Side chair

Date1800-1815

MediumBlack walnut and holly.

DimensionsOH: 34 1/2"; OW: 18 3/8"; OD: 17 1/2".

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1987-827

DescriptionAppearance: Side chair with square back consisting of cock beaded stiles, splat rail, and crest rail; crest rail topped with short carved tablet; crest and splat rails support splat consisting of three narrow vertical elements carved with neo-classic foliage and supporting a carved double swagged, fringed drapery arranged over 3 holly cloak pins; slightly bowed side and front seat rails; over rail upholstery on front and side seat rails, half over rail on rear seat rail; originally covered with black horsehair (fragments survive under nail heads on bottom of seat rails) and trimmed with straight rows of brass nails; square tapered legs; front legs have holly string inlay on all four sides, stringing arched at top of front and outside leg surfaces, parallel at top of back and inside leg surfaces.

Construction: The front and side seat rails are horizontally double laminated and are shaped on both their inner and outer faces. The rear rail is solid. The corner blocks are vertically grained and quarter-round in shape. Those in the rear are solid, while the front blocks are double laminated.

Materials: Black walnut crest rail, splat, splat rail, stiles, front legs, seat rails, and glue blocks (by microanalysis); holly inlays.
Label TextMany Philadelphia furniture makers who migrated to the urban South during the years just after the Revolution took up residence in Norfolk, Virginia. Although most were journeymen in search of employment, some were established independent tradesmen. For instance, in 1793 Messrs. Hazen and Chamberlin, previously associated with "the first shops in Philadelphia," opened a cabinet- and chairmaking shop in Portsmouth, Virginia, just across the Elizabeth River from Norfolk. Six years later, Philadelphia "windsor chairmaker" Michael Murphy moved his business to Norfolk, as did cabinetmaker Joseph Lestrade in 1817.

This well-carved neoclassical chair descended in the Galt family of Norfolk and was almost certainly made there by a transplanted Philadelphian. The chair's splat pattern was adapted from plate 49 in Sheraton's 1802 edition of the Cabinet-Maker and Upholsterer's Drawing Book and was common in and around Philadelphia. It has been recorded nowhere else in America except Norfolk, where several examples remain. That the chair was produced in Norfolk and not imported is suggested by the fact that its frame and secondary supports, including seat rails and glue blocks, are of black walnut, a wood that remained fashionable in coastal Virginia well into the nineteenth century. In typical Norfolk style, the chair features an abundance of stringing, even on the backs of the front legs where it would be difficult to see.

Small differences in the carving and design of Norfolk-made chairs in this pattern indicate that they were produced in more than one shop. The CWF chair is one of the most carefully executed examples in the group. Among the subtle refinements its maker incorporated is the novel use of three minute, round, holly inlays on the splat. They were intended to represent the bright brass cloak pins from which fringed classical drapery, here carved in black walnut, would have been suspended.

InscribedNone.
MarkingsNone.
ProvenanceThe chair probably came to Williamsburg from Norfolk when Sarah Maria (Sallie) Galt bequeathed the family's longtime Williamsburg residence to the Norfolk branch of her family in 1880. It remained in the Galts' Williamsburg house until the contents were sold at auction by Anne Galt Black in 1979. Purchased at that time by Ohio antiques dealer Don Desapre, the chair was subsequently resold to dealers Priddy & Beckerdite of Richmond, Va., who sold it to CWF in 1987.

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