This is, I would venture to guess, a water color by John Coles, Sr., a heraldic painter in Boston in the late 1700s. Other than the crest, there’s nothing particularly weird about it. In fact, I’d say the arms themselves are rather nice, and a quick look at Papworth suggests that they are apparently not pirated from any previously existing English arms.
Coles’s work has long been scorned as useless by those who wanted early use of heraldry to be proof of descent from armigerous ancestors in the old country. To me, it’s nevertheless of great interest as evidence of vibrant interest in personal heraldry even in the immediate aftermath of the Revolution.
Given the 15 stars and 15 stripes it presumably dates 1792-96.
James
Looking at other work by John Coles, a lot of the crests seem to be the same. Was there a specific reasoning for this or just artistic license?
http://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?museum=all&t=objects&type=all&f=&s=peale&record=32
Quote:
Looking at other work by John Coles, a lot of the crests seem to be the same. Was there a specific reasoning for this or just artistic license?
Neat find! Here is another I saw with the American flag (but not in the crest):
http://p1.la-img.com/1030/31081/12241910_4_l.jpg
http://www.liveauctioneers.com/item/12241910_wc-coat-of-arms-winship-brighton-ma-18th-c
Snyder;99613 wrote:
Looking at other work by John Coles, a lot of the crests seem to be the same. Was there a specific reasoning for this or just artistic license?
http://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?museum=all&t=objects&type=all&f=&s=peale&record=32
Patriotism, I would imagine.
Snyder;99613 wrote:
Looking at other work by John Coles, a lot of the crests seem to be the same. Was there a specific reasoning for this or just artistic license?
http://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?museum=all&t=objects&type=all&f=&s=peale&record=32
Robson: "The British herald; or, Cabinet of armorial bearings of the nobility ...", 1830, indicates that the arms "Argent a dragon’s head erased very holding in the mouth a hand gules" is attributed to Williams of Eltham, Kent but is not the arms of the better known family of baronets of the same place a few lines higher, at http://books.google.be/books?id=03EUAAAAYAAJ&pg=PT625. However, in the illustration by Coles there is an inescutcheon indicative of a baronet. Who are the arms of?
Derek Howard
