Chapter 4
The connection between China and North America can be traced to the initial settlement by British colonists on the East Coast of North America in May 1609. These colonists, sent by the Virginia Company of London, landed on the north bank of a river they named the James and built Fort James—later to be renamed Jamestown. They believed the river’s headwaters to be “the shortcut to China.”1 The choosing of Jamestown as the landing spot was not a chance decision, but was made in accordance with instructions given by the Virginia Company.2 Even the “decisive and stern leadership” of John Smith (1580–1631) was not given “the authority to override” the instruction from the company, which believed that the James River could lead the colonists to “a shortcut to China.”3
It seems a historical irony that China—an ancient, distant empire—also influenced the founding of the United States. Military support from France was one of the key factors in the colonists’ victory in the American Revolutionary War. One reason the French royal court fought the British in North America was to prevent a monopoly of trade with China. The French court understood that it needed a victory to “destroy British hegemony, not only in North America but in the sugar-rich West Indies and the even richer market of India and China.”4
Below I will provide a summary of the founders of the American colonies and Chinese material culture. Then I will examine two items: tea and porcelain ware, which had a remarkable social and political impact on American society in the colonial and early republic period.
THE AMERICAN FOUNDERS AND CHINESE MATERIAL CULTURE
Chinese material products, in particular tea and porcelain ware, were greatly influential on American society. Before American independence, Chinese goods enriched colonial “American life in many, many ways”5 with the Chinese developing products that increased in popularity and “spread among less affluent sectors of American society.”6
Throughout the mid-eighteenth century, affluent American colonists bought substantial amounts of “Chinese Chippendale” furniture, Chinese wallpaper, silk, and porcelain ware. Chinese tea had become the most popular drink for most colonists.7 For some, China was a source of silk.8 Countless Chinese trade products impressed the Americans. From letters and correspondence penned by some of the American founders, we can glean that abundant amounts of goods originating from China could be found in the colonies. These included “the Flour matting from China,”9 “Chinese silk Netting,”10 “Chinese Wall Papers,”11 “Chinese porcelain table,”12 “Chinese straw floor cloth,”13 “Chinese pipe,”14 “Linnen China, Glass kitchen furniture Plate,”15 Cloth (Nankins),16 “bundles of Nankeens imported from China,”17 the “cotton fabrics of China,”18 “Gong (bell),”19 “fine Cambk Pockt Handfs of the Chinese sort,”20 and more. Benjamin Franklin was “particularly fascinated by the huge sheet of Chinese paper, presumably rice paper.”21 George Washington bought “A Neat tortoise shell Comb & Case for the Pocket—small at one end & large at the other.”22 He also maintained “2 dozn pr large Chinese green Ivory Table knives & Forks.”23
The founders discovered the importance of Chinese domestic animals. As a result, Chinese pigs also reached North America. In 1796, George Washington “purchased the Guinea, or Chinese Hogs”24 and raised the “Chinese Hogs” at his mill.”25 Three years later, Washington told William Thornton (1759–1828) that he had “The true Chinese Hogs.”26 Washington went too far with trying to develop a certain breed of pig and needed more of the original species to start the process again. He told William Thornton that he thought his Chinese Hogs “have got so mixed, that a boar pig is desirable; & I would thank you for securing one for me, of the genuine kind, if to be had.”27 In 1811, Peter Carr (1770–1815), gave Jefferson “a very fine boar-pig of the Chinese or Parkinson breed.”28
Tea and other Chinese products had become profoundly popular in colonial society, becoming an indispensable element of colonists’ daily lives. The British monopoly of tea importation and the colonists’struggle against this changed the historical development of the colonies. The tax on tea and the resentment toward the tea monopoly by the East India Company were factors that led the colonists to rebel. Chinese porcelain ware not only greatly enriched American life but became the catalyst of the formation of American identity.
