Desk

Date1770-1780

OriginAmerica, North Carolina, Northeastern or Virginia, Norfolk

MediumBlack walnut, yellow pine, cherry, and maple

DimensionsOH: 44 1/8", OW: 44 1/2", OD: 27 1/2"

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1951-398

DescriptionAppearance: Blockfront desk with architectonic corbelled and recessed interior, four pilastered document drawers interspaced with pairs of vertical pigeon holes over small drawers, central arched prospect door, with removable interior case with upper pigeon holes over lower drawer, and behind this a hidden case with three plain drawers with leather pulls; fluted quarter columns frame case; large brass pulls, on upper case drawer bent to fit blockfront; stepped ogee bracket feet.

Construction: On the case, the top and bottom boards are half-blind dovetailed to the two-board side panels. The vertically set backboards are nailed into rabbets at the top and sides and flush-nailed at the bottom. The fall board has mitered batten ends that are tongue and grooved in place and secured with pins. The exposed black walnut portion of the writing surface and the corresponding yellow pine dustboard are dadoed to the case sides. Each of the thin fall board supports is faced with an applied thumbnail-molded facade and surmounted by a dovetail-shaped tenon that corresponds to a long dovetail-shaped mortise cut into the underside of the writing surface and dustboard. All drawer blades are tenoned and pinned to the front stiles and additionally dadoed to the side panels. The drawer runners are nailed to the side panels. A shallow well is found at the bottom of the case because of the inclusion of bottom drawer runners and a corresponding blade. The quarter-columns and plinths are glued and nailed to stiles that are tenoned in place and are similarly joined to the case sides. The base molding is nailed in place, while the front and rear side bracket feet are nailed to the underside of the case and are further supported by shaped wooden flankers and quarter-round vertical glue blocks. The rear brackets are flush-nailed to the side brackets and to the underside of the case and are additionally secured with quarter-round vertical glue blocks that sit on the outside of the bracket.

On the desk interior, the three long upper drawers over the pigeonholes reveal traditional dovetailed joinery, although the bottom edges have mitered corners. The bottom panels are glued into rabbets, while the face moldings are nailed to the drawer fronts with the protruding sections nailed around glued-on blocks. Chamfered glue blocks are found inside of the front on the right side drawer but not on any other drawers. The dividers and shelves on the desk interior are dadoed to one another and to the side panels, with the dividers miter-joined at the bottom. The prospect door has a nailed-on molding and keystone. Inside this section is a removable prospect case that has open dovetailed construction, a backboard nailed into rabbets, and traditionally dovetailed drawers. The entire prospect case is locked in place with a wooden spring fitted into the right side panel and accessible only through a small hole on the corresponding vertical divider. Behind this case is another hidden prospect. It, too, has open dovetailed construction and three stacked drawers with standard dovetails and leather pulls. This second case is held in place with a wooden spring fitted into the top board and is accessible only through a small hole in the upper dustboard. The four document drawers have shaped sides nailed into rabbets at the front and flush-nailed at the rear and bottoms that are flush-glued to the interior surfaces. The pilasters and corresponding moldings and plinths are cut from the solid rather than built up from individual pieces of wood. The desk interior sits on a raised plinth board that has a molded leading edge and is nailed to the rear half of the writing surface.

All of the case drawers are traditionally dovetailed together, have chamfered bottom panels set into grooves with full-length glue strips along the sides, and are flush-nailed at the rear. The blocked fronts of the case drawers are shaped from single pieces of wood, and the interior surfaces of the projecting faces are hollowed out and fitted with individual shaped blocks glued to the drawer bottoms. On the top drawer, the upper edges are notched to receive the fall board supports. Both of the notched areas are framed with a horizontal rail sprig-nailed to the drawer sides and a vertical rail that abuts the horizontal rail and is dovetailed into the front and back of the drawer.

Materials: Black walnut top, sides, moldings, drawer fronts, exposed parts of feet, interior prospect cases and corresponding drawer fronts, quarter columns, stiles, blades, plinth on desk interior and exposed front section of writing surface, fall board, and pins; yellow pine backboard, bottom board, foot blocks, rear faces of bracket feet, all drawer secondaries, and rear section of writing surface; cherry spring lock on front prospect case, and foot blocks; maple spring lock on rear prospect case.

Label TextAt first glance, this black walnut desk resembles the blockfront examples produced in eighteenth-century New England. Both feature deeply shaped facades, stepped bracket feet, and architecturally inspired baroque interiors with corbelled recesses, pilasters, and arched prospect doors. Even the omission of dustboards on the interior of the black walnut desk parallels common New England practices. Upon closer inspection, however, other structural elements and the extensive use of yellow pine as a secondary wood separate this desk from its New England counterparts. The drawer blades on this desk are mortised into the case sides rather than slid into open dovetails and the drawer runners are screwed and nailed in place, whereas many Boston pieces use sliding dovetails in this location.

The desk is firmly associated with a group of case furniture produced around Norfolk, Virginia, and the adjacent northeast corner of North Carolina, a largely rural region that had significant economic and craft ties to Norfolk. Key to the attribution was the discovery of a desk by the same artisan. The second desk was collected by its former owner in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, in the 1930s (CWF acc. 1986-238). The desks exhibit virtually identical document drawers faced with fluted pilasters and deeply molded terminals. In both cases, the pilasters are cut from single pieces of wood, a time-consuming approach rarely encountered elsewhere. Equally distinctive are the matching blocked fronts of the interior drawers, each with unusual mitered bottom pins on the dovetailed corners. Similar detailing appears on the interior drawers of a northeastern North Carolina bookcase possibly by the same craftsman.

It is impossible at present to determine whether the desks were made in urban Norfolk or rural North Carolina. The unmistakable stylistic ties to New England cabinetmaking traditions are certainly akin to those that produced Norfolk dressing tables like CWF acc. 1989-424, which closely resembles tables from the Connecticut River valley. Yet New England influences are also evident in several northeastern North Carolina dressing tables, and the style could easily have been introduced to the area by Samuel Lockhart, Thomas Sharrock, or any of the other Norfolk-trained cabinetmakers who moved there before the Revolution. Wherever he worked, it is clear that the maker of these desks was not trained in New England but merely copied the exterior details of imported New England pieces. It is likely that he also worked as a house joiner, an assumption based on the exposed nailing of many of the raised elements on the desk interiors and the application of the segmental moldings on the long upper drawers on the writing interior of the present desk. Both techniques are common in house carpentry.

Inscribed"B_ll" or "B__ll" is written in ink on the top edge of the upper right side drawer in the desk section. Incised construction "X" marks are seen on most of the drawers along with modern pencil numbers and scribbles. Compass marks appear on several of the interior desk drawers. There are incised roman numerals on the drawer sides. Late nineteenth-century pencil inscriptions on the interior desk drawers read "Spencer Scotton," "John W. Scotton," and "J.B. Scotton, Esq."
MarkingsNone.
ProvenanceThe desk was acquired from Israel Sack of New York in 1951. Sack purchased the piece from the Riddle family of Philadelphia, who had collected it in North Carolina. Inscriptions on the desk indicate that it was owned by the Scotton family of Maryland and Delaware in the late nineteenth century.

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