C. Malcolm Watkins

“ The sgraffito pottery is a red earthenware, coated with a white slip through which designs have been incised. An amber lead glaze imparts a golden yellow to the slip-covered portions and a brownish amber to the exposed red paste. The gravel-tempered ware is made of a similar red-burning clay and is remarkable for its lack of refinement, for the pebbly texture caused by protruding bits of gravel, and for the crude and careless manner in which the heavy amber glaze was applied to interior surfaces. ”

“ No other identifiable English ware of this period compares with the gravel-tempered pottery, the use of gravel for temper apparently being restricted to North Devon. Gravel is found in red earthenware sherds from Spanish colonial sites and in olive oil jars of Hispanic origin, but both the quality and proportion of temper differs, as do the paste characteristics, so that no possibility exists for confusion between them and the North Devon ware. ”

“ The utilitarian red-ware was indeed coarse, since it was liberally tempered with Bideford gravel in order to insure hardness and to offset the purity and softness of the Fremington clay. An anonymous historian wrote in 1755: [37]
Just above the bridge [over the River Torridge] is a little ridge of gravel of a peculiar quality, without which the potters could not make their ware. There are many other ridges of gravel within the bar, but this only is proper for their use. ”

“ Although great antiquity attaches to the origins of North Devon pottery manufacture—Barnstaple has had its Crock Street for 450 years [30] —the principal evidence of early manufacture falls into the second half of the 17th century. We have seen that a growing America provided an increasing market for North Devon’s ceramic wares. In 1668 Crocker’s pottery was established at Bideford, and it is in the period following that Bideford’s importance as a pottery center becomes noticeable. ”

“ They help to date the sites; they reflect cultural and economic levels in the areas of their use; and they throw light on manufacture, trade, and distribution.
Satisfying instances of these uses were revealed with the discovery in 1935 of two distinct but unidentified pottery types in the excavations conducted by the National Park Service at Jamestown, Virginia, and later elsewhere along the eastern seaboard. One type was an elaborate and striking yellow sgraffito ware, the other a coarse utilitarian kitchen ware whose red paste was heavily tempered with a gross water-worn gravel or “grit.” ”

“ The clay with which all the potters worked came from three similar deep clay deposits in a valley [Pg 30] running parallel with the River Taw in the parishes of Tawstock and Fremington between Bideford and Barnstaple. A geologist in 1864 wrote that the clay is “perfectly homogeneous ... exceedingly tough, free from slightest grit and soft as butter.” [35] When fired at too high a temperature, he wrote, the clay would become so vesicular that it would float on water. ”

“ The only known counterparts of the North Devon ovens are Continental. A 15th-century example appears in an Augsburg woodcut, and a 16th-century specimen is depicted in De Bry’s engraving after Le Moyne’s painting of Fort Caroline, the Huguenot settlement in Florida. There are many suggestions of Huguenot and Low Country influences on North Devon pottery. Bideford and Barnstaple both were Puritan strongholds in the 17th century, and both became French Huguenot centers, especially after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. ”

“ Its orientation for a lengthy period was towards America, and the welfare of its inhabitants was therefore largely dependent upon commerce with the colonies.
In common with other West of England ports, Barnstaple and Bideford engaged heavily in the Newfoundland fishing trade. However, “the principal part of foreign commerce that Bideford was ever engaged in, was to Maryland and Virginia for tobacco.... Its connections with New England were also very considerable.” ”

“ Archeological, documentary, and literary evidences indicate that yellow sgraffito ware, gravel-tempered earthenware utensils, and gravel-tempered pottery ovens were made in several potteries in and around Barnstaple and Bideford in North Devon. Clay from the Fremington clay beds was used.
The North Devon potteries manufactured for export, sending their wares to Ireland as early as 1600 and to America by 1635. The trade was particularly heavy in the years following the Stuart Restoration and was tied to the influential 17th-century West-of-England commerce with America. ”

“ All these wares, including the ovens, are interrelated—the specimens found in America having been shipped in a busy North Devon-North American trade. The North Devon towns, moreover, were an important pottery-making center for export markets in the West of England, Ireland, and North America. Thousands of parcels of earthenware were shipped to the American colonies from Bideford and Barnstaple during the 17th century. ”

“ Such a wide distribution of either type implies a productive European source for each, rather than a local American kiln in a struggling colonial settlement like Jamestown. Bailey’s attribution of the sgraffito ware to Devonshire was confirmed in 1950 when J. C. Harrington, archeologist of the National Park Service, came upon certain evidence at Barnstaple in North Devon, England. This evidence was found in the form of sherds exhibited in a display window of C. H. Brannam’s Barnstaple Pottery that were uncovered during excavation work on the premises. ”

