A Set of Three George II Silver Meat Dishes, Paul de Lamerie, London, 1745

Welbore Ellis (1713-1802) to his great nephew

Henry Welbore Agar, 2nd Viscount Clifden (1761-7836) and by descent to

Henry Agar-Ellis, 4th Viscount Clifden (1863-1895) perhaps sold privately

George Dunton Widener (1861-1912) and by descent to his son (dishes no. 14 and 15)

George Dunton Widener Jr. (1889-1971) (14 and 15)

Christie's New York, 29 April 1986, lot 175 (14 and 15)

Sotheby's London, 5 March 1998, lot 238 (14 and 15)

F. Gorevic & Son, Inc., New York (13)

Bonham's, London, 30 June 2010, lot 89 (13)

The arms are those of Ellis impaling Stanhope for Welbore Ellis (1713-1802), born Kildare, Ireland, as the sixth and youngest but only surviving son of Dr. Welbore Ellis (1661/2-1734), bishop of Kildare and from 1732 of Meath, and his wife, Diana Briscoe (d. 1739), the daughter of Sir John Briscoe of Boughton, Northamptonshire, and Amberley Castle, Sussex. Ellis attended Westminster School and Christ Church Oxford, graduating 1736. He served as M.P. for Cricklade, then for Weymouth, as well as Spokesman for the Admiralty and Lord Chancellor of the Exchequer.

He married in 1747, Elizabeth Stanhope (d. 1761), the only daughter of Sir William Stanhope. The couple lived at Tylney Hall, Hampshire, and at Pope's Villa, Twickenham, which Elizabeth had acquired from her father. Their entertaining invited comment from their waspish neighbor Horace Walpole. Ellis was created 1st Baron Mendip in 1794, the title passing to his great-nephew and heir, Henry Welbore Agar, second Viscount Clifden, who assumed the surname Ellis.