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Outstanding Bell family, Strasburg, VA earthenware cat figure

Jeffrey S. Evans plans June 23 auction of Americana, antiques

Outstanding Bell family, Strasburg, VA earthenware cat figure

Outstanding Bell family, Strasburg, VA earthenware cat figure

MT. CRAWFORD, Va. – Jeffrey S. Evans & Associates is pleased to announce its 22nd semi-annual catalogued auction of Americana and Fine Antiques spotlighting Virginia and the South. The auction will take place on Saturday, June 23 beginning at 9:30 a.m. ET, with Internet live bidding through LiveAuctioneers.com.

The sale will feature the collection of Leah and the late Bill Pollard of Purcellville, Va., plus consignments from more than 50 estates and collections from across North America, including a large number of historically important objects that have descended in the families of the original owners.

The 700+ lot auction will include a fine selection of rare Virginia and other Southern material; 18th and 19th century American formal and country furniture; fine and decorative arts; outstanding folk pottery, important folk art, early Virginia manuscript material, country accessories, textiles, antique firearms and edge weapons; select advertising and country store items; Virginia coin silver, antique Oriental carpets, 18th and 19th century ceramics; and more. Virtually every lot will sell without reserve.

One of the most exceptional Virginia lots in the auction is a pair of watercolor portraits by Charles Burton (1782-after 1847), circa 1841, likely depicting members of the Flynn/Flinn family of Page County or Petersburg, each measuring 9¾” x 8” and in excellent condition. A Burton portrait depicting Charles Henry Ellis of Richmond and exhibiting a virtually identical background is in the collection of the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Center in Williamsburg. It is among seven Burton watercolor portraits in the museum’s collection. The pair offered in this auction is from the Pollard collection, ex-collection of Elouise Ritenour of Woodstock, Va., who acquired the portraits directly from a member of the Flynn family of Luray, Va. This pair is conservatively estimated at $5,000-$8,000.

Additional important Virginia folk art highlights include an important 1830 Shenandoah Valley of Virginia watercolor “Bonaparte in Trouble” after the Amos Doolittle engraving, signed and dated by Page County silversmith Andrew F. Grayson (1807-1878); a 19” x 24” Shenandoah Valley naive oil on board landscape with livestock painting inscribed “Near House Mountain, 1898” on verso, Rockbridge County, Virginia; and a pair of circa 1847 Shenandoah Valley pastel portraits of Benjamin J. Trumbo (1821-1891) and his wife Cynthia Riddle Trumbo (1827-1865) from the Brock’s Gap area of western Rockingham County, Virginia. The 9½” x 7” Trumbo portraits were published by the Shenandoah Valley Folklore Society in its 1993 catalogue Folk and Decorative Art of the Shenandoah Valley, p. 13, fig. 209 and p. 80, pl. 3.

Significant Virginia furniture offerings include a fine unsigned Winchester walnut tall-case clock, circa 1795, that is attributed to the Frye-Martin shops. The clock features arched stop-fluted quarter columns, stands 99” high and is in outstanding original condition. A nearly identical example is illustrated by Wallace Gusler in his article “The Furniture of Winchester, Virginia,” published in American Furniture 1997, (Chipstone Foundation/Luke Beckerdite ed.), p. 243, figs. 22 and 23. This clock was recently discovered in a Maine estate and is estimated to sell in the $20,000-$30,000 range. Another extremely rare Virginia tall-case clock up for bid is signed by Leesburg clockmaker Edward Francis (1807-1879) and represents one of only three recorded examples by this maker.

Additional Southern furniture includes an imposing Piedmont Georgia walnut huntboard, circa 1830, measuring 45½” high and 74” wide, that descended in the Charles Powell family of Aiken Co., S.C.; a Mecklenburg County, Va., walnut bureau, circa 1800, from a seemingly unique regional group/shop characterized by the utilization of a central prospect door between the upper drawers (other examples reside in the collections of MESDA and Colonial Williamsburg); and a selection of 10 Shenandoah Valley of Virginia pie safes, many in as-found condition.

A selection of formal furniture from a three generation family collection started in the 1920s includes a circa-1810 highly important Federal inlaid and banded mahogany sofa table attributed to Boston, possibly the shop of John and Thomas Seymour, which is estimated at $10,000-$15,000. Closely related tables are illustrated in Robert Mussey’s The Furniture Masterworks of John & Thomas Seymour, p. 320, catalogue entry 93, and Betty Monkman’s The White House, Its Historic Furnishings & First Families, p. 268. The provenance of the table in this auction includes the Charles Ellis Goodin collection of Philadelphia, by descent to his grandson with original ownership by Sir John Wentworth (1737-1820), Colonial governor of New Hampshire and later Lieutenant-Governor of Nova Scotia.

The top attention-getter among more than 100 lots of folk pottery is an exception Bell family, Strasburg, Va., mottle-glazed earthenware cat figure, probably by S. Bell & Son, circa 1890, standing 5” high and in near-mint condition. This newly discovered Shenandoah Valley figure is estimated at $4,000-$6,000. Stoneware includes rare examples from Strasburg and Alexandria, Va., as well as western Pennsylvania.

A large selection of domestic and utilitarian articles will be sold including fine Virginia painted woven-splint baskets, treenware, boxes of all types, and hearth equipment highlighted by an extremely rare Virginia copper tea kettle signed “J. H. BLONDEL” for John Henry Blondel (1800-1881), copper and tinsmith in Martinsburg, Va. (now West Virginia), c. 1825.

Textile offerings include a fine selection of 19th-century quilts, most from Virginia, and an important Pennsylvania silk and watercolor on silk needlework picture signed and dated May 9, 1801 by Elizabeth Foster (1789-1847), likely executed when the family was residing in Shippensburg, Pa. The picture has descended directly in the Foster/Baker family of Winchester, Va., and is being offered with extensive family genealogy.

The auction will conclude with a good selection of Staffordshire ceramics including American historical transferware examples and majolica.

For additional information on any lot in the sale, call 540-434-3939 for additional information.

View the fully illustrated catalog and sign up to bid absentee or live via the Internet at www.LiveAuctioneers.com.

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View the fully illustrated catalog and register to bid absentee or live via the Internet as the sale is taking place by logging on to www.LiveAuctioneers.com.


ADDITIONAL LOTS OF NOTE


Outstanding Bell family, Strasburg, VA earthenware cat figure

Outstanding Bell family, Strasburg, VA earthenware cat figure

Exceptional Virginia watercolor portraits by Charles Burton (1782-after 1847)

Exceptional Virginia watercolor portraits by Charles Burton (1782-after 1847)

Folk art o/b painting “Near House Mountain, 1898”, Rockbridge Co., VA

Folk art o/b painting “Near House Mountain, 1898”, Rockbridge Co., VA

Fine Winchester, VA walnut tall case clock, c. 1795, the case attributed to the Frye-Martin shops

Fine Winchester, VA walnut tall case clock, c. 1795, the case attributed to the Frye-Martin shops

Important Federal mahogany sofa table attributed to Boston, possibly the shop of John and Thomas Seymour, c. 1810

Important Federal mahogany sofa table attributed to Boston, possibly the shop of John and Thomas Seymour, c. 1810

Important signed and dated 1801 Pennsylvania needlework picture

Important signed and dated 1801 Pennsylvania needlework picture