939

Rare Antebellum Tennessee Agricultural Premium Coin Silver Julep Cup

1857, by Samuel Simpson (1800-1872), Clarksville, Tennessee and Hopkinsville, Kentucky, of traditional tapering cylindrical form with beaded molded banding, engraved "Made by / S. Simpson / for / Christian Co. A. and M. / Association / 1857".
h. 3-1/2", dia. 3-1/8"; 5.14 t. oz.

Literature: Benjamin Hubbard Caldwell, Jr., Tennessee Silversmiths (Winston-Salem: Museum of Early Southern Decorative Arts, 1988), pp. 154-156.

Marquis Boultinghouse, Silversmiths, Jewelers, Watch & Clock Makers of Kentucky, 1785-1900 (Lexington: the author, 1980), p. 250.

Notes: This lot is one of a rare handful of known silver cups given as premiums at the first Christian County [Kentucky] Agricultural and Mechanical Association, each proudly engraved by its maker Samuel Simpson (1800-1872) and bringing together the most desirable elements of antebellum Tennessee and Kentucky coin silver.

The organizational charter for the Christian County Agricultural and Mechanical Association was granted in 1856 by the Kentucky Legislature, and its first meeting was held on February 2, 1857. Grounds were purchased outside of Hopkinsville, the county seat, and buildings were built for the first fair to be held for four days beginning on October 21, 1857. There is no record of the specific premiums awarded (though they totaled $1,500), but, following the fashion of the Central Kentucky and other fairs that year, the silver cups were probably among the $10 premiums awarded primarily for livestock, but also for equipment (carriages, buggies, plows and harnesses) and textiles (quilts and jackets). There is a single known silver goblet by Simpson with an 1857 "Christian County A & M" inscription, and at least three julep cups identical to the present lot, including one from the Caldwell collection (auctioned in 2006), and examples in the Tennessee State Museum, Nashville and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.

Benjamin Caldwell Hubbard, Jr., in his seminal Tennessee Silver includes scant biographical information on Simpson, though more has come to light since its publication in 1988. For instance, Caldwell dismissed the possibility that Simpson could be the Samuel Simpson, watchmaker listed in York County, Maine in 1823, based on approximate birth dates of 1807 and 1815 taken from U.S. Census information in 1850 and 1860, respectively. However, the 1870 census and Simpson's death record both agree on his birth around 1800, making it more likely that he was, in fact, working in his native Maine (on which all censuses agree) before moving to Tennessee.

He moved to Tennessee by the late 1830s, probably directly to Clarksville in Montgomery County, on the southern border of Christian County, Kentucky. He began advertising in the Clarksville Chronicle in February, 1840, and ran notices consistently there for the next fifteen years, until September 1857 when Simpson offered the sale of his house. Caldwell postulates that Simpson had relocated to Christian County, Kentucky at this time, a theory supported by a January 1858 advertisement of silversmith George Edward Cooke (1835-1902) as the successor to S. Simpson in Clarksville and Simpson's listing in Hopkinsville, Kentucky in the 1859-1860 Kentucky State Gazetteer.

However, on March 2, 1860, the Clarksville Chronicle noted that "among the noticeable improvements now going on in our city, not the least is that of our former esteemed townsman, Mr. Samuel Simpson on Franklin Street, next door to Tate's saddlery store. Mr. Simpson has had the entire front of his store taken out and remodeled, besides making other desirable alteration, and will have one of the neatest rooms in town. Mr. Simpson will soon open on the first floor a fine stock of Jewelry, Watches, &c." Two weeks later, Simpson ran an ad announcing his the new firm of Simpson & Price with Andrew G. Price (1816-1884). This firm ran ads throughout the year until December 1860, when Simpson once again announced that he was selling his house. This ad ran for nearly a year - until November of 1861, by which time the Civil War had started. The Chronicle still mentions Simpson & Price until at least February 1862, after which no extant documents record the fate of the firm during the war.

In July 1865, however, Price had evidently left the partnership, as Simpson announced that the firm would thenceforth be known as A. & H. Simpson: his sons Alfred and Henry, born 1837 and 1840, respectively, and both of whom had served in Co. A of the 49th Tennessee, CSA. This firm evidently was short lived, as an announcement of its dissolution ran on September 7, 1866, with notice that it would continue under the name Henry Simpson, and with the assurance that "watch repairing will be under the control of Sam'l Simpson, as heretofore". Although this announcement predates the event, the death of Alfred Simpson five days later on September 12, 1866 in Hopkinsville, Kentucky is certainly not coincidental, and suggests that the Simpson firm continued a business connection in Christian County Kentucky.

The last mention of the Simpson firm in Clarksville was in April 1867 (with the announcement of a brief working visit by "Mr. J. W. Pyle, Ornamental Hair Workman"). In 1870, Samuel Simpson appears in the U.S. Census in Austin, Travis County, Texas with his wife Josephine (nee Love), son Henry and the rest of his children. Immediately next door to him is his brother William Simpson (1802-1877), also a watchmaker, and who had been in Austin since the 1830s. Samuel is listed as a retired jeweler in the census, and he died two years later in Austin, on November 10, 1872. His son Henry left the watch and jewelry trade and later became a confectioner; he died on October 23, 1912, in San Marcos, Hays County, Texas.


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