Wiolrealp and Rpla) DpaWs in 



- „»ooKw« CUT <a^ — 



NEWYORK.*'^ ^^=^ ^^ PARIS. 



NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR BREAKAGE. 



HROAUWAT &■ BROQMK 8bi . 



Temis Ca8h,without discount. 







Figure 4. — Letterhead of E. V. Haughvvout .& Co., fiom whom the purple set was oideied. (.Smithsonian 

 photo 6000 1 -A.) 



before the symbol is appropriate. Writing; in 1895 

 Edwin Atlee Barljer says of the Lincohi Cihina that 

 the design for the decoration, selected after nuich 

 consultation among ofiicials at Washington, was added 

 in New York by the importer. It consisted of a 

 spirited rendering of the arms of the United States — 

 the American eagle motinted on the national shield 

 and beneath it the motto E Pluribus L'num. This 

 design was engra\'ed and then transferred to the 

 china as an outline to be filled in with color. The 

 border of the plate, a gold guilloche, or cable, of two 

 strands entwined and, thus, mutually strengthening 

 each other, was intended to signify the union of the 

 North and South. ^ The same idea was meant to be 

 conveyed in the central design: "Though clouds 

 surrotmd our Country, the sunlight is breaking 

 through." The explanation of the symbolism of the 

 design, while appropriate for the Lincoln Administra- 

 tion, could hardly have been true for the china which 

 was originally designed for Presidential use in 1853. 



Tradition identifies the blanks on which the design 

 of the Lincoln china was painted as being imported 

 from the Haviland factory in Limoges, France. 



The original china bears no maker's mark, however, 

 as this was more than ten years before the Ha\iland 

 factorv started to mark their ware.'' The earliest 

 positive link of the Lincoln china to Haviland and 

 Company seems to be an affidavit which Theodore 

 R. Davis attached to a Lincoln plate in 1881 saying 

 "This plate One of the Lincoln .Set made by Haviland 

 & Co. was used by President Garfield when upon his 

 death bed. The plate was broken in bringing it 

 from the President's room and was given by Wm. 

 Crump to Theo. R. Davis Sept. 1881." The plate is 

 now in the collections of the State Historical Society 

 of Wisconsin. It is possible that Theodore Davis, 



5 Edwin Atlee Barber, "The Pioneer of China Painting in 

 America," The Ceramic Monthly (September 1895), vol. 2, no. 2, 

 pp. 15-20. 



'• Letter hojn Charles Haviland at Limoges, France, to 

 Theodore Haviland in the United States dated March 4, 1869, 

 in the archives of Haviland & Co., Inc.: "It would certainly be 

 a good thing to stamp all our china with our name if, 1st our 

 china was better than any one else or at least as good and 

 2nd if we made enough for our trade. Without that it would 

 turn against us and learn people that by ordering through 

 Vogt or Nittal they could get Gibus or Julieus china which is 

 better than ours. And if ours was the best but we did not make 

 enough to fill orders there would be a complaint when we gave 

 other manufacturer's china. .So our first aim must be to 

 manufacture as well or better than any body else and to make 



all we sell The7i & thett only it will be a capital thing to 



stamp all our make with our name." Their goal was finally 

 achieved in I87f), 



114 



BULLETIN 230: CONTRIBUTIONS FROM THE MUSEUM OF HISTORY AND TECHNOLOGY 