“ Slip-covered portions are coated with amber glaze by sifting on powdered galena (lead sulphide) . Containers which are slipped externally are glazed externally and internally. Slip and glaze do not cover lower portions of jugs, but run down unevenly.
Figure 20.—Gravel-tempered chafing dish from Jamestown. Colonial National Historical Park. (Smithsonian photo 43104.)
Color: Slipped surfaces are white where exposed without glaze. Unglazed surfaces are a dull terra cotta. The glaze varies in tone from honey color to a dark greenish amber. ”

“ In 1786, “Barnstaple ovens” were advertised for sale in Bristol at M. Ewers’ “Staffordshire, Broseley, and Glass Warehouse.” [47] Thirty-six years earlier, in 1750, Dr. Pococke, who indefatigably entered every sort of observation in his journal, noted that in Devonshire and Cornwall “they make great use here of Cloume ovens, [48] which are of earthen ware of several sizes, like an oven, and being heated they stop ’em up and cover ’em over with embers to keep in the heat.” ”

“ Fremington ovens also were shipped to Wales, [44] and, according to Jewitt, those made in the Crocker pottery in Bideford “are, and for generations have been, in much repute in Devonshire and Cornwall, and in the Welsh districts, and the bread baked in them is said to have a sweeter and more wholesome flavour than when baked in ordinary ovens.” [45]
Of ovens made at Barnstaple there is much the same kind of evidence. ”

“ Once seen, it is instantly recognizable and entirely distinct from other known types of English or continental pottery. A complete oven (fig. 10) , now restored at [Pg 20] Jamestown, is of similar paste and quality of temper. It has a roughly oval beehive shape with a trapezoidal framed opening in which a pottery door fits snugly.
Figure 2.—Sketch of sherd of sgraffito-ware dish, dating about 1670, that was found during excavations of C. H. Brannam’s pottery in Barnstaple. ”

“ After that date, decoration was confined mainly to harvest jugs and presentation pieces. Gravel-tempered utensils and ovens continued to be made, but the North Devon trade with America ceased by 1760.
Archeological evidence indicates that gravel-tempered ware was used in America between about 1675 and about 1760. An isolated example of sgraffito pottery, distinguished by crude design and glaze, dates from before 1640. The typical sgraffito ware is illustrated by specimens found in the fill under and around the brick drain in the May-Hartwell site at Jamestown. ”

“ No 18th-century intrusions were noted in the brick drain area, and only a scattering in other portions; none was found in association with the North Devon sherds.
JAMESTOWN, VIRGINIA: OTHER SITES.
North Devon wares occur in the majority of sites at Jamestown, but it is not always possible to date them from contextual evidence because precise archeological records were not always kept in the early phases of the excavations. Nevertheless, narrow dating is easily possible in enough sites to suggest date horizons for the wares. ”

“ In the parish of Fremington are great quantities of reddish potters’ clay, which are brought and manufactured at Biddeford, whence the ware is sent to different places by sea.
John Watkins, in 1792, wrote: [29]
The potters here, for making coarse brown earthenware, are pretty considerable, and the demand for the articles of their manufacture in various parts of the kingdom, is constantly great ... ”

“ As the century advanced, this trade increased enormously. In 1694, 17 separate earthenware shipments totaling 50,400 parcels were made from Barnstaple and Bideford to Dublin, Wexford, and Waterford. [26] It is possible that some of these cargoes were shipped to America, since it was necessary to list only the first port of entry. ”

“ This was supported by the inclusion in the fill of many bottle seals bearing Hartwell’s initials, “H. H.” Hartwell married the widow of William White, who had purchased the property from Nicholas Merriweather in 1677. ”

“ North Devon Gravel-Tempered Ware
Sites: Jamestown, Kecoughtan, Green Spring, Williamsburg, Marlborough, John Washington House, Kent Island, Angelica Knoll, Townsend, John Bowne House, “R. M.,” Winslow, John Howland House.
Paste
Manufacture: Wheel-turned, except ovens and rectangular pans, which are “draped” over molds. (See “Forms,” below.)
Temper: Very coarse water-worn quartz and feldsparthic gravel up to one-half inch in length; also occasional sherds. Proportion of temper 15-25 percent, except in ovens, which were about 30 percent. ”

“ Jugs: Height 61⁄2′′ and 8′′-81⁄2′′. Globose bodies, vertical or slightly everted collars tooled in a series of ridged bands, with tooled rims at top. Some have pitcher lips, some do not. Slipped, decorated, and glazed externally above an incised line encircling the waist; glazed internally. (Figs. 13, 14.)
Eating bowls: Diameter, including handle, 9′′-10′′; depth 31⁄4′′-4′′. Straight, everted sides, flat rims, with slightly raised edges, one small flat loop handle secured to rim. Slipped, decorated, and glazed internally and on rim.
Figure 21.—Gravel-tempered baking pan from Jamestown. ”