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Desk and bookcase

Date1750-1760

Artist/Maker Mardun Vaughan Eventon

OriginAmerica, Virginia, King William County

MediumBlack walnut with oak and yellow pine secondary woods

DimensionsOH: 87 3/4"; OW: 39 1/2"; OD; 21 5/8"

Credit LineGift of The Burlington-Gwathmey Memorial Foundation

Object number1988-437

DescriptionAppearance: Black walnut desk and bookcase in two parts; desk with hinged fallboard concealing writing interior with a figured walnut prospect door flanked by vertical document drawers concealed behind columns; document drawers originally released by a latch inside flanking shaped drawers, now one is opened with a brass pull and the other opened with a nail; shaped drawers are flanked by two stepped drawers and sit below two pigeon holes with brackets; brackets closest to prospect conceal shallower drawers, brackets are replacements; stepped drawers below pigeonhole with brackets; molding beneath shaped drawers and prospect; writing surface and interior all above four long graduated drawers; top drawer flanked by fallboard supports; three late baroque brasses on each drawer front, now missing original bails.

Bookcase: molded cornice above two raised paneled doors with pierced brass rococo escutcheons; left door has dead bolts at top and bottom with brass encasement with drop leaf pendant designs at one end; doors conceal interior with cluster of three shelf supports above row of eight pigeonholes with brackets above large central pigeonhole flanked by two tiers of pigeonholes on each side, inner pigeonholes lack brackets and are wider than outer ones with brackets, all above row of eight pigeonholes with brackets; above three drawers with brass pulls; center drawer set in; below doors are two shallow drawers (candlestick shelves) with brass pulls.

Construction: On the bookcase, the side panels are secured to the top board with open dovetails and to the bottom board with half-blind dovetails. The vertically grained back panel is beveled on the top and sides and set into corresponding grooves flush-nailed at the bottom, and further secured with nails driven into the rear edges of the shelves. Except for a bottom bead, the cornice is cut from the solid. The cornice and waist moldings are nailed in place. The door panels are set into grooves on pinned mortised-and-tenoned frames. The pigeonhole dividers are set into dadoes mitered to one another and have glued-on brackets. The small drawers are dovetailed front and rear, with mitered top edges on the rear corners and bottom panels that are glued into rabbets. The candle slides are in the form of shallow dovetailed drawers with bottom panels glued into rabbets.

On the desk, the two-board sides are secured to the top with blind dovetails and to the bottom with half-blind dovetails. The back construction matches that of the bookcase. The drawer blades and stiles adjacent to the fall-board supports are open dovetailed into the case. The large drawers rest on runners attached to the case sides with nails set in rectangular notches. The fall board has end battens that are tongue and grooved with mitered top corners. The integral base molding and bracket feet are cut from single boards, nailed to framing strips on the underside of the case, mitered at the front corners, and pinned to vertical quarter-round glue blocks. On the desk interior, the small drawers are built like those in the bookcase. The document drawers are flush-nailed together, while the vertical partitions and drawer dividers sit in dadoes and are miter-joined to one another. The central pigeonhole brackets slide out to reveal shallow dovetailed drawers supported by thin runners. The central prospect section and surrounding pigeonholes sit on a thin platform with a molded leading edge.

The case drawers have dovetailed frames and are mitered at the rear corners. The riven drawer bottoms have grain running front to back. They are beveled along the front and sides, set into corresponding grooves, reinforced with corresponding glue blocks, and flush-nailed at the rear.

Materials: Black walnut case sides, doors, fallboard, drawer fronts, drawer blades, moldings, exposed parts of feet, and top board on desk; oak small drawer bottoms, large drawer sides and backs, and fall-board supports; yellow pine small drawer sides and backs, large drawer bottoms, backboards, bookcase top and bottom boards, desk bottom board and foot blocking.
Label TextFew known advertisements by pre-Revolutionary southern cabinetmakers are more extensive than the one Mardun Vaughan Eventon placed in the Virginia Gazette on August 22, 1777. The maker of this desk and bookcase, Eventon informed the public that he "Wants Employment, and is now at Leisure, a Master Workman in the various Branches of the Cabinet Business, chinese, gotick, carving, and turning; is well acquainted with the Theory and Practice in any of the grand Branches of the five ancient Orders, viz. Ornamental Architects, gothick, chinese, and modern Taste, &c. also Colonades, Porticoes, Frontispieces, &c. to Doors; compound, pick [pitch] Pediment, and plain Tabernacle Chimney Pieces; chinese, ramp, and twist Pedestals; geometrical, circular, plain, and common Stair Cases, and sundry other pieces of Architect too tedious mentioning. My chief Desire is to act in the Capacity of Superintender, or Supervisor, over any reasonable Number of Hands, either in public or private Buildings. I have an elegant Assortment of Tools and Books of Architect, which I imported from London and Liverpool."

