Relief-Moulded Jugs

My first encounter with relief-moulded jugs occurred during a visit to Bill & Janet Coysh in their Hampshire cottage in the late-1970s. We had a common interest in blue and white transferwares (which ultimately led to our joint authorship of The Dictionary of Blue and White Printed Pottery 1780-1880) but our mutual interests ranged much more widely, even as far as postcards and bookmarkers. I noticed a group of four or five moulded jugs on a windowsill and Bill told me a bit about them. He also thought that there would never be enough material to justify a book on the subject. I went away from that visit but soon found myself picking up occasional jugs at antiques fairs and markets, eventually becoming hooked.

By a strange quirk of fate, in about 1982 John Steele at the Antique Collectors’ Club asked me to have a look at a manuscript about jugs he had received for possible publication. It was an interesting exercise but to cut a long story short, John and I eventually agreed that I should write a new book on jugs. That was the birth of my Relief-Moulded Jugs 1820-1900, published in 1984. I continued to collect jugs alongside blue and white wares, and these forays led to a more wide-ranging volume, An Illustrated Guide to British Jugs, published in 1997.

Subsequently, I have become much more involved with transfer-printed wares, and my time has been devoted largely to the production of The Transferware Recorder, with four volumes published to date, between 2013 and 2018. The plans for two further volumes are well advanced, but the demise of book publishing, largely due to the rise of the internet, has led to delays. [Volumes Five and Six subsequently published in May 2023].

My lingering desire to improve and extend my work on relief-moulded jugs was always in the background, and I have now come to the conclusion that a new book would be impractical, for financial and other reasons, so I have decided to join the modern world and make all my jug research available on the web. Hence this section of the www.reynardine.co.uk website makes its appearance. It is very much a grand, long-term project and the initial pages may be relatively few, but hopefully, like Topsy, it will grow. I would be delighted to receive comments, compliments or brick-bats, and particularly future contributions, be they information or images. I hope you find it all useful.

Dick Henrywood
January 2022

Since the above introduction was written over 18 months ago, there are lots of developments to report. The two new volumes of The Transferware Recorder mentioned above were both published in May 2023 (see website), and work on this jug project has continued unabated. At the time of writing this site now covers well over 400 different jug designs, nearly 90% illustrated, and there are over 560 images of jugs plus a further 250 images of marks, source prints and other related items. It has turned out to be a huge task, almost too much for a single author but I will press on so that my research should not die when I finally pop my clogs. My records are by no means exhausted and I have many more jugs to record and images to process. I must apologise if any particular area seems inadequate to some readers, but I will endeavour to keep making progress. Comments, criticisms, brickbats, suggestions and new information and/or images would all be gratefully received. I am starting to think about preserving the site when I am gone, so any constructive suggestions there would be particularly welcome. In the meantime, enjoy the site, make use of it, and happy collecting!

Dick Henrywood
August 2023

I will continue to develop the site as time permits. You can find the latest enhancements here.

Manufacturers
The following list of manufacturers will be expanded as time permits. Click on the relevant name to see further information about the firm and lists of their jugs, with illustrations wherever possible:

