Five-piece coffee and tea set for one

Intended as a service for one, both the coffeepot and teapot in this diminutive service hold one-half pint of liquid. In the latter half of the nineteenth century in Europe and America, the term cabaret service was applied to small services that included either a tea- or coffeepot, a creamer and sugar bowl, and often a tray. Those intended for two held one pint in the tea- and coffeepots and were called tete à tetes. Those intended for one were termed solitaire services.

Although lacking a tray, this elaborate set has both a coffee- and teapot as well as a creamer, sugar bowl, and waste bowl. It is characterized by the clean lines, symmetry, and polished surfaces of the Neo-Grec style introduced in this country by George Wilkinson, a professional English designer engaged by the Gorham Company in 1857. The jewelry-like gilded ajouré-work monogram emphasizes the intention of the service as a type of personal ornament. The new style offered a high contrast to the effusive naturalistic ornament and highly textured surfaces characteristic of the prevailing Rococo-revival style, and by 1870 it had spread to manufacturers throughout the United States.

The set may have been made by John R. Wendt, a talented silversmith born and trained in Germany. Wendt’s New York City shop provided silver for Ball, Black & Co. and others, such as Crosby & Morse of Boston, retailers of this service. Before moving to New York, he worked in Boston, earning recognition as a chaser. The refined flat-chased ornament that graces this service also appears on the Rogers & Wendt service (see cat. no. 229) and on hollowware marked by Ball, Black & Co. It has been suggested that the quality mark “925/1000” within a shield, inscribed on each piece, may also support an attribution to Wendt.

Samuel Trevett Crosby, the first-named partner of Crosby & Morse, was born in Charlestown, New Hampshire. In 1837 he began an apprenticeship with Jones, Lows & Ball (a forerunner of Shreve, Crump & Low), the Boston luxury goods retail house. It is unknown whether Crosby apprenticed as a smith, watchmaker, or shopkeeper. A decade later he became associated with Jeffrey R. Brackett (about 1815 – 1876) and celebrated Boston silversmith Obadiah Rich. The three advertised in the 1847 – 48 Boston directory as “Importers, Wholesale and Retail Dealers in Rich Watches, Jewelry and Plated Wares . . . Silverware by O. Rich.” By 1850 blindness caused Rich to retain only a financial interest in the trade, and Brackett left entirely to become a commercial broker. After a short period as sole name, as indicated on the company letterhead, Crosby took Seth E. Brown as a partner and, later, engraver and jeweler Henry D. Morse, with whom he retailed this service. In 1869 Charles M. Foss joined the firm.

By the late 1860s both Crosby and his partner Morse had worked in Boston’s jewelry trade for a generation, Crosby principally as a retailer. Morse began his career as an engraver in the 1840s; he became interested in the new popular diamond business, and, during his partnership with Crosby, diamond jewelry seems to have been the company’s focus. In the 1865 triennial exhibition of the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanics Association, Crosby & Morse earned a gold medal for Morse’s diamond-cutting expertise, which “introduced a new art to the mechanics of our country.” The firm competed directly with Boston’s preeminent jewelry houses such as Shreve, Stanwood & Co. and Bigelow, Kennard & Co., all located within a few blocks of one another in Boston’s fashionable shopping district on upper Washington Street.

These firms drew their inventories of silverware from large manufacturers, including Gorham in nearby Providence, Rhode Island, and from wholesalers such as the Laformes of Boston and John R. Wendt, who had moved from Boston to New York City in 1860.

According to the R. G. Dun reports of the early 1870s, the firm of Crosby & Morse suffered financial reverses due to “heavy expenses.” Morse claimed that he had left the firm before it failed. Foss joined Crosby in 1876, and the Dun report noted that Crosby and Foss “finally settled their debts and are going on but there is great lack of confidence . . . [they are] not recommended for credit.” By 1890 Crosby left the jewelry trade for the insurance business, and Morse rejoined Foss at 120 Tremont Street, where they worked as diamond specialists.

This text has been adapted from "Silver of the Americas, 1600-2000," edited by Jeannine Falino and Gerald W.R. Ward, published in 2008 by the MFA. Complete references can be found in that publication.