Ilkeston.
The “Ilkeston Potteries” were established by the late Mr. George Evans in 1807, and were carried on by him until his decease, in 1832, when he was succeeded by his son, Mr. Richard Evans, the present sole proprietor of the concern. At first, and during the lifetime of Mr. George Evans, Derbyshire stone bottles alone were made, and these are still manufactured to a large extent. By the present proprietor the buildings have been considerably increased, and a general pottery added for the production of useful articles in stoneware and ornamental terra-cotta goods. The present productions of the works are in stoneware bottles, jars, pans, &c., of all sizes and of every usual form; filters of an improved construction; carriage, foot, and other warmers; sanitary pipes, and ware of every kind, &c., &c.; and in terra-cotta, vases, pedestals, flower and tree boxes and pots, garden-edgings, chimney-tops, &c., of various designs, and all the more usual productions of fire-clay goods.
Pinxton.
The village of Pinxton (a large parish in East Derbyshire, close on the borders of Nottinghamshire) is principally inhabited by colliers and other “hardy sons of toil,” who work in the ironstone mines and at the furnaces of the neighbourhood. The manor belongs to the family of Coke, the same family as the Cokes of Trusley and the Cokes of Melbourne, and to one of this family, John Coke, Esq., the establishment of the china works is owing. Mr. John Coke was the youngest brother of D’Ewes Coke, Esq., the lord of the manor; the second brother being Sir William Coke, Judge of the Supreme Court, Ceylon, who died at Trincomalee, in Ceylon. The present head of the family is Lieut.-Col. E. T. Coke, of Debdale. Mr. John Coke, who was born in 1775, passed several of the early years of his life at Dresden, and there, doubtless, acquired that love for porcelain ware which induced him to commence the manufactory at Pinxton on his return to this country. Having an idea that some clays found on the family estates near Pinxton might be made available for the manufacture of china ware, Mr. Coke entered into correspondence with Mr. Duesbury, of the Derby China Works, and sent him samples of his clays for trial and experiment. Whatever encouragement or otherwise he received from Mr. Duesbury—and I have reason to believe that encouragement was not given—the result of his own convictions and his own trials, &c., determined Mr. Coke on starting the works, and he ultimately made an engagement with William Billingsley, of the Derby China Works (which see, page 102); and having built a somewhat large and very conveniently arranged factory, commenced the manufacture of china ware in 1796.
William Billingsley was the son of William and Mary Billingsley, of the parish of St. Alkmund, Derby. In 1774 he was apprenticed by his widowed mother to Mr. Duesbury, the proprietor of the Derby China Manufactory, for five years, “to learn the art of painting upon china or porcelain ware,” as I have already shown in my notice of Billingsley on page 101, ante. In 1796 he left the Derby China Works, where he had been employed for the long period of twenty-two years, and removed to Pinxton, occupying, with his wife, his wife’s mother, and two daughters, a part of the factory built by Mr. Coke. Here Billingsley succeeded in producing that beautiful granular body which he afterwards perfected at Nantgarw and at Swansea; and here, too, stimulated by Mr. Coke’s good taste, he introduced faultless forms in his services and a high style of excellence in decoration. He brought with him several experienced workmen and artists from the Derby Works, and took into the factory, and instructed, several young people of Pinxton and its neighbourhood. His own time was thus so fully occupied with the management of the works, with the arrangement of the concern, and with the “overlooking” of the persons employed, that, unfortunately, his own skill and his own splendid colouring of roses and other flowers were lost to the manufacture; and thus we do not find that the expressed fear of his late Derby employers that “his going into another factory will put them in the way of doing flowers in the same way, which they are at present entirely ignorant of,” was sustained. In fact, while employed by Mr. Duesbury, Billingsley was in every way master of the art he had been taught; and he had acquired a peculiar method—entirely peculiar to himself—of painting roses which, with his free and truly artistic grouping and harmonious arrangement of colours, made his pieces so much sought after, that orders were constantly sent in for objects “painted with Billingsley’s flowers.” At this period of course his whole time was devoted to painting, and his heart was in his work. After leaving his employer, his attention was naturally, in the new sphere in which he found himself at Pinxton, almost wholly given to the practical instead of the Art portion of the establishment, and thus none, or scarcely any, of the known examples of Pinxton china bear evidence of being his handiwork. Indeed, it is not too much to say that, from the time when he closed his connection with the Derby Works, his Art-skill declined, but his manufacturing skill became more and more apparent.
The works at Pinxton were built by the side of the canal, and the workshops formed three sides of a square. These are still in existence at the present day, and are shown in the accompanying vignette, from a sketch made for the purpose. They are now converted into cottages, and are occupied by colliers and others. The kilns, &c., have entirely disappeared. The place and cottages are still called “China Square,” or “Factory Square.”
Through some misunderstanding or other, the arrangement between Messrs. Coke and Billingsley was not of long duration, and in a very few years—probably about 1800 or 1802—Billingsley left the place and removed to Mansfield, where, it is said, he for some time occupied himself in decorating and finishing china ware which he bought in the white state in Staffordshire. He afterwards, as I have already shown, removed to Torksey, Worcester, Nantgarw, Swansea, and Coalport, and died about 1827 or 1828.
Fig. 114.
Mr. Coke married in 1806 and settled at Debdale Hall, where he died in 1841, in his sixty-sixth year, leaving his estates to Lieut.-Col. Coke, their present possessor. At Debdale are preserved, with religious care, some of the finest examples ever made at Pinxton. These pieces were brought there by the founder of the works, Mr. John Coke just spoken of, and have remained there ever since. They consist of large semicircular spill-stands, mugs, &c., beautifully painted with views, one of which, a view of the family seat of Brookhill Hall, is remarkably fine. Some of the stands are grounded in the Dresden canary colour, and the whole are very choice and unique examples of Pinxton porcelain.