George III William Bateman Silver Cup, ca. 1820
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GUEST:
I was married on June 13, 1992. I was living in Buffalo, New York, and my fiancé had come that weekend before the wedding. Everything had to be paid—the venue, the cakes, all that stuff had to be paid for. So we didn't have a whole lot of money. And we saw this garage sale at Children's Hospital in Buffalo. And it was in a poured concrete, um, ramp, garage ramp, and, um...
APPRAISER:
Actual garage sale.
GUEST:
Yes, an actual garage sale. (chuckling) I saw a teapot, and then I saw this. And I asked the man at the table, "What is this?" And he said, "It's a yachting trophy." I said, "How much for that, how much for the teapot?" He said $25 for the teapot, $35 for that. But I had no money. I mean, I didn't have any money on me. And I'm thinking, "$60? I don't think I even have $60 in my checking account." He held them for me. I went to the ATM, I'm punching in my password, thinking, "Oh, please, please, let there be $60." I was willing to bounce a check if necessary, but I didn't even have to do that. And as it turned out, I came back, I got the teapot, and I got that. It was on the table the day of our wedding, which was a week later.
APPRAISER:
Have you had it looked at before or appraised before?
GUEST:
In the mid- to late '90s.
APPRAISER:
Okay.
GUEST:
I brought it to Rochester. He was a, a famous appraiser of, uh, antiques in Rochester. And he looked at it and he said, "It's from the reign of George III." And I said, because there's an inscription on it from 1931, with the, the, the yacht race, I said, "So, the reign of George III, 1931?" He goes, "No, I said the reign of George III." He was kind of annoyed at me, and I said, "I heard what you said, "but it's not registering in my brain that it could be that old."
APPRAISER:
This happens a lot. There is that inscription on the front from 1931. So when you have a date, you really don't think to look for another date. But, when you keep looking... ...you have around here English hallmarks. You see that they are in fact from the reign of George III, 1820.
GUEST:
Ooh, wow.
APPRAISER:
And it has the maker's mark of William Bateman...
GUEST:
Mm-hmm.
APPRAISER:
...one of the silversmiths from the Bateman family of silversmiths. And the most famous member, of course, is Hester Bateman, who is very well-known for a, an abundance of George III silver production. You're looking at the Regency period in English design and history. You have this abundance of grape clusters and all these elaborate leaves all around the base. Then you look down at these griffins' heads, and they have a ducal coronet around them, and you look at the piece as a whole, it doesn't quite seem to fit. When you look at the pieces by Bateman, you want this to be a covered cup. So it would have had two handles coming from the side and a base that would have probably mirrored these grapevines, and a lid. And those cups were made for presentation purposes. This is a very significant piece, and this would not have been inexpensive in its, in its day. The base is, is really what's throwing me a little bit, but the quality is exquisite. You want to see some evidence that handles were taken off, or a base was removed, and I, I don't see that. The Regency period was known for a little bit of this, this more elaborate style. So I wouldn't be shocked if this is how it was made.
GUEST:
Ah...
APPRAISER:
Now, I'm not convinced, but it's a wonderful piece by William Bateman. At least the top part. I wouldn't be surprised if someone paid anywhere from $5,000 to $10,000 at auction.
GUEST:
(breathlessly): Oh, my gosh, that much? (laughing): No... (choking up): Really? Oh! Whoa. Well, a lot more than I thought.
APPRAISER:
Not too bad. (laughing breathlessly):
GUEST:
Wow.
APPRAISER:
Worth scrambling to the ATM for.
APPRAISER:
(laughing): Yeah, really.
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