TEA: THE LEAVES THAT TRIGGERED THE AMERICAN WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE
On the night of December 16, 1773, a week away from Christmas Eve, colonial patriots disguised as Indians secretly entered Boston Harbor under the cover of night. They boarded three British ships in the harbor and dumped some 350 chests of Chinese tea. John Adams commended the destruction of the tea, calling it the “grandest Event” in the history of the colonial protest movement.29 The Boston Tea Party was merely the first of a series of tea parties given by Americans at the expense of the East India Company and colonial tea importers.30 Their action was a protest of taxation without representation and the monopoly granted to the East India Company—among other complaints against the British Empire. Chinese tea, which was transported from China to Britain and then re-exported to North American Colonies, formed part of Britain’s contentious taxation agenda during the 1760s and 1770s.31 George Washington stated, “Is it against paying the duty of three pence per pound on tea became burthen-some? No, it is the right only, we have all along disputed.”32 Thomas Jefferson also echoed, “We must boldly take an unequivocal stand in the line with Massachusetts.”33 This protest brought Anglo-American relations to a boiling point.
The incident was an indicator that the importance of tea had developed to such a degree that it impacted the historical course of the North American colonies. Tea had become a basic element in North American colonial society. In the eighteenth century, drinking tea in the morning at home and socially in the afternoon or early evening became an “established custom.” According to Benjamin Franklin, “at least a Million of Americans drink Tea twice a Day.”34 Another contemporary estimated that one third of the population drank tea twice a day.35 Foreign travelers who visited there left vivid records about tea drinking in Pennsylvania and New York, “The favorite drink, especially after dinner, is tea.”36 The tea ceremony, with tea drinking, became the core of family life. A Swedish traveler found that there was “hardly a farmer’s wife or a poor woman, who does not drink tea in the morning.”37 In Philadelphia women would rather go without their dinners than without “a dish of tea.”38 By the early 1780s, most American “had acquired the tea-drinking habit.”39
As Samuel Shaw, the first American merchant to sail to China on new nation’s first commercial ship—Empress of China—in 1784, observed, “The inhabitants of America must have Tea, the consumption of which will necessarily increase with the increasing population of our Country.”40
Since the early 1700s, tea had been used as a social beverage in the colonies. Judge Samuel Sewall maintained good records of Boston life in the turn of the eighteenth century. The guests enjoyed tea in a meeting at the residence of Madam Winthrope, he wrote on April 15, 1709.41 According to Peter Kalm (1716–1779), who toured North America in the mid-eighteenth century, tea had not only replaced milk as a breakfast beverage but also was drunk in the afternoon.42 From the letter that Ms. Alice Addertongue wrote to Benjamin Franklin in 1732, we can tell that tea was widely used in social gatherings. Addertongue told Franklin, “The first Day of this Separation [with her mother] we both drank Tea at the same Time, but she with her Visitors in the Parlor.”43
Tea had become the excuse for many a social gathering. Benjamin Franklin wrote a note showing his appreciation for Mr. Fisher’s “Company to drink Tea at 5 o’clock this afternoon, June 4, 1745.”44 During the tea hour, social and economic affairs were discussed and interestingly, since teatime provided an ideal opportunity to get acquainted, young men and women enjoyed it very much. Being invited to drink tea became a special event for the colonists. The habit of tea drinking also had an impact on women’s status in colonial society. The tea drinking,
its ceremony and its equipage from pots to slop bowls to cups, that more than any other single ritual symbolized the new domestic world in which women were in charge of a home that was the center of social and family life.45
Benjamin Franklin also published advertisements for tea traders. In August 1745, the colonists read in the Pennsylvania Gazette, “Choice Bohea Tea to be sold by the Dozen or half Dozen Pound, at the Post-Office, Philadelphia.”46
Realizing that it would be a great source for its national revenue, the British government began to impose a tax on tea, first through the Stamp Act of 1765 and later with the Townshend Act of 1767. Given their monopoly of the tea business, the British East India Company profited greatly. Benjamin Franklin reported that in the five years since the act passed, Americans “would have paid 2,500,000 Guineas, for Tea alone, into the Coffers of the Company.”47 The acts created serious dissatisfaction among the American colonists. Many colonists grew to dislike tea “due to what it supposedly represented-taxation without presentation and corruption of monopoly, both of which were reviewed as threats to political and economic freedom.”48 They tried to boycott the acts by avoiding tea and drinking herbal infusions. Benjamin Franklin tried to find some alternatives to Chinese tea. Peter Kalm had an interesting conversation with Franklin. He commented,
Benjamin Franklin, a man now famous in the political world, told me that at different times he had drunk tea cooked from the leaves of the hickory with the bitter nuts. The leaves are collected early in the spring when they have just come out but have not yet had time to become large. They are then dried and used as tea. Mr. Franklin said that of all the species used for tea in North America, next to the real tea from China, he had in his estimation not found any as palatable and agreeable as this.49
Two weeks before the events in Boston Harbor, Franklin, then the representative from the North American colonies, found that the colonists’ “steady refusal to take tea from hence for several years past has made its impressions”50 in the British Parliament. In 1773, Parliament enacted a law in May 1773. This Tea Act authorized the drawback of duties paid on all tea above ten million pounds held by the East India Company in its warehouses before being exported to the colonies. Furthermore, it allowed the company to directly export this excess amount of tea to the colonies. There were about seventeen million pounds of tea on hand and some of it had been there more than seven years.51 Franklin worked hard to convince Parliament to issue “a temporary license from the treasury to export tea to America free of duty.”52 Franklin took every step in his power to prevent the passage of the Stamp Act, but the tide was too strong.53 They could gain nothing through peaceful negotiation. Smuggling tea could not meet the demand of the consumers.
