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28-A Maine Antique Digest, April 2017
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AUCTION -
28-A
“Among the most rare
and magnificent surviving
examples of Philadelphia
seating furniture.”
Sotheby’s, New York City
The E. Newbold and Margaret
du Pont Smith Collection
by Lita Solis-Cohen
Photos courtesy Sotheby’s
A
merican furniture and paintings from the
collection of the late E. Newbold and
Margaret “Peggy” du Pont Smith, which
sold at Sotheby’s on Saturday afternoon, January
21, had been assembled over two generations.
Peggy Smith’s mother, Margaret W. Lewis du
Pont, left some of her furniture to her daughter,
who added to the collection over the years.
Sometimes Peggy Smith bought at auction,
but more often she bought at the Philadelphia
Antiques Show, which she cochaired in 1977
and 1978 and served as chair of the advisory
committee the following decade. Newbold
Smith graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy,
where he was a star football player and wrestler.
A lifelong sailor who owned a fine racing yacht,
he collected marine paintings.
The Smiths’ miniature Chester County
William and Mary walnut flat-top high chest was
the most coveted lot of Americana Week. There
was spirited bidding for this small valuables
chest, sometimes called a spice chest, with
competition on phones and in the salesroom
from the trade and from private collectors.
Leigh Keno, sitting between collectors Marjorie
and John McGraw, was the winner, paying
$612,500 (with the buyer’s premium) for the
chest, estimated at $80,000/120,000.
The price was an auction record for a miniature
high chest, even though it was announced from
the podium that the bottom drawer had been
rebuilt, probably in the 18th century. This
continued the trend that if a piece is rare and has
a presence, minor repairs do not matter. Fresh
to market, it had not been seen publicly since
1999, when it was exhibited at the Philadelphia
Museum of Art in the exhibition
Worldly Goods:
The Arts of Early Pennsylvania 1680-1758.
When Peggy Smith bought it for $33,000 in
May 1980 at the Sotheby Parke Bernet sale of
the collection of Colonel Edgar William and
Bernice Chrysler Garbisch (held at Pokety, the
Garbisch estate on Maryland’s Eastern Shore),
she thought she had overpaid. The price was
$10,000 more than the price of an eagle-inlaid
spice chest on stand that sold at the same sale for
$23,000. The new record price of $612,500 for a
miniature Pennsylvania high chest tops $288,000
paid for a Philadelphia walnut miniature high
chest with Spanish feet, circa 1740, that had sold
at sale of the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Walter
Jeffords at Sotheby’s in 2004. A valuables box
on a stand in the form of a William and Mary
high chest on stand, illustrated in the Chipstone
Foundation’s
American Furniture 2015
(p. 21,
along with another similar one at Chipstone,
both possibly from the John Widdifield shop in
Philadelphia), sold at Pook & Pook in January
2012 for $112,575. (The chest at Pook & Pook
also had some minor drawer problems; the
bottom and top drawers are early replacements,
and the period pulls have new wires. It lacks a
secret drawer behind the center drawer, and the
center raw bottom is a replacement.)
Other Chester County spice chests at the
Smith sale brought more than estimated. One
with an inlaid door sold for $50,000 (est.
$15,000/30,000). Another one, with the initials
“SL” and the date 1746 and extra secret drawers
behind a removable back panel, sold for $43,750
(est. $15,000/25,000).
The star of the sale was the Smiths’
Philadelphia tall-case clock with works by
Peter Stretch and the engraved motto
“Tempus
There was a lot of bidding for this 24¾" x 14¼" x 9¾"
William and Mary turned and joined walnut flat-top
chest of drawers with paneled sides, Chester County,
Pennsylvania, circa 1725, used as a valuables cabinet,
with a rich historic surface and original cast brass
hardware. It was announced from the podium that the
lower drawer had been rebuilt in the 18th century. It sold
in the salesroom for $612,500 (est. $80,000/120,000) to
Leigh Keno, who was sitting between collectors John and
Marjorie McGraw.
At the sale of the Garbisch collection on May 23, 1980,
it had sold for $33,000, when a more common form of
Chester County spice box on frame sold for $23,000.
This cherrywood tall-case clock is an extremely
rare Queen Anne clock with works by Peter
Stretch of Philadelphia and its case attributed to
John Head of Philadelphia. It sold for $348,500
(est. $150,000/300,000) to Virginia consultant
Luke Beckerdite. It is illustrated in
Stretch:
America’s First Family of Clockmakers
by
Donald L. Fennimore and Frank L. Hohmann
III (2013), no. 56, pp. 232-33. While Stretch
routinely signed his clockworks, Head did not
sign his cases. In his online writing (found at
In Proportion to the Trouble) Christopher
Storb, who is a furniture conservator at the
Philadelphia Museum of Art, writes about this
clock: “While not a record for an American
tall-case clock—that belongs to another Peter
Stretch clock in a carved mahogany case
purchased by the Winterthur Museum in 2004
for $1,688,000—it is a record price for any
furniture documented or attributed to the
workshop of John Head.” Storb writes that this
clock and case represents the most expensive
version of the John Head and Peter Stretch
collaboration, because Head charged £5-0-0
for clock cases with arched hoods in woods
other than walnut—the most he charged for
any clock case—and Stretch charged £15-0-0
for arch-dial clock movements, for a total of
£20-0-0 for the combined clock and case. Storb
also suggests that the moon dial seen on this
clock was produced in the years 1725-35 and
that John Head debited Peter Stretch for cherry
clock cases in 1732 and 1737, so the 1750 date
in the catalog may be late. Storb writes that he
does not know if the pierced name boss with the
maker’s name and location surrounded by engraved foliate scrolls,
a pair of birds in flight, and the motto “
Tempus Rerum Imperator”
(Time, Commander of All Things) added to the £15 price Stretch
charged for arch-dial clocks. He also suggests that the clock once had
turned feet. His evidence is holes bored in the base.
This exceptional Queen Anne carved and
figured maple armchair, attributed to Solomon
Fussell or William Savery of Philadelphia,
circa 1750, is 45½" high and sold for $60,000
(est. $60,000/120,000) on one bid on the phone.
According to the catalog, Albert Sack called
it “Best” and “one of the great masterpieces
of Pennsylvania furniture.” It was included in
Jack Lindsey’s
Worldly Goods:
The Arts of Early Pennsylvania
1680-1758
at the Philadelphia
Museum of Art in 1999. (At
Christie’s in October 1996 it
had sold for $134,500.) The
undercut scrolled handgrip
was one of the feature photos
in the front of this 2017 sale’s
catalog, and the chair was
placed at the front of the sale’s
exhibition with the painting by
Edward Hicks. Philadelphia
collector Joan Johnson said
she owns the chair’s mate;
perhaps she now has a pair.
This is a rare William and Mary line-
and-berry-inlaid walnut chest of drawers,
Chester County, Pennsylvania, circa 1740.
It is 44" x 39¼" x 23" and sold for $52,500
on the phone with competition online and
in the salesroom, even though drawers had
been rebuilt and the feet and base moldings
were replaced. This is another example of
how repairs did not affect the price.
This rare circa 1770 Pennsylvania
Windsor walnut dish-top table,
26" x 17¼" x 17", sold for
$18,750 (est. $3000/5000) in the
salesroom to Pennsylvania
collector Steve Smith, underbid
by another collector on the
phone with Erik Gronning.