Rare Turner ‘Traveller’ Blue and White Transfer Printed Cup and Saucer, c. 1795

This is a delightful and rare cup and saucer in ‘The Traveller’ or ‘One Legged Duck’ pattern by the Staffordshire firm, Turner. The soft blue transfer print hybrid on hard paste porcelain is of very fine quality.

The cup and saucer are unmarked but a teapot in the same pattern can be seen on p.192 of Geoffrey Godden’s New Guide to English Porcelain and the Northern Ceramic Society website pictures a jug. https://www.northernceramicsociety.org/exhibition/staffordshire-porcelain/

The cup has no chips or cracks. There is a little kiln grit and a tiny firing crack in the glaze on the underside of the foot. The saucer has some brown discolouration to the base and two minute frits to the underside of the rim which cannot be seen when the saucer is displayed. The glaze is unscratched.

The firm was founded by John Turner (1738-87), who had been one of the original partners in the New Hall manufactory. His sons, William and John, continued the business on his death. They were among the best and most successful potters at the end of the eighteenth century and early part of the nineteenth century. Their work was considered the equal of Wedgwood and is sometimes mistaken for it (Hillier‘s Master Potters of the Industrial Revolution – The Turners of Lane End). Godden describes their porcelain as “extremely fine – perhaps too good and costly for the market”. He adds they are “also very difficult to find today.”