• Title
  Sheffield silver salver inscribed on underside "To Capt. Gill By his Friend Capt. J. Wallis 46th Regt", 1817
• Call number
  R 989
  
• Level of description
  fonds
• Date
  
  1817
• Type of material
  Graphic Materials, Objects
• Reference code
  457605
• Physical Description
  Objects - 1 silver salver (or waiter) with scroll and shell decorative border, on 3 raised feet - 22.4 cm. diam.
  
• Access Conditions
  
  Access via appointment
• General note
  
  Hallmarked `Sheffield 1817'
  The maker's mark is that of James Ellis & Co., whose mark was first registered in 1793. The inscription is a dedication from Captain James Wallis, Commandant of the Newcastle penal settlement to his friend and fellow officer, Captain John Maunder Gill. Both were officers in the 46th Regiment and had joined the regiment as young men in the early 1800s. Both had served as ensigns in the West Indies against Napoleon's forces and both took part in the famous battle of Dominica in 1805. By 1813 when their regiment sailed for New South Wales, Wallis and Gill had risen through the ranks to become captains. Gill became Acting Engineer for the colony soon after arriving in Sydney up to his departure in December 1817. In this position, he had responsibility for all public works and the lumber yards. He appears to have become a personal friend of the Governor, Lachlan Macquarie, his wife and young son. As his farewell present to Gill, Macquarie requested via a letter from Colonial Secretary J.T. Campbell to James Wallis that Wallis should despatch to Sydney lengths of local cedar and rosewood. Affirming that the best quality cedar and rosewood would be found, Wallis's reply also recorded his own 'loss of a sincere friend of fifteen years standing'. It may have been on his friend's departure from Sydney on 27 December 1817 that Wallis gave him this Sheffield silver salver, inscribed on the underside in lettering similar to the script of convict engraver Walter Preston, then in Newcastle under Wallis's custody; or possibly he arranged for the gift to be made via an agent in England at the time of Gill's marriage on 21 November 1818. No further details are known of the provenance of the salver -- from notes on file by Mitchell Librarian, March 2007
  Digital order no:Album ID : 861972
• Name
  Gill, John Maunder, d.1823
  Wallis, James, 1785?-1858
  
• Topic
  antiquities
  presents
  silverware
  trays
  
• Open Rosetta viewer
  IE3246411

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