Images(9)

Storage Jar

Date1835-1838

Maker Lucius Jordan (1818-1889)

OriginAmerica, Georgia, Washington County

MediumAsh-glazed stoneware

DimensionsOH: 15 in.; Diameter: 11 in.

Credit LineMuseum Purchase, The Friends of the Colonial Williamsburg Collections Fund

Object number2018-228

DescriptionAsh-glazed ovoid shaped storage jar with everted rim and lug handles high on the shoulder, directly beneath the rim. Incised onto the side of the vessel near the shoulder are the conjoined initials"LJ" for Lucius Jordan and 5 slash marks next to one of the handles to indicate that it is a 5-gallon jar. In addition, there is a hand print on the rim that was left by the potter when he was dipping it into the wet glaze.
Label TextApproximately 100 miles from the Edgefield District of South Carolina was another group of stoneware potters working in Washington County, Georgia. The first potters known to have worked in this region were trained in Edgefield and there are similarities between the pots made in the two areas. Lucius Jordan, the potter who signed his initials on this vessel was a free person of color who worked first in Washington County and then moved shortly after this piece was produced to neighboring Hancock County. Around 1860, approximately twenty-two years later he returns to Washington and is listed in documents as white. Jordan’s story appears to speak to the complexities of race in the antebellum South.

MarkingsConjoined initials "LJ" incised