I do not, by this, claim for Caughley the honour of inventing the art of transfer-printing on to porcelain; but I feel assured that that art must have been there practised at quite as early a period as the dated example of Worcester make; and I am led to this belief partly from the fact that the Robert Hancock whose beautiful productions I have before spoken of, and to whom the engraving of the dated example is ascribed, also engraved for the Caughley works. And I have an impression of a plate, of an identical pattern with the famous tea group, which bears his monogram on the Worcester specimens, on which his name, R. Hancock fecit, occurs in full at Caughley. Collectors, therefore, in a case of this kind, must not be too hasty in ascribing, from appearance alone, examples to either one or the other make, but must be guided, in a great measure, by the body on which the engraving occurs.
It cannot be wondered that an art, then such an important secret, should have been followed at Caughley,—a place so perfectly retired from the world, situated in the midst of woods and wilds, almost unapproachable to strangers, and with every facility for keeping the workmen away from all chance of imparting the secret to others,—in place of in Worcester, where secrecy would be almost impossible, and where the information would ooze out from the workmen, at the ale-house or elsewhere, and be greedily caught up by those interested in the process. At Caughley every possible precaution seems to have been taken to secure secrecy; and the workmen—the engravers and printers—were locked up and kept apart from every one else. Who the engravers were I cannot satisfactorily say. It is, however, certain, that Hancock engraved for the works; and it is said that Holdship, of whom I have before spoken, was also employed. Among the other engravers was a man named Dyas, who was apprenticed as an engraver at Caughley about the year 1768, and who continued at the works until his death, at the ripe age of eighty-two. It is also worthy of note that Mr. Minton, the father of Mr. Herbert Minton, was in his early days employed as an engraver at these works. It is not too much to say, that the style of engraving adopted at so early a period was remarkably good, and of really high character. Indeed, some specimens which I have seen of the plates used at Caughley are far superior to most of the productions of the period.
Vol. I
Plate IV.