Outraged colonists, including merchants, shippers, and the general masses, started demonstrations. This culminated in the famous Boston Tea Party of December 1773. General Thomas Gage (1718/9–1787), commander in chief of the army in America, was made governor of Massachusetts and was authorized to bring in troops to maintain order in the colony.54 This imprudent step ignited more objections from the colonists. Just a year and a half after the patriots dumped the tea in Boston Harbor, Paul Revere’s (1734/5–1818) ride and the first shots were fired at Lexington. The conflict caused by the justified right to drink tea without extra economic burden led to political hostilities, which in due course led to the American war for independence.
After independence, Americans enjoyed their gatherings again around the tea table. Moreau de Saint-M é ry, a foreign visitor to Philadelphia in the 1790s, noted the warmth and hospitality of these events. Philadelphia families would usually unite at tea, “to which friends, acquaintances and even strangers are invited.”55 Nancy Shippen, a Philadelphian, mentioned in her journal between 1783 and 1786 that one afternoon in December 1783 she and other people “were honored with the Company of Gen Washington to Tea.”56
As soon as the Americans were free of British control, they sent the ship of the Empress of China to Guangzhou (Canton) to bring tea back to North America. In 1785, the ship, carrying three hundred piculs of Hyson and Bohea Tea, returned to New York City. The era when Britain monopolized the tea trade in North America had gone forever. The Chinese-American tea trade increased steadily after 1785 (table 4.1). With the increase of population and increased national wealth, the American people demanded larger and larger quantities of tea. Exports of tea from Guangzhou to the United States increased from 6.6 million-ton pounds in 1822 to 19 million pounds in 1840.57
Table 4.1 American Ships and Exports of Tea at Guangzhou (Canton) 1785–1800 (in Pounds)
|
Year (based on season rather than calendar year) |
Ships |
Tea Exports to the United States |
|
1785 |
2 |
880,100 |
|
1786 |
1 |
695,000 |
|
1787 |
5 |
1,181,860 |
|
1788 |
2 |
750,000 |
|
1789 |
4 |
1,188,800 |
|
1790 |
14 |
3,093,200 |
|
1791 |
3 |
743,100 |
|
1792 |
3 |
1,863,200 |
|
1793 |
6 |
1,538,400 |
|
1794 |
7 |
1,973,130 |
|
1795 |
7 |
1,438,270 |
|
1796 |
10 |
2,819,600 |
|
1797 |
13 |
3,450,400 |
|
1798 |
10 |
3,100,400 |
|
1799 |
13 |
5,674,000 |
|
1800 |
18 |
5,665,067 |
|
1801 |
23 |
4,762,866 |
|
1802 |
31 |
5,740,734 |
|
1803 |
20 |
2,612,436 |
|
1804 |
12 |
2,371,600 |
|
1805 |
31 |
8,546,800 |
|
1806 |
37 |
11,702,800 |
|
1807 |
17 |
8,464,133 |
|
1808 |
31 |
6,408,266 |
|
1809 |
6 |
1,082,400 |
|
1810 |
29 |
9,737,066 |
|
1811 |
12 |
2,884,400 |
Sources: Foster R. Dulles, The Old China Trade (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1930), 210; Tyler Dennett, Americans in Eastern Asia: Critical Study of the Policy of the United States with Reference to China, japan, and Korea in the 19th Century (New York: Macmillan, 1922), 45.
