarks.co.uk/, is a great resource, as long as the hallmarks are reasonably clear. Pay attention to the little details - the style of the font on the date letter, which assay office is represented, which monarch (if any) is depicted.
Determining value, of course, is tougher. You can at least determine an absolute floor for the value, the so-called “melt value.” Weigh everything, multiply by the current spot price of silver, multiply by 0.925, because sterling isn’t pure silver (pure silver would be too soft for much of anything, and especially not flatware), then deduct maybe 5%-10% for the scrap dealer’s margin.
Value above that level is dependent upon collectability, which is difficult to gauge. Mismatched sets of flatware are a tougher sell than something like a christening cup, a tankard, or a big, showy serving piece. But William Eaton, for example, is a well-known name, and his pieces can command some fairly eye-popping prices, even in one’s and two’s.
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Your good lady seems to have acquired a harlequin set of plain fiddle pattern dinnerware.
You show one clear mark and you can use the tool Jeff has referred you to to look up the others.
Valuation for flat late georgian early Victorian flatware is something this website can help you with:
That will tell you the value if you melt them down. And you would think that was the lowest value, since if you were custom ordering a set like this today it would cost you about a hundred quid plus a peice or more. Sadly, or happily if you are buying, you’d be wrong.
At auction plain fiddle or even fiddle and thread or the more elaborate modern patterns are fetching just under scrap.
Go to www.auctioneer.com and you can see world-wide pricing. Don’t look at the currently listed prices look at the tab next to it for prices realized. Type in “flatware” or “Georgian” flatware or something along those lines and you will see.
And, I am coming across like a Debbie Downer, but there is this: auctioneers charge the buyer and the seller, typically their total fees which of course reduce the price paid usually come to about 50% of the realised value, 25% of the selling price charged directly to you and another 25% to the buyer who reduces his bid to accommodate this flagrant larceny by the auctioneer.
I say flagrant larceny as if you asked why charge, the auctioneer will tell you with an absolutely straight face its to certify the value of what you are buying. This is a calumny as in my experience auctioneers rarely know anything about what they are selling and in any event have a term of sale which precludes them from liability if the item is bogus.
So, if you were ever thinking of selling, which you may not have been, then you certainly won’t do it by auction.
Other ways to sell. Well there’s ebay. Which is sort of the on line casino of goods for sale. It really is the wild west and their fees have got worse and worse too. Used to be run by a very nice lady who was a friend of mine and I once did a great deal of business, usually buying. No longer.
Other ways of dealing with old silver. Well the modern world hates cleaning silver — I know this as I have tried to palm off boxes of the stuff to my children and grandchildren and they either accept it and vault it or make excuses like “We love to have it, Grandpa, but the luggage weight restrictions of the flight home etc…” It’s all nonsense as they all travel first
or business class because they are in the business but, whatever.
You could always insure it having got it appraised photographed and otherwise certified as worth whatever you think the market will bear and then buy a nice wooden house and await events.
Take it down to your local antiques dealer and put it on consignment or actually use it.
I do.
Georgian silver on a period mahogany table with a set of Rundell cande sticks, some period salts and peppers, a couple of bottle sliders and and a good Edwardian rose bowl with some of your English roses and the fact that the staff has screwed up the souffle won’t even come up at your dinner party for twelve.
On the bright side, the incoming administration over here is probably going to start some sort of international brouhaha which is excellent for gold and silver. In fact the value of raw silver has gone up about 30% recently. I live in one of those Canadian towns where they started off with a silver and cobalt mine and gave up in the thirties. Tried giving my dog a decent burial in the back 40 couple of years ago, got down a foot and hit something solid. If silver goes any further north I may have to dig him up again.
Christopher Wilson
Guildhall Antiques
Cobalt and Grand Cayman
PS My daughter read this through and said I sounded callous about Frederick. Frederick was my dog. So I should explain he was dead when I buried him. The local funeral parlor offered their services, but I wasn’t sure if they were talking about Freddie or myself or a sort of package deal so I left with matter unresolved and went off to have a thought about it. Which, with global warming isn’t the best thing to do is you are using the family station wagon as an impromptu hearse. Hence the backyard burial which apparently isn’t without its silver lining.
You missed your opportunity to reenact a Monty Python sketch.
MRS. CONCLUSION: Graham Chapman
MRS. PREMISE: John Cleese
Mrs. Conclusion : Hullo, Mrs. Premise.
Mrs. Premise : Hullo, Mrs. Conclusion.
Conclusion: Busy day?
Premise: Busy? I just spent four hours burying the cat.
Conclusion: Four hours to bury a cat?
Premise: Yes, it wouldn’t keep still, wriggling about, 'owling.
Conclusion: Oh - it wasn’t dead, then?
Premise: Oh no no, but it’s not at all a well cat and as we’re going away for a fortnight, I thought I’d better bury it just to be on the safe side.
Conclusion: Quite right - you don’t want to come back from Sorrento to a dead cat. It’d be so anticlimactic. Yes, kill it now, that’s what I say.
My daughter just read my postscript and your kind comment and said we are both being frivolous as all the poor man wants to know is about a box of his wife’s flatware and all we needed to say was it was silver and it would be worth more if it was a bunch of ingots with “Mathis AG” stamped on them.
Going on about dead dogs and prosecuting my pet peeve about auctioneers on the inquirer’s nickel was at best extraneous and … well that’s as far as she got. Except to tell me she meant callous about threatening to exhume Freddie if silver prices justified it not about burying the poor animal in the first place.
Elizabeth, that’s my daughter was a great fan of Freddie having sort of grown up with him. Asked on one occasion if she wanted me or the dog to take a plane seat next to her she opted for Freddie on the basis he snored less.
On cat’s, I have never owned any. One or two, usually belonging to women of my acquaintance considered they owned me. There was one who used to climb on the roof of her house whenever I showed up. Having got itself up there it could never get down, or at least that was its story, and set to howling through the night and achieving the outcome or lack of it it wanted.
And it wasn’t even a tin roof although it might have been a tad warm.
CRWW