A George I Caster
Silver
London 1719
Maker’s mark of Paul de Lamerie
Height: 8 ½ inches (21.6 cm)
Weight: 22 oz. 19 dwt. (714 g)
Provenance: Presented to the Rev. Edward Serocold Pearce F.R.S. (later Pearce-Serocold) (1796-1849) by his friend Walter Arcedeckne (1797-1865) in July 1842, and then by descent. Octagonal and on conforming base, the detachable cover pierced with foliage scrolls and lattice work and engraved with portrait busts, with vase-shaped finial, engraved with two crest.

Walter Arcedeckne (1797-1865) was the third son of Chaloner Arcedeckne of Glevering Hall, co. Suffolk. He was educated at Eton College and St. John's College Cambridge. He died in 1865, his residences listed as being in Lower Grosvenor Street and Lewes Crescent, Kempton, Brighton.

Edward Serocold Pearce F.S.A (1796-1849) was the only son of the Rev. William Serocold Pearce D.D., Master of Jesus College, Cambridge. He was educated at Eton College and both St. John's College and Jesus College, Cambridge. He was admitted to the Inner Temple in 1818 and was ordained in 1822. He became curate of St. Mary-le-Bone. He married twice, firstly in 1824 Georgina Elizabeth, the daughter of George Smith M.P. and secondly in 1842 Charlotte, daughter of Col. A. Vansittart of Shottesbroke Park. He died in 1849 and a memorial was raised in his memory in Cherry Hinton church, Cambridge.

Both attended Eton College and entered St. John's College, Cambridge in March 1814 and November 1813 respectively.

Artist Biography:
Paul de Lamerie arrived in England with his Huguenot parents in or before 1689, having been baptiszed at 's Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands in 1688. In 1703 he was apprenticed to the Huguenot goldsmith Pierre Platel, and after being admitted to the freedom of the Goldsmiths' Company, he registered his first mark and set up a workshop in Windmill Street, Soho, in 1712. He took thirteen apprentices between 1715 and 1749 who paid premiums varying between £10 and £45m In 1716 he married Louisa Juliott, also a Huguenot, and by her had six children, three of whom died in childhood. Little more of his personal history is known, although his career in the Goldsmiths' Company is comparatively well documented. By 1717, he was already referred to as 'the King's Silversmith' but again in a complaint 'for making and selling Great quantities of Large Plate which he doth not bring to Goldsmith's Hall to be mark't according to Law.' He joined the livery in 1717; fourteen years later he was elected to the court of assistants. In 1743 he was appointed fourth warden and in 1747 second warden; that he never became prime warden probably due to ill health. From the outset he had wealthy clients such as the Honourable George Treby and the Duke of Sutherland. Among his more important later patrons were Sir Robert Walpole, Baron Anson, and the fifth Earl of Mountrath. A gradual expansion of his business culminated in his move in 1739 to considerably larger premises in Gerrard street. His pre-eminent position in the trade is signified by the commission he received in 1740 from the Goldsmiths' Company to provide two of their most splendid pieces of ceremonial display plate, a silver-gilt inkstand and the famous rococo ewer and dish.