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A Reputation Forged in Silver

Craftsman and revolutionary Elias Pelletreau found success even in rural Southampton

A pepper caster, spoons and a tankard made by Elias Pelletreau, now part of the Suffolk County Historical Society collection. (Newsday Photo/Bill Davis)

By Michele Ingrassia | Staff Writer

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Listen, my children, and you shall hear of the midnight ride of ... Elias Pelletreau? Well, not exactly.

Few 18th-Century American craftsmen rivaled the myth and magic of Paul Revere, the Boston silversmith, Revolutionary patriot and muse for Longfellow's heart-thumping poem, ``Paul Revere's Ride.'' Nevertheless, Pelletreau -- Revere's Southampton-born contemporary and a revolutionary patriot in his own right -- flourished, if not as Revere's artistic equal, certainly as one of the most prolific rural silversmiths of the era and Long Island's most important.

``Pelletreau was not a great artist, but he was significant,'' says Pelletreau scholar Dean Failey, senior director of American furniture and decorative arts at Christie's auction house. What distinguishes his work is not just art, but commerce. ``He was one of a very, very small handful of silversmiths who were able to successfully carry on their craft in a nonurban setting. His ability to network was remarkable.''

But Pelletreau was no Revere-lite. Like many upwardly mobile young men, this son of a successful Huguenot merchant was considered a worthy candidate for apprenticeship. ``We talk about Little Italy and Chinatown today, but the Huguenot community was a very important part of 18th-Century New York,'' says Failey. ``His contacts had everything to do with the fact that he was part of that community.''

In 1741, at age 15, Pelletreau was sent from Southampton to New York to learn from Simeon Soumaine, the master goldsmith and fellow Huguenot. Unlike many urban apprentices, though, he left after his tutelage, returning home in 1750 to set up shop in the building attached to his father's house on Main Street. The one-room structure still stands, sandwiched between an antiques shop and the Southampton Chamber of Commerce.

During the next 30 years -- including seven spent in Connecticut during the British occupation -- Pelletreau crafted a steady stream of tankards, porringers and teapots for some of Long Island's most formidable families. Among them: Nathaniel Woodhull; David Gardiner, the sixth proprietor of Gardiners Island; his son, John Lyon Gardiner; merchant Samuel Townsend; and Dr. George Muirson, who later pioneered the Island's use of the smallpox vaccination.

To understand the magnitude of his success, it's important to note that working in revolutionary Southampton (population 2,792) would have been akin to couturier John Galliano setting up shop today in Cedar Rapids, Iowa: There wasn't a ready audience for grand designs. Rural markets typically demanded just a handful of pieces a year, few more adventurous than spoons. Silver was a luxury, after all, and customers tended to be urban, well-educated and well-traveled, a group with a taste for fashion and the money to indulge it.

But Pelletreau wasn't typical. His ledgers list more than 100 hollowware customers -- urbane types who could have bought anywhere, and inward-looking locals who, as East Hampton preacher Lyman Beecher wrote in the early 1800s, ``made no other journey during their whole lives'' than the trip to church on Sunday. Part of Pelletreau's cachet reflected his status as farmer (he owned 125 acres), patriot (though too old to fight, he was made captain in the Southampton militia company) and benefactor (he reportedly loaned William Floyd money to travel to the first Continental Congress).

More important was his hybrid style, which mixed the fashionable and the solid, drawing from New York, where silversmiths were influenced by cutting-edge London, and New England, which defied trendiness. Some of his tankards, for example, were flat-topped New York style; others were dome-topped New England.

For the most part, though, this was straightforward design, devoid of the rococo flourishes raging in Europe. ``What separates a straightforward piece from something we go oooh and ahhh over is an element of decoration, such as engraving,'' says Faily. Since Pelletreau was not an engraver or an embellisher, his legacy suffers.

Though Pelletreau surpassed local silversmiths and rivaled many New York contemporaries, even his best work falls short of pieces by top artisans such as Revere and New York's brilliant Myer Myers. ``The best of Myers and the others goes one step beyond reducing an English form to American tastes and transforms it to something that soars,'' says Kevin Stayton, curator of decorative arts at the Brooklyn Museum, which mounted a 1959 Pelletreau show.

Where does that leave Pelletreau's legacy? Financially, his silver fetches respectable if not staggering prices today -- about $2,000 to $3,000 for a porringer; $10,000 to $15,000 for a tankard and more than $20,000 for a teapot. Stylistically, there is much to praise. ``A number of significant factors come together in Pelletreau: his French descent, the fact that his silver is very handsome, and his solid craftsmanship,'' says Stayton. ``There was no one else on Long Island producing like that -- and producing a full repertoire.''