circa 1765, dense and rich red brown mahogany, deeply carved raised arch shell to crest rails, pierced vasiform splats, trapezoidal seat frames, front cabriole legs with anthemion knee carvings, ball and claw feet, baluster and block turned side stretchers, marked "XII" and XIII", 38-3/4 x 21-3/4 x 20-3/4 in, seat height 17-1/2 in.
Provenance: By descent through three generations of the Charles Morris Smith Family, Providence, Rhode Island; Sotheby's, New York, NY, "Important American Furniture, Decorations, Silver and Chinese Export Porcelain," January 28, 1984, lot 865; The Hascoe Family, Greenwich Connecticut; Sotheby's, New York, NY, "Property from the Hascoe Family Collection, Important American and English Furniture, Fine and Decorative Art", January 23, 2011, lot 34; Levison & Cullen Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia, January 2013 (accompanied by copy of invoice); Estate of Richard and Shirley Roberts, Virginia Beach, Virginia
Literature: Illustrated in Michael Moses, Master Craftsmen of Newport: The Townsends and Goddards (1984), pl. 21, p. 236, fig. 5.24/5.24a.
Note: These chairs are part of a set of at least fourteen chairs, now with only six surviving, one (marked 'I') which is in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum (illustrated in Morrison H. Heckscher, American Furniture in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (1985), pp.44-45, cat. no. 9. Notably, the set is unusual among Rhode Island cabriole-leg chairs in having square seat frames and anthemion-like relief carving on the sharp-edged knees.
In characteristic manner, the feet of these chairs display balls proportionally wider than they are tall, slender and elongated talons, delineated knuckles with the rear talon meeting the ankle in a rounded joint, and a flattened area between the tendons of the ankle. These same feet appear in a corner chair and table made for John Brown in 1760 and a tea table made for Jabez Bowen in 1763 (see: Albert Sack, The New Fine Points of Furniture: Early American [1993], p. 67 and Nancy Richards and Nancy Goyne Evans, New England Furniture at Winterthur: Queen Anne and Chippendale, [1997], pp. 238-239, cat.no. 123).
This pair of chairs descended in the family of Charles Morris Smith (b. 1838), a Rhode Island financier, and were passed down in the family home at 112 Benevolent Street in Providence until their initial sale in 1984. The original set of chairs was probably made for John Still Winthrop (1720-1776), the great-grandson of Quaker colonist Governor John Winthrop (1588-1649). A resident of New London, Connecticut, Winthrop had strong ties to nearby Newport; his sister, Mary, married Joseph Wanton (1705-1780), the last colonial governor of Rhode Island. Charles Morris Smith's grandfather, Amos Denison Smith, was a landowner in Groton, Connecticut, where the Winthrop family also owned real estate.
The four remaining known chairs from the original set of 14 include the chair at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, two that were sold at Christie's, New York, NY, "Important American Furniture, Folk Art and Decorative Arts", October 5, 2000, lots 95 and 96, and a single chair sold Sotheby's, New York, NY, "Property From The Hascoe Family Collection: Important American And English Furniture, Fine & Decorative Arts", January 23, 2011, lot 65.
By descent through three generations of the Charles Morris Smith Family, Providence, Rhode Island; Sotheby's, New York, NY, "Important American Furniture, Decorations, Silver and Chinese Export Porcelain," January 28, 1984, lot 865; The Hascoe Family, Greenwich Connecticut; Sotheby's, New York, NY, "Property from the Hascoe Family Collection, Important American and English Furniture, Fine and Decorative Art", January 23, 2011, lot 34; Levison & Cullen Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia, January 2013 (accompanied by copy of invoice); Estate of Richard and Shirley Roberts, Virginia Beach, Virginia
in very good condition overall, repairs and infill at one crest rail attachment, typical minor restorations such as later bracket returns and one rear foot, later slip seat frames, typical stress cracks to mahogany, one chair now with scattered finish distress at splat (see photos)； per Sotheby's condition report in 2011 "chair XII： proper right rear heel cracked and reglued and pinned, rear seat rail, shoe, splat and crest rail numbered VI, partially repinned, slip seat frame replaced chair XIII： rear seat rail, shoe, splat and crest rail marked XI, proper right rear heel cracked, reglued and repinned, proper side knee return replaced, repinned, wear to central stretcher, slip seat frame replaced one chair bearing Roman numeral XIII on inner seat frame, the other chair bearing the number XII, each with identifying assembly Roman numerals on the backside, crest, seat rail and shoe"
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