Good day, friends. I have a Hanoverian (rattail) pattern sterling silver soup ladle made by David Fullerton in 1916 (London assay). It has an engraving on the back of the finial. It looks more like an armorial or crest than a monogram (personal initial). Please see the first pic.
With regard to the armorial pictured above, I have searched as much as I can, and I have found two very similar designs (see next two pics) that lead me to think they refer to the same family. The crest is shown to belong to the Wyman family. The second pic I found on the internet, described as a fighting cock complete with spurs, standing on a sheaf of wheat, appears on a Victorian silver plate sugar sifter spoon, dated c.1860, made by Gilbert of Birmingham. This crest is said to come from the Anglo-Saxon personal name Wyman, and can have a different spelling, like Weyman, Wyeman and Wayman. The third pic is the Wyman family crest shown under the heading “Family Crest Finder” on the Myfamilysilver.com website. My question: can I safely assume my soup ladle used originally to belong to that family in England, or are my assumptions merely a flight of my fancy? You see, my assumptions are making me inagine that this soup ladle originally belonged to a set bought in England by members of the Wyman family and engraved with their family crest, and was broken up at some stage, with the ladle eventually arriving in South Africa as a separate item. Perhaps I’m just grasping at straws?
Regards
Jan
The only straws here, Jan, are the ones under the cockerel. I think you have everything correct. I checked Fairbairn’s Crests (available free online) and found exactly the same information: family name: Wyman, location: England. The heraldic description of the armorial is “on a garb, in fess, or, a cock, gu.” and the accompanying image appears to be the source of the myfamilysilver image:
Phil
Thank you, Phil. If other forum members are reading here, they might wonder why I’m trying to make a mountain out of a molehill? Well, it just goes to show that when an activity like researching antique silver spoons goes a long way, it opens all kinds of new and exciting avenues of thought. Much like archaeology? I don’t think I’ll go so far as to try to contact members of the Wyman family in England. Years ago I researched a silver medal from World War I and could trace it back to the aged (80 year old) daughter of the original recipient. Strangely enough, they did not request that I return it to the family!
But this story about the medal is off topic. I just mentioned it for comparison.
Regards
Jan
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