A measured drawing of the Challis mug was given to Mr. James E. Maloney of the Williamsburg Pottery,[252] who kindly agreed to undertake a series of experiments to reproduce the piece in his own stoneware kiln, using local Tidewater clay. The results of the first trials were extremely successful, and they showed that it would be possible to reproduce exact copies of the Yorktown wares from this clay (fig. 8). Thus any doubt as to the supply source was dispelled.
The conditions of firing at the Williamsburg Pottery, however, are somewhat different from those that would have prevailed in the 18th century. Mr. Maloney's kiln is fired by oil rather than wood, so that the localized variations of color resulting from the reducing effects of wood smoke have been eliminated. In addition, Mr. Maloney's pots are fired without the use of saggers, thus providing more uniform atmospheric and salting conditions than would have been possible with the 18th-century method of stacking the kilns.
Figure 3.—Pint and quart mugs of brown salt-glazed stoneware made for the Swan Tavern at Yorktown. Each mug is decorated with an applied swan in high relief.
The Yorktown mugs were hand thrown, but a template was used to shape the ornamental cordoning. It was first assumed that a single template had served to fashion both the cordons at the base and the groove below the lip. We had such a tool made of aluminum, copying the Challis mug's ornament, and proportionately enlarged to allow for shrinkage in firing. But in using this template Mr. Maloney discovered that it was impossible to shape the whole exterior of the vessel in one movement without the tools "chattering" against the wall. Since none of the Yorktown sherds nor, indeed, any of the brown-stoneware mugs I have studied in England exhibit this feature, it is clear that the potters used only a small template which molded the base cordoning alone, a technique in marked contrast to that of the German Westerwald potters of the same period, whose mass-produced tankards and chamberpots invariably exhibit considerable "chattering." Shaping the lip of the Yorktown tankards appears to have been accomplished entirely by hand as was the application of the encircling groove below it. Because the clay used in the manufacture of these brown stonewares is relatively coarse, it does not lend itself readily to the thin potting so characteristic of English white salt-glaze or the refined Nottingham and Burslem brown stonewares. Consequently, it was necessary to pare down the mouths of the mugs to make them acceptable to the lips of the toper. This interior tooling, extending about half an inch below the rim, is found on all the Yorktown and English brown stonewares of this class. The technique is the reverse of that used by the Westerwald potters, whose mugs are thinned from the outside, leaving the straight edge on the interior.[253] Having imbibed from both types of tankard, I believe that the English (and Yorktown) technique is distinctly preferable. One's upper lip does most of the work; the paring of the inside of the vessel shapes the rim away from that lip and carries the ale smoothly into the mouth.
Figure 4.—Yorktown stoneware mug fragment marred by kiln drippings lodged above the handle. The fragment was found in Williamsburg. Height of sherd 4 centimeters.
The treatment of the single-reeded handle on the Challis site mug equals the best English examples, being thin and of sufficient size to accommodate three fingers, with the top of its curve remaining below the edge of the rim so that the thumb cannot slip over it. In addition, the lower terminal is folded back on itself and impressed. While it has often been said that the signature of a potter is found in the shaping of his rims and his handles, we must remember that in a large commercial pottery the person who applies the handles often is not the same workman as he who throws the pot. This explains the considerable variety among the handles of supposed Yorktown tankards, some of them very skillfully fashioned and applied, others appallingly crude. It is inconceivable that all can be the work of a single craftsman.
