Object Description
Earl Nelson’s Old Sheffield Plated Heated Venison Dish or Tureen and under-plate, c.1820
This fine piece consists of a domed cover, an under-plate and a heater element beneath. The plate and cover both engraved on let-in silver panels with crests denoting that the piece was part of a service ordered by or for presentation to the 2nd Earl Nelson of Trafalgar Park. The piece has an exceptional cast handle in the form of an Earl’s coronet and the crests include the Nelson family’s warship crest with motto Faith and Works.
The main decoration on the piece consists of fine gadrooned borders and side handles and the under-plate has an engraved anthemion design to catch meat juices in use. The piece comes with its Marshall Field and Co. tag, showing that it was retailed by the antique department in that venerable American department store at some stage in the 20th century.
An act of parliament in 1815 purchased an estate for the Nelson family out of gratitude for the heroic conduct of Admiral Nelson and the 2nd Earl, a Reverend by training who had served at sea briefly in his youth before becoming a man of the cloth, was the beneficiary of this extraordinary settlement. As such he moved from Norfolk to Hampshire to live the life of a gentleman of means, betraying his younger brother’s request that he should look after Emma Hamilton and their daughter Horatia. Nelson entertained in style and luxury and the present dish would have been part of a grand service of Sheffield plate designed for that residence around 1820.
Although the second Earl was able to live out the rest of his life in luxury, the funds voted to the family by the British government were discontinued after the Second World War, causing the Earl at that time to sell the house and grounds and many of the Nelson treasures that they had accumulated. It is likely that the present piece left the family at this stage, making its way to Chicago and Marshall Field and Co.