THE U.S. FOUNDERS AND CHINESE PORCELAIN WARE
Chinese porcelain ware—also called Chinaware—was very important to colonial life in the North American colonies. From Benjamin Franklin’s “beautiful simile of the ‘fine and noble China Vase the British Empire’” we can tell its importance in colonial Americans’ minds.58 By comparing the North American colonies as a “noble china vase,” Franklin warned the British parliament it should deal with colonial issues with a fair attitude and reasonable policy—otherwise, sooner or later, the colonies would no longer belong to the British Empire:
Long did I endeavour with unfeigned and unwearied Zeal, to preserve from breaking, that fine and noble China Vase the British Empire: for I knew that being once broken, the separate Parts could not retain even their Share of the Strength or Value that existed in the Whole, and that a perfect Re-Union of those Parts could scarce even be hoped for.59
After the signing of the Treaty of Paris in 1783, the colonists won their desired independence and became the owners of the “noble china vase.” Franklin told the American people, “There is sense enough in America to take care of their own china vase.”60
Benjamin Franklin’s simile indeed revealed the historical reality of the cherished nature of Chinese porcelain ware in colonial America and the fledgling United States. In the following I will introduce you to the Founding Fathers’ fondness for and their effort to obtain Chinese porcelain. It is believed that their love of chinaware “attested to individual and national taste in a pivotal period of American cultural history.”61
Chinese porcelain ware made its way into the North American colonies through Europe during the eighteenth century. New Englanders also learned about Chinese porcelain ware. The direct trade between China and the United States opened the channel that allowed the flow of large quantities of chinaware into North America. Chinese porcelain, “standing preeminent in its picturesqueness and grace,” almost “wholly displaced all other wares, whether metal, leather, or glass.”62 For instance, in Elias Hasket Derby’s house in Salem, Massachusetts, almost every corner “was adorned with Chinese pottery, while one closet contained china estimated as worth $371.”63
A personal story that Benjamin Franklin told in his well-read autobiography reveals chinaware’s popularity in the colonial society (figure 4.1):
Being call’d one Morning to Breakfast, I [Benjamin Franklin] found it in a China Bowl with a Spoon of Silver. They had been bought for me without my Knowledge by my Wife, and had cost her the enormous Sum of three and twenty Shillings, for which she had no other Excuse or Apology to make, but that she thought her Husband deserv’d a Silver Spoon and China Bowl as well as any of his Neighbours. This was the first Appearance of Plate and China in our House, which afterwards in a Course of Years as our Wealth encreas’d augmented gradually to several Hundred Pounds in Value.64
Washington and Jefferson also displayed their fondness for Chinese porcelain ware. Throughout his life, Washington treasured his porcelain. The history of his affection for Chinese porcelain can be traced back as early as his youth. From 1757 through 1772, he sent numerous orders for Chinese porcelain to Bristol and London.65 During this period, Washington obtained Chinese porcelain from a famous Chinese dealer.66 A survey of the invoices sent to Washington by Robert Cary (1730–1777), Virginia merchant of London and Hampstead, from 1759 to 1772, reveals that Richard Farrer (1692/93–1775) supplied an extraordinary range of Chinese porcelain to Washington.67 Washington’s use of Chinese porcelain ware for the wedding ceremony at his marriage in the White House on the Pamunkey River68 set “the vogue for men of means to celebrate their wedlock with beautiful collections of chinaware.”69
Figure 4.1 Franklin’s Chinaware in the Franklin Museum. The bowl is in the collections of the Franklin Institute, Philadelphia, in proximity to the photo representation. (Photo by the author.)
