A PAIR OF AMERICAN SILVER WAITERS, SIMEON SOUMAINE, NEW YORK, CIRCA 1738-40

with molded piecrust rim, center engraved with foliate mirror cypher EC within a circle, on three scroll legs with hoofed feet

Elizabeth Cruger (d. 1760), to her husband
Henry Cruger (d. 1780), then either
their son Henry Cruger Jr. (d. 1827) or their daughter Mary Cruger (m. Jacob Walton)
Matilda Caroline Cruger (Henry's daughter) and her husband Henry Walton (Mary's son)
Thence by descent
(One) Sotheby's New York, January 18, 2002, lot 464
(The other) Jonathan Trace, July 2005

SAM American Sampler 2002-2005

One with tiny rim split (stress fracture), otherwise good throughout
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.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

The cypher is that of Elizabeth Harris (1712-1760), who married Henry Cruger (1707-80) in Legnaum, Jamaica, in 1736. 

As the family bible records (cited on ancestry.com), Henry Cruger was born in New York on November 25, 1707, and was baptized on the 26th. The sponsors were John van Giesen, Myndert Schuyler and his wife Rachel Schulyer. The infant was the son of John Cruger (d. 1744) and Marie Cuyler (1677/8-1724, m. 1703). John Cruger served as Alderman of New York for 22 years, from 1712-1733, and was Mayor of New York from 1739 until his death. His wife was the eldest daughter of Hendrick Cuyler of Albany, Captain and Major of the Albany Troop 1685-1689. 

In 1731, at age 24, Henry Cruger left New York on the "Sloop Mary Capt. Jacoby Kip for Jamaica to Settle in the Island.'' While there, he married firstly in 1734 Hannah Slaughter Montgomery, but she died a little over a year after the wedding. He then married Elizabeth Harris in Legnaum on December 21, 1736. Elizabeth was born June 7, 1712, to Dr. Nicholas Harris (d. in Jamaica on December 18, 1736, aged 57) and Saye Harris (d. Jamaica, 1713). After the birth of their eldest son, John Harris, the couple left Jamaica, April 23, 1738 on the "Ship Mary Capt. Robt. Ratsey'' and arrived in New York on May 31 of that year. Their son Henry Jr. was born in New York in 1739. The Crugers probably ordered silver from Simeon Soumaine either upon their return to New York in 1738, or possibly after Henry inherited his father's estate in 1744. Soumaine was vestryman at Trinity Church, where the Crugers worshiped, between 1712 and 1750. Another item belonging to the Crugers, and one of the most famous pieces of American silver, is the covered sugar bowl by Soumaine engraved with the same cypher, now in the Garvan Collection at Yale University Art Gallery (1930.1056). 

The cypher is taken from Col. Parsons' A New Book of Cyphers (see Buhler and Hood, p. 57), one of the many manuals available to the early 18th century engraver. Silver salts and spoons with this same cypher were owned by a Cruger descendant in England; the salts were stolen in the mid 20th century. This group of silver would have been on prominent display in the home of one of New York's wealthiest merchants. The comparable table of William Walton, whose son Jacob married the Cruger's daughter Mary, "groaned under its weight of brilliant massive silver" (The History of the City of New York, p. 683). 

Henry Cruger was a member of the New York Assembly from 1745 to 1759, and was appointed in 1767 to the King's Council of the Province. On his resignation in 1773, his son, John Harris Cruger, succeeded to this position. Henry was in partnership with his brother John as shipping merchants in the English and West Indian trade, their vessels sailing from Cruger's Docks on the East River.

John Cruger (Jr.; 1710-1792), Henry's brother, was a member of the New York Assembly, and from 1756-65 Mayor of New York. He was one of the most stalwart opponents of arbitrary measures by the English government. He authored the "Declaration of Rights and Grievances'' put forth by the Stamp Act Congress in 1765, insisting upon "no taxation without representation.'' When the hated stamps arrived, he surrendered them to the City authorities, and exercised great tact and diplomacy in handling General Gage. In 1768, he was chief organizer and first President of the New York Chamber of Commerce, and in 1769 was chosen Speaker of the Assembly over William Livingston. When the British occupied New York, John Cruger retired to Kinderhook, and only returned to New York after the Revolution.

Elizabeth Cruger died on April 14, 1760, and was buried in Trinity Church. In 1757, Henry Cruger, Jr. had been sent to Bristol, and became a prominent merchant there. In 1774 he and Edmund Burke were elected Members of Parliament for Bristol. With the outbreak of hostilities, Henry Cruger, Sr., in poor health, left for England and joined his son Henry Jr. in Bristol. John Harris Cruger, Henry's eldest son who had married a daughter of General Oliver de Lancey, served as Lieut.-Colonel and fought on Long Island, at Savannah, Charleston, and Camden. Henry's youngest son, Nicholas, was a West Indies merchant who served as mentor to Alexander Hamilton and who sided with Washington during the Revolution.

The elder Cruger died in Bristol and is buried in the center aisle of Bristol Cathedral. The will of "Henry Cruger the Elder late of the City of New York in North America, but now residing in the City of Bristol in Great Britain'' was proved on March 2, 1780. John Harris Cruger, fighting for the British in North America, received all of his father's East Indies estates. Nicholas Cruger, on the American side, received £500 and a quarter of the residue of the estate. His daughter Mary Walton received £1, 000 and another quarter, while Henry, Jr. received a third quarter but was also acquitted of a debt of £1,270.

Henry Cruger, Jr. was elected mayor of Bristol in 1781, and re-elected to Parliament in 1784. He married in 1772 as his second wife Caroline Elizabeth Blair. However, in 1790 the family returned to America and to New York, and in 1792 Henry was elected a Senator of New York. He lived at 382 Greenwich St., where he died in April, 1827. His daughter, Matilda Caroline, who married as her second husband her cousin Henry Walton, son of Jacob Walton and Mary Cruger. The waiters could have passed through either line, Elizabeth and Henry's daughter Mary or their son Henry Jr.; the one sold Sotheby's, 2002 had been retained by the descendants of Matilda Caroline.