Teabowl & saucer, Qianlong c.1745, with the arms of Fearon impaling Eckford
A teabowl & saucer, Qianlong c.1745, with the arms of Fearon impaling Eckford, from one of two services made at this time copying the same original artwork. The second service is known from a single baluster vase decorated around the body with Chinese pheasants on rockwork and the arms on the rim. A squirrel as a crest is relatively uncommon in British heraldry and just eight families with armorial services feature this above their arms.
The marriage represented by the heraldry has not been found, although it seems possible that it was ordered for the family of Thomas Fearon, Chief Justice of Jamaica. This is lent credence by the fact that the Fearons were associates of the Beckford family of Jamaica who ordered a similar service decorated with pheasants. A commercial company called Fearon & Hudson were London merchants and financial brokers at this time.
Several members of the family later served in the East India Company and traded in China, while Edward Fearon (born in Hackney in 1813) and his wife Elizabeth Ward, who married in London in 1740, settled in New Zealand at Motueka in the Wairau Valley in 1842, leaving a number of distinguished descendants in New Zealand through their daughters, and after whom Fearon Street and ‘Fearon’s Bush’ were named (my grateful thanks to Laurie Jones for NZ information).
Reference : Howard, David S.; Chinese Armorial Porcelain, Volume II, p.342
Condition : Haircrack consolidated in teabowl only
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