A Very Fine and Rare Queen Anne Carved Cherrywood Flat-Top High Chest of Drawers, Hartford County, Probably Middletown, Connecticut, circa 1785

Appears to retain its original finish and cast brass hardware.

Reputedly purchased in Madison, Connecticut from the family of Jane P. Barnes (Pritchard) (1918-1971) and belonged to Mrs. Julis Von Bierwirth;
John Walton, Jewet City, Connecticut.

John Walton advertisement, The Magazine Antiques, (October 1972), 525;
Thomas P. Kugelman and Alice K. Kugelman with Robert Lionetti, Connecticut Valley Furniture: Eliphalet Chapin and His Contemporaries, 1750-1800 (Hartford, CT: Connecticut Historical Society Museum: Distributed by University Press of New England, 2005) p. 123, no. 51C.

Several minor patches to drawer lips. Image of chest prior to restoration in Kugelman book on Connecticut furniture.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
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This exceptional cherrywood high chest relates to a group of furniture produced in the Middletown area of Connecticut by a craftsman who was trained in the Wethersfield style. It has been illustrated by Thomas P. Kugelman and Alice K. Kugelman with Robert Lionetti, in Connecticut Valley Furniture: Eliphalet Chapin and His Contemporaries, 1750-1800, published by the Connecticut Historical Society Museum in 2005. They identify this Middletown area group as the “Wilcox Group” for a high chest that descended in the Wilcox family of the Westfield section of Middletown (see Kugelman, Kugelman and Lionetti, cat. 51, p.  122-3.) The unidentified highly skilled maker responsible for the Wilcox high chest likely apprenticed in Wethersfield before moving to Middletown, where he achieved perfection in his designs.  A scalloped-top dressing table with no early history also appears to stem from his shop (see ibid, cat. 52, p. 125).

This high chest is remarkably similar to the Wilcox high chest in its large center drawers carved with well-executed Wethersfield style shells, signature front apron scalloped with arches of equal height flanked by a single spur on each side, ogee shaped knee returns attached to the underside of the apron and canted in back, and well formed cabriole legs with unusually slender ankles and saucer-shaped feet with supporting pads shaped as truncated cones. However, the fact that it lacks a bonnet and several additional construction differences suggest it was not made in the same shop. The upper case drawer configuration is typical of the Wethersfield style after about 1760 while the apron and carved shell suggest a date at least a decade later.  

A bonnet-top high chest in the collection of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation also shares a similar front-apron profile and relates to the group (see ibid, cat. 51b, p. 123).