Lot 296
TAIN – A RARE PAIR OF SCOTTISH PROVINCIAL TEASPOONS
HUGH ROSS
Auction: Day Two | Thursday 20 August from 10am | Lots 199 - 555
Description
Marked HR, St Duthac, of Scots Fiddle pattern engraved to terminals over two lines in contemporary script ‘Jean Moffat to Ka. Fraser’ (2)
Dimensions
12.6cm long, 18.6g (combined)
Provenance
The Scottish Sale, Bonhams 22nd – 24th August 2007, lot 286
Footnote
This pair of spoons match another single example researched and written up in great detail by Estelle Quick (see The Tain Silver Collection, in Tain & District Museum page, 46 and The Finial - A Big Story From A Little Spoon by Estelle Quick, Volume 21/05, May/ July 2011, page 10- 11)
Through the very unusual inscription, it is clear these spoons were the gift of a mother Jean Moffat to her daughter Katherine Fraser (who had married a local Minister to Tain).
Jean was born around 1665 in Selkirkshire, to a staunchly Covenanting family. Persecuted for their religious beliefs she was imprisoned in Dunnottar Castle in 1685. Here he met fellow prisoner John Fraser of Pitcalzean near Tain. They were later that year both transported, as slaves, to New Jersey. They escaped this fate and settled in Connecticut where they married in 1689.
On the accession of William of Orange they returned to Scotland and John Fraser become minister in Alness, until his death in 1711. Jean long outlived him and died in about 1750.