Table

Object Name:

Table

Object ID:

2014.014

Creator:

Ellis, Horace (1807-1872)

Place of Origin:

Newport, NH

Date:

1839

Description:

Table. Made by Horace Ellis (1807-1872), Newport, NH, 1839. Mahogany and mahogany veneers with pine secondary wood. Rectangular pivot top with hinged, scalloped-corner drop leaves and moveable leaf supports. Doric central pedestal tenoned to top frame and base. Four carved lion paw feet with casters. Iron hinges. "Made by Horace Ellis / Newport N.H. / June 8th 1839" written in ink on side of frame. "Made by Horace Ellis / Newport N.H." written in pencil on opposite side of frame.

Material:

Wood
Mahogany
Pine

Dimensions:

H-29.5 W-35.8 L-36.3 inches

Provenance:

Made in 1839 by Horace Ellis (1807-1872) of Newport, NH, for James Perkins (1786-1857) of Croydon, NH. Perkins, the son of Benjamin and Lydia (Hawkes), married Anna French of Winchester, NH, in Princeton, MA. In 1815 they moved to Croydon Flat, where he built a grist mill, saw mill, and fulling mill. The table descended through the Perkins family to the seller.

Horace Ellis was born March 5, 1807, the son of Dr. Arnold and Hannah (Buel) Ellis. Little is known of Ellis except that he married Susan Maria Davis on May 12, 1831, at Castleton, VT. During the 1820s Ellis was one of fifteen journeyman cabinetmakers documented as working in the Newport shop of entrepreneur Willard Harris (1782-1848). The table documents the fact that he continued to make furniture in Newport through 1839. By the late 1860s Ellis next appears in Erie, PA, working as a painter, where he died in 1872.

Credit Line:

New Hampshire Historical Society Purchase, Katharine Prentis Murphy Fund

People:

Ellis, Horace (1807-1872), Perkins, James (1786-1857)