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A rare
silver wine cup, once owned by William Bradford, is now owned jointly by
Pilgrim Hall Museum and the Smithsonian.
Elegant in its simplicity, the Bradford Cup is made of 12 ounces of
solid silver and stands 7” high. The
initials “WB” are engraved just below the top edge.
The bowl is marked with the maker’s initials (“H.S.”), the
“lion passant” that was used on London silver until 1697 and a date
letter (which appears on every piece of silver assayed in London), which
tells us the cup was made in 1634.
The 17th century is the first period from which a sizeable
quantity of domestic silver survives, probably because of the enormous
quantities of silver imported by the Spanish from the Americas.
It is rare, however, to find domestic silver from the first half of
the century and even rarer to find a silver piece connected with an early
American leader.
The cup is documented, as one of a pair, in the 1657 inventory of
William Bradford’s estate - “A Trew Inventory of the Estate of Mr.
William Bradford… 2 wine Cupps.”
The cups were valued at a total of 2 pounds.
Bradford’s estate was divided between his sons with a share to
his widow, Alice Carpenter Southworth Bradford.
The inventory of her estate, taken 31 March 1670, includes “a
wine Cupp” valued at 1 pound.
The cup descended to William and Alice Bradford’s son, Major William
Bradford, then to his son David Bradford, and then to his daughter Lydia,
who married, first, Elkanah Cushman and, second, Lazarus LeBaron (son of
Francis LeBaron, immortalized in fiction by Jane G. Austin as “The
Nameless Nobleman”).
The cup then descended through the LeBaron/Bradfords, remaining in
Plymouth until the mid-19th century when the cup was
transported first to Illinois and then to New Orleans.
A modern-day Bradford descendant first offered the cup for sale in 1981. At that time, the Smithsonian bid on the cup, but fell short.
In March of 1985, however, the combined forces of the Pilgrim
Society’s Pilgrim Hall Museum and the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum
of American History were able to purchase the cup from its new European
owner for just under $100,000. More
than half of the purchase price came from the Pilgrim Society.
The major source was John G. Talcott, Jr., Trustee of the Pilgrim
Society (former president and now a Trustee Emeritus of the
Society).
John Talcott, slender and elegant, is still active and involved in the
Pilgrim Society – at the age of 97!
John remembers his first “Bradford project” as being the bronze
statue of William Bradford that now stands on the Plymouth waterfront.
When John was serving as president of the Plymouth Bicentennial
Commission in 1976, he noticed that there were two people who were almost
unrecognized in the Town of Plymouth.
Those two were Plymouth’s first governors: John Carver and
William Bradford. Pilgrim Hall Museum provided an avenue for righting at least
one of those wrongs! Among
the collections at the Hall was a plaster statue of Bradford by renowned
artist Cyrus Dallin. John
arranged, almost single-handedly, for a near-life-size bronze casting of
this plaster model of Bradford to be made and properly displayed on a
plinth near Plymouth Rock.
When the Bradford Cup became available in 1984, John once again
became involved with William Bradford.
Laurence Pizer, former Director of the Pilgrim Society, remembers
John’s generosity as heartfelt and spontaneous.
John, realizing the rarity and
importance of the Bradford Cup, took the lead in ensuring that the it
would be acquired so that this extraordinary artifact would be available
to visitors to Pilgrim Hall Museum. John
is not a Bradford descendant, but says he feels a strong affinity for the
governor – and hasn’t given up on finding that elusive personal
genealogical connection! He
remembers how important he thought it was, when the Cup was offered for
sale, that Pilgrim Hall Museum have something that was listed in the
inventory of Bradford’s estate as being among the governor’s actual
possessions. John also
realized that the Pilgrim Society had better take this opportunity to
acquire the cup. It is
unlikely that another such cup would ever appear!
The Bradford Cup was one of a pair but the whereabouts of the other
cup is unknown. In
reminiscing about his extraordinarily generous support of the acquisition,
John said simply “I thought that I ought to do what I could.”
In the efforts to raise the remaining funds for the purchase of the
Bradford Cup, the Pilgrim Society also had the very welcome services of
Mary Ellen Pogue. Mary Ellen, an energetic little dynamo (and a member of the
Pilgrim Society) who was serving as historian of the Bradford Compact, was
so interested in seeing the Pilgrim Society acquire the cup that she took
the lead in approaching the members of the Bradford Compact for funding.
Mary Ellen, being a resident of Chevy Chase, took particular
delight in the joint ownership between the Pilgrim Society and the
Smithsonian – when the cup was in Plymouth, she knew it was being cared
for by the museum devoted to preserving the artifacts and story of the
Pilgrims. When it was in the
Smithsonian, the cup was not only available to an even wider audience, it
was almost in her own back yard!
The cup now spends three years in Washington in the care of the
Smithsonian Institution and then returns to spend three years in Plymouth
on display at Pilgrim Hall Museum.
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