Among Chinese porcelain ware, Washington had a special attachment for blue-and-white porcelain. There are at least nine recorded references to his purchase of blue-and-white Chinese porcelain in Washington’s papers.70 Samuel Fraunces (ca. 1722–1795), realizing that Washington loved this, found an assortment of blue-and-white china for Washington.71 As the War of Independence ended and American officers and troops turned toward their civilian futures, Washington began to search for a large set of chinaware for Mount Vernon. He wrote to Daniel Parker (a partner with William Duer and John Holker in a company formed to provision the Continental Army) in occupied New York and requested “a neat and complete sett of blue and white table China.”72 With the help of Samuel Fraunces, Parker collected 205 pieces of blue-and-white porcelain before September.73 Edward Nicole Jr. also provided some blue and white pieces for Washington.74 Washington learned through an advertisement in the Maryland Gazette and Baltimore Advertiser on August 12, 1785, that the Pallas, which was coming directly back from China, would be selling its cargo, including blue and white Chinese porcelain. He wrote to Tench Tilghman, his former military aide, and asked him to inquire about the conditions of sale and price.75 Five days later Washington, at Mount Vernon, learned that “the Cargo is to be sold at public Venue, on the first of October,” and wrote a letter to Tilghman in which Washington asked him to buy “a set of large blue and White China Dishes with the badge of the Society of the Cincinnati” and the best Hyson Tea, one dozen small blue and white porcelain bowls and best nankeens.76 In July 1790, when two ships had just arrived in New York from Canton, Tobias Lear asked Clement Biddle to purchase and send to Mount Vernon blue and white china tea and coffee services for twenty-four persons with three or four matching slop bowls for tea dregs. A week later Biddle sent to Mount Vernon a box marked GW containing three dozen china cups and saucers, two dozen coffee cups and saucers, and four slop bowls by the sloop Dolphin, Captain Carhart, on August 6, 1790.77
Washington used Chinese porcelain as precious gifts to his friends and guests. In 1797, he gave Mrs. Samuel Power a Chinese porcelain cooler, liner, and cover, with an underglaze-blue river scene with gilt handles and rims.78 On June 9, 1798, Mrs. Washington made Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, a Polish journalist then visiting Mount Vernon, a gift of Chinese porcelain cup with her name and the name of the United States.79
Washington’s appreciation for Chinese porcelain ware created unlimited influence on other Americans since a stream of visitors to the headquarters were served with the ware at the commander in chief’s table. Washington once called his home “a well-resorted tavern.”80 Some existing records confirm his statement. According to householddocuments, Washington dined with his wife alone only twice in the last twenty years of his marriage. Ordinary American citizens and friends “flocked to see the President, and with customary grace, he welcomed them to home, not only for meals but to spend the night.”81
Before direct trade between China and the United States, Europe was the main source of Chinese porcelain for Americans. Thomas Jefferson made good use of his stay in France to acquire Chinese porcelain ware. On May 7, 1784, Jefferson was appointed the European commissioner, replacing John Jay. In August 1784, Jefferson went to take his position in Paris. As soon as he arrived, he bought some Chinese porcelain ware including one dozen coffee cups, saucers, and teacups when he still lived “in temporary quarters.”82 In the following year, he ordered more Chinese porcelain ware. On March 6, 1786, Jefferson left France and before departing he acquired “larger quantities of Chinese export porcelain” in Paris. Among the things he wanted to take back with him to the United States were “a set of table furniture consisting in China, silver & and plated ware.”83
Like most who ordered stock Chinese porcelain in the eighteenth century, Jefferson relied on the tenacity of middlemen, and the nature of the current inventory in China. After he came back from Paris, Jefferson gave a “second large order of Chinese export porcelain.”84
The process through which Thomas Jefferson transported Chinese porcelain from Europe to North America served as an indicator of the value of the Chinese porcelain ware. In order to protect Chinese porcelain ware from being broken in the process of transportation, Jefferson bought creamware made by English potters. He clearly stated out that the purchase was to protect the Chinese porcelain ware from harm. Then he put them outside of the Chinese porcelain ware as a protective layer. Jefferson’s action led an author to conclude that the role of English creamware was changing and its “aesthetic and qualitative value was waning.”85
Later, in 1789, Jefferson ordered more Chinese porcelain from Edward Dowse, a Boston merchant engaging in Chinese trade. In April 1790, Dowse sent the porcelain ordered by Jefferson to New York where Jefferson was serving as the first secretary of state.86 In the interim, the porcelain ware he ordered in France arrived, including 120 porcelain plates, 58 cups, 39 saucers, 4 tureens, saltcellars, and various platters. He used these in New York and Philadelphia, and what remained was eventually shipped to Monticello.87 In 1793, Jefferson had all his Chinese porcelain transported to Monticello.88
