Desk on frame

Date1770-1790

OriginAmerica, Virginia, Eastern or Piedmont

MediumBlack walnut and yellow pine

DimensionsOH: 59 1/8"; OW: 48 1/4"; OD(open): 44"; OD(closed): 24"

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1968-304

DescriptionAppearance: Slant top desk with reading molding and upper shelf; divided desk interior with lower tier of shelves; thumb-nail molded drawers and an open front area; lower frame with rear drawer and front leaf supported on swing leg; ovolo molded Marlborough legs and beaded stretchers.

Construction: On the desk section, the balusters are through-tenoned into the shelf and into the top board, which in turn is flush-mounted to the top edges of the side and back panels and secured with wooden pins. The carcass is joined with open-dovetails, and some of the dovetail pins are wedged. The two-piece bottom board is nailed into rabbets on the underside of the case, while the two-piece lid is dowel-joined and features mitered tongue-and-groove end battens and flush-mounted edge moldings. The book molding is flush-nailed in place. The interior dividers are dadoed to one another and to the sides of the case. The interior drawers reveal traditional dovetail joinery, although some of the small dovetail pins are wedged. On each drawer, the sides of the bottom panel are beveled, set into corresponding grooves, and held in place by a full-height drawer back.

On the frame, the rails are tenoned into the legs. Inner side rails are flush-nailed in place and form rabbets that support the nailed-on two-piece top board, which is fitted along the front edge with a rule-joined blade and cut around the top of the front legs. The inner front rail is secured to the hinged rail with large wooden pins. As with the lid, the two-piece table leaf is doweled together and through tenoned with mitered tongue-and-groove battens. The one-piece rear rail is cut to receive a large drawer, now missing. A pair of broad, flat drawer supports is tenoned into the front and rear rails. The stretchers are tenoned into the legs, and the front stretcher is notched at the center to receive the swing leg.

Materials: Black walnut shelf, balusters, top board, side and back panels, lid, leaf, drawer fronts, moldings, legs, hinged and fixed outer rails, exposed frame pins, desk divider blades, and stretchers; yellow pine desk dividers, bottom boards, drawer secondaries, drawer supports, inner front and side rails, and inner frame pins.
Label TextThe neat and plain style of this desk, which has an oral tradition of use at an Orange County tavern in the Virginia Piedmont, mirrors then prevalent Virginia fashions. Less common are the open upper shelf, the presence of decorative moldings on all four sides, and the use of highly figured wood on the back, all of which indicate that the desk was designed to be used in the middle of a room. The baluster-supported upper shelf was a handy storage element and also acted as a barrier that literally and psychologically separated the person behind the desk from the client or associate on the other side.

The user had access to a host of small interior drawers and could raise the unusual rule-joined table leaf to create a large work surface. The public side of the desk originally contained a large lockable drawer that increased its storage capacity. These features suggest that this desk was first used in a school or business. Tutor Philip Fithian noted the presence of a similar form in the schoolroom at Nomini Hall, the Westmoreland County home of planter Robert Carter, in his diary on February 2, 1774: "Prissy This day began Multiplication. We had also a large elegant Writing Table brought to us, so high that the Writers must stand."

The upper section of the CWF desk was originally attached to the frame with wooden pins that are now missing. Pinned joinery figures prominently elsewhere in the construction: all of the mortise-and-tenon joints are pinned, and the interior front rail is attached to the hinged rail in a similar fashion. The top board of the desk section is flush-mounted to the side panels and secured with wooden pins as well. Even the two-board desk lid and table leaf are butt-joined and pinned, a method most often associated with early floorboard construction. The conspicuous use of pinned construction, as well as the presence of thin wedges that bisect several of the dovetails pins, suggests production by a carpenter or joiner. Stylistically, this desk follows provincial British models and structural parallels in British carpentry can be found as well.

InscribedThe desk interior shows adhered remnants of twentieth-century printed matter. A nineteenth-century pencil inscription on the top of the table section reads "Mr. Edward."
MarkingsNo.
ProvenanceThe desk was acquired in 1968 from Williamsburg antiques dealer William Bozarth, who reported that it had been acquired by its previous owner in the 1920s at an auction of the contents of an old tavern located on the road between Montpelier and Orange in Orange Co., Va.