Despite the trail of similarly informative references left by this self-proclaimed master of the woodworking trades, Mardun Eventon remains an enigmatic figure. Circumstantial evidence of his existence first appears in 1755 when carpenter Maurice Eventon, Mardun's kinsman and constant companion, took an apprentice in King William County, Virginia, about twenty-five miles northwest of Williamsburg. That cabinetmaker Mardun was also there is suggested by the inscription "Made By / Mardun V. Eventon" inside the body of this desk and bookcase. It descended in the Gwathmey family of Burlington plantation in the same county.

By 1762, the Eventons had moved north to Prince William County on the Potomac River, where Mardun was party to a legal action. About the same time, he appeared in the ledgers of a local merchant who credited the versatile artisan for making tables and repairing a broom and a scrubbing clamp. Other Prince William County records show Mardun was paid for unspecified "joiner's work" and for work on the lower church of Dettingen Parish. During this period he advertised for "Two or Three Journeymen CABINETMAKERS" and witnessed the indenture of Thomas Williams to Maurice, who was to instruct the boy in the "Carpenters and house Joiners traide." These references and the similarity of their trades suggest that Mardun and Maurice worked together on projects like the Dettingen Parish church.

Mardun's career was marked by repeated legal troubles and financial reverses, which may account for his continual relocations. Financial difficulties in 1763 compelled him to sell or mortgage most of his household goods, livestock, provisions, "two thousand feet of Walnut plank," "one Compleat set of Cabinet &. one Compleat set of Joyner's Tools," and a set of turner's tools. The setback may have been connected to troubles suffered earlier in the year when Mardun was brought before the Prince William County court and charged with attempting to break into the local jail to free two suspected counterfeiters. Trouble followed him in his next move to Henrico County in central Virginia, where he was sued again in 1768.

By 1777, Mardun had moved to Chesterfield County west of Richmond. That his difficulties continued is indicated by the above advertisement in which he stated, "Wants Employment, and is now at Leisure." The Revolution had begun, and the consequent lack of business may have led him to join the army. A "Mardan Evington" is listed on a muster role for the 5th Virginia Regiment of the Continental Line. By the end of the year, Mardun was either injured or ill, forcing Maurice to offer his kinsman's tools and books for sale. Mardun died a short time later and his remaining possessions, including "12 or 15 books of architecture, by the latest and best authors in Britain, viz. Swan, Pain, Langley, and Halfpenny" and "as complete a set of cabinet and carpenters tools as any in the state," were again offered by Maurice to settle debts owed by Mardun's estate.

The eccentric nature of Mardun's personal and professional history mirrors the eclectic nature of his furniture, which is distinguished by a merging of diverse stylistic and structural traditions. The exterior surfaces of his wares reflect the British-inspired, neat-and-plain furniture so popular in eastern Virginia during the third quarter of the eighteenth century. Yet the highly sophisticated writing interior of the CWF piece features corbelled drawer ranks and receding ogee-blocked drawer fronts that differ markedly from those on most contemporary Tidewater desks. This is also true of the compartmentalized bookcase and the drawerlike candle slides. All of these features had largely fallen out of fashion in Britain and eastern Virginia after the 1730s, but are akin to those on mid-century New England desks.

As with its design, the construction of the desk and bookcase parallels a wide range of British and New England craft traditions. The drawer runners are nailed into the dadoed side panels of the case rather than glued, a technique more common to rural British and New England goods, as are the exposed dovetail joints on the front of the desk section. By the 1750s, urban eastern Virginia artisans were using dustboards set into rabbets rather than nailed-on drawer runners, and fully concealed carcass joinery was the norm. Equally contradictory structural and stylistic elements appear on a chest of drawers in the CWF collection (accession 1957-157) that is firmly attributed to Mardun Eventon.

InscribedSigned "Made By / Mardun V. Eventon" in chalk on the inside of the lower case backboards. There is an illegible ink inscription on the top board of the desk section.
MarkingsNone.
ProvenanceThe desk and bookcase descended through the Gwathmey family of Burlington plantation in King William Co., Va. It remained in the house at Burlington until 1987, when it was loaned to CWF. The loan became a gift in 1988.