The Americans wanted to reduce their reliance on taxed imports and ultimately their need for other goods controlled by England. Their pursuing self-supply of Chinese porcelain ware became a powerful call for the patriotic support of American economic independence. Some colonists attempted to establish a porcelain manufactory company in Philadelphia in 1769. They established the factory on Prime Street “near the present day navy yard, intended to make china at a savings of 15,000 £.”89 Benjamin Franklin, who was in London at the time, showed his happiness seeing the achievement made by his countrymen. He said, “I am pleased to find so good progress made in the China Manufactory. I wish it Success most heartily.”90
The American China Manufactory became noted for the porcelain ware it produced. More importantly, it succeeded in cultivating patriotic support. It set in motion “an intense competition between the young American factory and its English contemporaries.”91 Although the porcelain factory only lasted until 1772, it challenged Britain’s monopoly of the Chinese products and ultimately contributed to the winning of American independence. Benjamin Rush (1745–1813) stated clearly, “There is but one expedient left whereby we can save our sinking country, and that is by encouraging American manufactures. Unless we do this, we shall be undone forever.”92
As one author aptly observed, “the sense of national independence was not confined to politics; it overflowed political channels and spread over the whole area of life. Independence, and its corollary, self-sufficiency, sought expression in industry and commerce and in culture.”93 The demand for Chinese porcelain and the efforts to shake off Great Britain’s control over it helped to create the national conscience of the patriots. Benjamin Rush was among the first group of colonists who wanted to build a porcelain factory in North America.94 For Dr. Rush, colonial production of porcelain ware was one of the means to overcome dependence on Great Britain for goods and trade. The building of such a factory was far beyond the porcelain only. It proved the colonists’ determination to be independent from their motherland.
Go on in encouraging American manufactures. I have many schemes in view about these things. I have made those mechanical arts which are connected with chemistry the particular objects of my study and not without hopes of seeing a china manufactory established in Philadelphia in the course of a few years. Yes, we will be revenged by the mother country. For my part, I am resolved to devote my head, my heart, and my pen entirely to the service of America, and promise myself much assistance from you in everything of this kind that I shall attempt through life.95
The above analysis of the Founding Fathers’ outlooks toward and exertions to acquire Chinese porcelain ware reveals the significant impact of Chinese porcelain or tea on social and political life in North American colonies. Their meaning was far beyond common instruments for daily life in the colonists. They became political tools for the founders to bring up the national awareness of the colonists. It is fair to conclude that Chinese goods left a deep mark in the social and political history in the foundational age of the United States.
NOTES
1. Bob Deans, The River Where American Began: A Journey Along the James (Lanham, MD and New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 59.
2. “Should they happen upon more than one suitable river, the colonists were instructed to if the difference was not great, make a choice of that which bendeth most toward the North-West for that way you shall soonest find the other sea. You must observe if you can, whether the river on which you plant doth spring out of mountains or out of lakes. If it be out of any lake, the passage to the other sea will be more easy, and [it] is like enough, that out of the same lake you shall find some spring which run[s] the contrary way towards the East India Sea.” The Instructions for the Virginia Colony, 1606, http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/documents/1600-1650/instructions-for-the-virginia-colony-1606.php.
3. Deans, The River Where American Began, 94.
4. With the accession of King Louis XVI, Charles Gravier Comte de Vergennes (1717–1787) became foreign minister. He believed that the power of the states on the periphery of Europe, namely Great Britain and Russia, was increasing and should be checked. His rivalry with the British and his desire to avenge the failure of the Seven Years’ War led to his support of the Americans in their war for independence. In 1777, he told the thirteen colonies’ commissioners that France acknowledged the United States and was willing to form an offensive and defensive alliance with the new nation. It was also due to his encouragement that King Louis sent expeditions to Indochina. Thomas Fleming, The Perishes of Peace: America’s Struggle for Survival After Yorktown (New York: Smithsonian Books, 2007), 57.
5. C. Martin Wilbur, “Modern America’s Cultural Debts to China,” Issues & Studies: A Journal of China Studies and International Affairs 22, no. 1 (January 1986): 127.
6. Warren I. Cohen, America’s Response to China: A History of Sino-American Relations (New York: Columbia University Press, 1990), 2.
7. Dave Wang, “Chinese Civilization and the United States: Tea, Ginseng, Porcelain Ware and Silk in Colonial America,” Virginia Review of Asian Studies (Summer 2011): 114–18.
