SALE OF FAMILY PLATE

Waikato Times, Volume 108, Issue 18165, 1 November 1930, Page 15 (Supplement)

SALE OF FAMILY PLATE

It will soon be difficult to keep

’ count of the silver dinner services ■J belonging to famous families which have been sold at auction, says a London exchange. At Christie's recently the Duke of Montrose’s Georgian plates and dishes were offered, and brought £1296 11s 3d. In the space- of twelve months there ha\e been sold at Christie’s the dinner services associated with families of Brownlow, Ranfurlv, Ravensworth, Balfour, and Wold of Lulworth Castle to name the more important. The service sold most recently was made for the third duke, James (1755-1836), and bore his arms, but there was an enhanced interest in the arms at the back of some of the dishes, which were of the family of Barham of Staines and Canterbury Impaling Smyth. It was from this family that' iiie celebrated author of “The' Ingoldsby Legends” sprang— Canon R. H. Barham, of St. Paul’s. The assumption is that the arms are those of his grandfather. If the witty versifier could have lived he would have doubtless invented another “legend” on the sale.