Hi there,
I received a matching teapot and coffee pot from my husband’s Granny after she passed. I cannot identify the markings, the closest I’ve come is I think the maker was MH & Co from Sheffield potentially? Any help would be so appreciated!
MARTIN HALL & CO
MARTIN HALL & CO LTD
Sheffield
The origin of the firm in the partnership established in 1820 in Sheffield by Henry Wilkinson and John Roberts who traded as Wilkinson & Roberts.The firm’s cronology is: John Roberts (1836), Roberts & Hall ( 1846), Martin Hall & Co (1854), Martin Hall & Co Ltd (1866-1936). Martin Hall & Co was one of the best known British manufacturers and participated to many international exhibitions including the Crystal Palace 1851 Great Exhibition. They had also a line of production in electroplate and in a patented white metal called “Martinoid”.
The letter into a hexagon is, possibly, a date code (unknown, but the presence of the “crown” signifies before 1895). The “date code” hypothesis is confirmed by the “clipped crown” (with “A”) as an emergency solution adopted when the use of the crown has been forbidden (1895).
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Thank you! Which one is the crown? The top looks like a P to me, the right looks like an S, but I can’t figure out the shapes of the bottom and the left.
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Ohhh okay that makes so much more sense, thank you! Last question (sorry!) which of the markings would indicate a date code?
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6695 - pattern number.
Thank you so much! I wasn’t sure if it had to do with the cross symbol adjacent to the 4. I’ll have to look up that pattern info now. Thank you again!
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A minor correction - the letters are EPGS for electroplated German silver, German silver being an older name for the base metal alloy now known as nickel silver. “German silver” fell out of favour during the First World War. Only a minor correction as Britannia silver is a similar white metal alloy.
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Sorry. Typo. I’m sick, I have a fever, but I’m still trying to participate in the forum.
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Thank you for this info! Does that help at all determine a rough manufacture timeline? By looking up the pattern number I’m getting no where yet.
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“The production date range for Martin Hall & Co. EPGS (Electro-Plated German Silver) pieces is generally from 1854 to 1936, but specific dates can be narrowed down by examining the hallmarks on the item. EPGS items were produced from the company’s formation in 1854, and the company existed until it was converted to a limited company in 1866, and continued as Martin Hall & Co Ltd until 1936. “
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The coffee pot is really a hot water jug. It’s just the Americans who insist on converting tea sets made in England for the tea-mad Brits into coffee sets with a teapot thrown in for good measure.
And whatever has been stuck on the top of the hot water jug lid as finial or handle needs replacing with something similar to what’s on the teapot. You can buy then on ebay sometimes.
Leaving electroplate or nickel silver items in your will or writing letters to executors telling them who should have what sometimes leads to what Victorian writer Charles Dickens termed " Great Expectations".
Sadly the value is largely emotive. This pair of pots might have started life as a wedding present to Granny with a creamer, a sugar bowl, maybe a waste cup for slops and even a tray.
Someone would have paid good money for it probably just before the war, if you want a date. Granny would have been happy to entertain her friends in her new home with it.
Today? Styles change. Teabags and 15 min coffee breaks have destroyed the utility and every auction house in North America is turning away people who want to sell broken up 20th century tea sets. If they are silver they sell just below scrap, if they are anything else, with the possible exception of old Sheffield plate, they are more difficult to place.
CRWW
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