8. Dave Wang, “Benjamin Franklin’s Efforts to Promote Sericulture in North America,” Franklin Gazette 18, no. 2 (Summer 2008): 3–7.
9. “From George Washington to Robert Morris, 15 January 1789,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-01-02-0180. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Presidential Series, ed. Dorothy Twohig, vol. 1, September 24, 1788–March 31, 1789 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987), 245–46.
10. “Invoice from Robert Cary & Company, 13 February 1765,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-07-02-0222. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, ed. W. W. Abbot and Dorothy Twohig, vol. 7, January 1, 1761–June 15, 1767 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1990), 353–57.
11. “Invoice from Richard Washington, 10 November 1757,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-05-02-0031. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, ed. W. W. Abbot, vol. 5, October 5, 1757–September 3, 1758 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1988), 49–51.
12. “To George Washington from Tobias Lear, 24 October 1790,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-06-02-0271. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Presidential Series, ed. Mark A. Mastromarino, vol. 6, July 1, 1790–November 30, 1790 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1996), 573–79.
13. “From Thomas Jefferson to Thomas Claxton, 18 June 1802,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-37-02-0504. Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. Barbara B. Oberg, vol. 37, March 4–June 30, 1802 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010), 615–16.
14. “Inventory of President’s House, 19 February 1809,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/99-01-02-9835.
15. “Abigail Adams to John Adams, 16 May 1789,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-08-02-0189. Original source: The Adams Papers, Adams Family Correspondence, ed. C. James Taylor, Margaret A. Hogan, Jessie May Rodrique, Gregg L. Lint, Hobson Woodward, and Mary T. Claffey, vol. 8, March 1787–December 1789 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007), 354–56.
16. “To Alexander Hamilton from Gouverneur Morris, 17 August 1792,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Hamilton/01-12-02-0174. Original source: The Papers of Alexander Hamilton, ed. Harold C. Syrett, vol. 12, July 1792–October 1792 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1967), 220–22.
17. “To James Madison from John Mitchell, 12 August 1803,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/02-91-02-0802.
18. “From James Madison to James Monroe, 20 May 1807,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/99-01-02-1706.
19. “To Thomas Jefferson from Henry Remsen, 19 November 1792,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-24-02-0623. Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, ed. John Catanzariti, vol. 24, June 1–December 31, 1792 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), 640–41.
20. “Enclosure: Invoice to Robert Cary & Company, 20 July 1767,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-08-02-0007-0002. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, ed. W. W. Abbot and Dorothy Twohig, vol. 8, June 24, 1767–December 25, 1771 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993), 12–14.
21. “To Benjamin Franklin from John Baskerville, 24 August 1773,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-20-02-0202. Original source: The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, ed. William B. Willcox, vol. 20, January 1 through December 31, 1773 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1976), 375–76.
22. “Enclosure: Invoice to Robert Cary & Company, 23 June 1766,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-07-02-0295-0002. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, ed. W. W. Abbot and Dorothy Twohig, vol. 7, January 1, 1761–June 15, 1767 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1990), 447–50.
23. “Enclosure: Invoice to Robert Cary & Company, 15 July 1772,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/02-09-02-0050-0002. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Colonial Series, ed. W. W. Abbot and Dorothy Twohig, vol. 9, January 8, 1772–March 18, 1774 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1994), 64–67.
24. “From George Washington to Bushrod Washington, 14 February 1796,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-19-02-0370. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Presidential Series, ed. David R. Hoth, vol. 19, October 1, 1795–March 31, 1796 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2016), 463.
25. “From George Washington to Bushrod Washington, 10 February 1796,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/05-19-02-0355. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Presidential Series, ed. David R. Hoth, vol. 19, October 1, 1795–March 31, 1796 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2016), 447–48.
26. “From George Washington to William Thornton, 1 December 1799,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/06-04-02-0379. Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Retirement Series, ed. W. W. Abbot, vol. 4, April 20, 1799–December 13, 1799 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1999), 434–35.
27. Ibid.
28. “Peter Carr to Thomas Jefferson, 31 August 1811,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/03-04-02-0105. Original source: The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, Retirement Series, ed. J. Jefferson Looney, vol. 4, June 18, 1811 to April 30, 1812 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007), 109–10.