William Adams (& Co.) (& Sons), Stoke and Tunstall
Adams, Scrivener & Co., Longton
Henry Alcock & Co., Cobridge
Samuel Alcock & Co., Burslem
Anderson & Betteney, Longton
Ashwell & Co., Lane End
John Denton Bagster, Hanley
George Baguley, Hanley
Bates & Co., Hanley
Bates, Brown-Westhead, Moore & Co., Shelton, Hanley
T.C. Brown-Westhead, Moore & Co., Shelton, Hanley
Baxter, Rowley & Tams, Longton
J. & J.B. Bebbington, Hanley
William Beech, Burslem
Beech & Hancock, Tunstall
Beech, Hancock & Co., Tunstall
Bednall & Heath, Hanley
John Bevington, Hanley
Samuel Bevington & Son, Shelton
J. Blackshaw & Co., Stoke
E.F. Bodley & Co., Burslem
Bodley & Harrold, Burslem
Thomas Booth (& Sons), Hanley
T. & R. Boote, Burslem
Bradbury, Anderson & Betteney, Longton
Bradbury, Mason & Bradbury, Longton
The Brownhills Pottery Co. (Ltd.), Tunstall
Burgess & Leigh, Burslem
Samuel & John Burton, Shelton
Jonathan Lowe Chetham, Longton
J.R. & F. Chetham, Longton
Cockson & Harding, Hanley
Thomas Cooper, Hanley
Copeland & Garrett, Stoke
W.T. Copeland (& Sons), Stoke
Copestake Brothers, Longton
Cork & Edge, Burslem
Cork, Edge & Malkin, Burslem
The Don Pottery, Swinton, Yorkshire
Sir James Duke & Nephews, Burslem
Edge, Malkin & Co., Burslem
James Edwards & Son, Burslem
James Ellis & Son, Hanley
John Ellis, Bristol
Ford & Challinor, Tunstall
Ford, Challinor & Co., Tunstall
Thomas Furnival & Co., Hanley
Furnival & Clark, Hanley
William Hackwood, Eastwood, Hanley
Hackney & Co., Longton
John Hall & Sons, Burslem
Hall & Read, Hanley
Hancock, Whittingham & Co., Burslem
Robert Heron (& Son), Fife Pottery, Kirkcaldy
J.S. Hill, Burslem
Leveson Hill, Stoke
Hope & Carter, Burslem
James Jamieson & Co., Bo'ness
Elijah Jones, Cobridge
Jones & Walley, Cobridge
Keys & Mountford, Stoke
William Kirkham, Stoke
John & Thomas Lockett, Longton
Lockett, Baguley & Cooper, Hanley
Machin & Potts, Burslem
C.J. Mason & Co., Lane Delph, Fenton
G.M. & C.J. Mason, Lane Delph, Fenton
T.J. & J. Mayer, Longport (includes a list of their design numbers)
Charles Meigh (& Son), Hanley
Mellor, Venables & Co., Burslem
Minton, Stoke (includes a list of their design numbers)
Old Hall Earthenware Co. Ltd., Hanley
James Oldham & Co., Hanley
Francis & William Padgett, Poole
J.W. Pankhurst & Co., Hanley
Pankhurst & Dimmock, Hanley
Phillips & Bagster, Hanley
Pinder, Bourne & Co., Burslem
Pinder, Bourne & Hope, Burslem
J.D. Pountney, Bristol
George Ray, Longton
E.J. Ridgway, Hanley
John & William Ridgway, Hanley
William Ridgway & Co., Hanley
William Ridgway, Son & Co., Hanley
Ridgway & Abington, Hanley
John Rogers & Son, Longport
Scott, Southwick Pottery, Sunderland
South Wales Pottery, Llanelly
William Stubbs & Co., Shelton and Hanley
Joseph Thompson, Derbyshire
Thomas Till & Son(s), Burslem
Edward Walley, Cobridge
Edward & William Walley, Cobridge
Josiah Wedgwood (& Sons) (Ltd.), Etruria
Wedgwood & Co., Tunstall
James F. Wileman, Fenton
Wilkinson & Rickhuss, Hanley
Wilkinson & Sons, Hanley
Enoch & Edward Wood, Burslem

Selected jugs by unknown makers
A large number of relief-moulded jugs are found with no maker's mark. Some are titled, but many are completely unmarked. A selection of jugs by unknown makers can be found here. News of other interesting unmarked jugs and particularly the discovery of any marked examples of these designs would be very welcome.

Coloured jugs
A number of relief-moulded jugs are found which are extensively coloured, not just with coloured backgrounds or small amounts of colouring to pick out the moulding. Most are coloured versions of jugs normally found in plain stoneware or parian, but a few are always coloured. Some may have been issued by the original factories, but others may have been coloured elsewhere, and some are obviously later reproductions. A selection can be seen here.

"Imperial Stone"
A group of stonewares, mostly with moulded bodies enhanced with sprigged decoration, are marked "Imperial Stone" on applied pad marks which usually feature a model or design number. The main effect comes from the sprigged decoration so the wares are (currently) ouside the scope of this website. However, three designs are listed which are exclusively or predominantly moulded (click here).

Brown Stonewares
The majority of relief-moulded jugs are potted in plain white or coloured fine stoneware or parian, but some jugs are found in brown stoneware, either salt-glazed or with the later so-called Bristol glaze. This is a complex subject, not a focus for this website, but a selection of typical brown stoneware relief-moulded jugs are shown here.

Relief-Moulded Teapots
Although they are not a focus for this site, teapots will be added here as I come across them. They were often adapted from jug designs and full details of the jugs will be filed on the appropriate manufacturer's page.

Published Designs
Some of the manufacturers of relief-moulded jugs attempted to protect their designs from being copied by the use of two Acts of Parliament dating from 1798 and 1814. The system required the wares to be marked in a specific way, following a fairly standard format which was dictated by the acts. Its first use on moulded jugs came in 1834, and the latest in the 1850s. The process was effectively superseded by the design registration system of 1842. Only twenty-one designs have so far been recorded bearing publication marks (click here).

Registered Designs
The Copyright of Designs Act of 1842 introduced a system where designs could be registered to protect them from being copied. Protected designs were then indicated with a diamond-shaped mark. Numbers and letters in the four corners of the diamond can be decoded to discover the name of the person or company that owned the registration, and a parcel number which distinguishes between designs registered on the same date. These marks are covered in detail elsewhere and the reader is recommended particularly to the two Cushion mark books (Cushion H and Cushion P) or Godden's Handbook (Godden NH) for more detail. A list of registered jug designs by manufacturers listed on this site can be found here. It should serves as an index which will be updated as new manufacturers and their jugs are added, becoming more comprehensive in due course.

Bibliography
A list of reference books relevant to this site can be found here.

Page created November 2021. Last updated 28 October 2024.

Potential contributions related to jugs or other pottery subjects would always be welcome. Please contact us (link at top of this page).