Like the works previously mentioned, those of Caughley were upon the outcrop of the coals and clays of the Shropshire coal-field. They were established about the middle of the 17th century, on the estate of Mr. Brown, who lived at Caughley Hall, and was an ancestor of T. Wylde Brown, Esq., of the Woodlands, near Bridgnorth. An opaque stone china appears to have been made there in the first instance.

The works appear to have been carried on by Mr. Brown, in the first place, and then by Mr. Gallimore, a relative of Mr. Brown’s; and afterwards by M. Turner, who succeeded in producing an article of very superior merit, and one which will always hold a distinguished place in the history of the ceramic art. Mr. Turner was the son of the Rev. Richard Turner, D.D., rector of Cumberton, vicar of Emley Castle and Norton, and Chaplain to the Countess of Wigtown. Thomas his son, was born 1749, and married in 1783, Miss Dorothy Gallimore, a niece of Mr. Brown, of Caughley Hall. Mr. Turner was a gentleman of great taste, a good draughtsman, and an excellent engraver, having learned the latter art at Worcester, probably under Robert Hancock, some very fine examples of whose work are in the possession of Mr. Arthur Maw, of Severn House, who also has many very fine productions of Caughley at the best period of its existence. In 1780 Mr. Turner visited France, and brought back with him several skilled workmen, and an architect, whom he employed in the erection of a very handsome chateau, in the French style of architecture. The works were several years in progress, and were completed in 1775, as shewn by a newspaper paragraph of November 1st in that year, which, is as follows:—

“The porcelain manufactory erected near Bridgnorth, in this county, is now quite completed, and the proprietors have received and supplied orders to a very large amount. Lately we saw some of their productions which in colour and fineness are truly elegant and beautiful, and have the bright and lively white of the so much extolled Oriental.”

Printing on porcelain appears first to have been introduced by Dr. Wall at the Worcester works, a process soon after taken to Caughley by a person named Holdship, a former partner in the Worcester works, where it was practised as a great secret, with closed doors.

Mr. Chaffers says:—

“The excellence of Turner’s porcelain and the invention of the beautiful dark blue of the Caughley china, attributed to him, gained him great patronage. In 1780 he produced the celebrated “willow pattern,” which even at the present day is in great demand, and the “blue dragon,” another favourite pattern, and completed the first blue printed table service made in England for Thomas Whitmore, Esq., of Apley Park, near Bridgnorth; the pattern was called Nankin, and was something similar to the Broseley tea service produced in 1782, all in porcelain. Mr. Thomas Minton, of Stoke, assisted in the completion of this service, being articled as an engraver there.

“Messrs. Chamberlain of Worcester, until the end of 1790, had their porcelain in the white from Thomas Turner of Caughley. He at first mixed all the bodies himself, but afterwards instructed his sister how to do it; subsequently a man named Jones mixed for him.”

The other works at Worcester, Grainger & Co., formerly, when first established, merely painted and finished ware manufactured at Caughley. The China so sent was marked with the letter “C.” for Caughley; sometimes “S.” for Salopian.

Among the chief workmen were the following:—Dontil, painter; Muss and Silk, who afterwards attained great celebrity in London, as painters on enamel, were landscape painters. Thomas Fennell, and Edward Jones flower painters, Thomas Martin Randall, bird painter, Edward Randall, gold decorator, Adams, blue painter, De Vivy and Stephan, modellers.

Perry, one of the workmen who was apprenticed to Mr. Turner, states that in 1797 they had four printing presses at Caughley, introduced by Davis; the patterns at that time and for years previously being birds and blue panels; that Turner had been an engraver at Worcester; that he recollects a slab on the front of one of the arches of the building at Caughley, stating the date of its foundation, 1772, which would be the time he succeeded Mr. Gallimore, and that it was not finished for some time after.

In the Salopian Mag. we gave an engraving of the old works, from a view in the possession of Mr. Hubert Smith, the only lineal descendent of Mr. Turner; and also of a “puzzle jug,” now in the possession of Mr. E. Thursfield, of Bridgnorth. It is eight inches in height, and is formed of the usual body of these works. It is decorated with blue sprigs, and bears on its front the name, in an oval border, of

John Geary
Cleak of the
Old Church
Brosley
1789.

On the bottom is written in blue “Mathew th v & 16,” though one would fail to see any allusion in the text here referred to either to the vessel or to its purpose.

The first specimens of Caughley are but little removed from earthenware, but the material speedily improved, as did the manipulation or potting; the latter to an extent as regards shape and outline so much so as to render many of them superior to the same class of articles of the present day. Their excellence in this respect is so self-evident as still to render Caughley china a great favourite. Choice articles of this manufacture are carefully guarded by Shropshire families, with whom they have become heirlooms; they are carefully stored in corner cupboards and on kitchen shelves, where they were once kept in countenance by rows of shining pewter, and are only produced at christenings and weddings, and on such red-letter days and rare occasions. Every year will add to their value, to the veneration in which they are held; and at distant periods, and when compared even with the ordinary productions of our factories at the present day, they will serve to show how successful were the well-directed efforts at the Caughley Works to produce a porcelain which should take high rank and maintain it.

The buildings of the old factory have been razed to the ground; the plough passes over where they stood, and a few pitchers turned up now and then are the only indications obtained of these interesting works. But a class of clever men were educated there; some of whom—as the late Herbert Minton’s father, John Rose, and others—have done much to raise the character of our English productions.