29. John E. Ferling, John Adams: A Life (Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1992), 92.
30. John C. Miller, Origins of the American Revolution: With a New Introduction and a Biography (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1943), 350.
31. Simon Hill, “China and the American Revolution,” Journal of the American Revolution (December 7, 2017). https://allthingsliberty.com/2017/12/china-american-revolution/.
32. “George Washington, To Bryan Fairfax, July 20, 1774,” Writings of George Washington, ed. John C. Fitzpatrick, vol. 3 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1939), 232. Also John Frederick Schroeder, ed., Maxims of Washington: Political, Social, Moral, and Religious (Mount Vernon, VA: Mount Vernon Ladies Association, 1942), 18.
33. Jon Meacham, Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power (New York: Random House, 2012), 71.
34. Benjamin Franklin, “Preface to Declaration of the Boston Town Meeting,” in The Votes and Proceedings of the Freeholders and Other Inhabitants of the Town of Boston (London, 1773), i-vi, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
35. Letter from Gilbert Barkly to directors of the East India Company, May 26, 1773 . Tea Leaves: Being a Collection of Letters andDocuments, ed. Francis S. Drake (Boston, 1884), 200.
36. Jacques-Pierre Brissot de Warville, New Travels in the United States of America, 1788, trans. Mara Sconceanu Vamos and Durand Echeverria; ed. Durand Echeverria (Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press, 1964).
37. Peter Kalm, Peter Kalm’s Travels in North America, ed. and trans. Adolf B. Benson (New York: Wilson-Erickson, 1937), 1:361.
38. Miller, Origins of the American Revolution, 275.
39. Michael H. Hunt, The Making of a Special Relationship: The United States and China to 1914 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1983), 7.
40. “To John Jay from Samuel Shaw, 31 December 1786,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jay/01-04-02-0208. Original source: The Selected Papers of John Jay, ed. Elizabeth M. Nuxoll, vol. 4, 1785–1788 (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 2015), 448–59.
41. Samuel Sewall, Diary of Samuel Sewall, 1674–1729, reprinted in Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 1879, ser. 5, vol. 6, 253.
42. Peter Kalm, “The America of 1750,” in Peter Kalm’s Travels in North America, ed. and trans. Adolf B. Benson (New York: Wilson-Erickson, 1937), 1:346 and 2:605.
43. Pennsylvania Gazette, September 12, 1732, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
44. Benjamin Franklin, to Denial Fisher, June 4, 1745, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
45. Stephanie Grauman Wolf, As Various as Their Land: The Everyday Lives of Eighteenth-Century Americans (New York: HarperCollins, 1993), 80.
46. Pennsylvania Gazette, August 8, 1745.
47. Franklin, “Preface to Declaration.”
48. Hill, “China and the American Revolution.”
49. Peter Kalm, “Conversation with Benjamin Franklin,” Franklin Papers, https://franklinpapers.org/framedVolumes.jsp?vol=4&page=053a.
50. Benjamin Franklin, to Joseph Galloway, London, November 3, 1773. Reprinted from William Temple Franklin, ed., Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin, L.L.D., F.R.S., &c… (3 vols., London, 1817–1718), II, https://franklinpapers.org/framedNames.jsp.
51. Lawrence Henry Gipson, The Coming of the Revolution, 1763–1775, in the New American Nation Series, ed. Henry Steele Commager and Richard B. Morris (New York: Harper & Row, 1954), 217.
52. Benjamin Franklin, to Joseph Galloway, London, November 3, 1773.
53. Carl Van Doren, Benjamin Franklin (New York: Viking, 1938; third printing 1968), 322.
54. John Richard Alden, The American Revolution, 1775–1783, New American Nation Series, ed. Henry Steele Commager and Richard B. Morris (New York: Harper & Row, 1954), 7.
55. Mederic Louis Elie Moreau de Saint-M é ry, Moreau de St. M é ry’s American Journey, translated and edited by Kenneth Roberts and Anna M. Roberts (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1947), 266; Beth Carver Wees, Coffee, Tea and Chocolate in Early Colonial America, http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/coff/hd_coff.htm.
56. Nancy Shippen, Nancy Shippen, Her Journal Book, edited by Ethel Armes (Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1935), 167–243.
57. Yen-P’ing Hao, “Chinese Teas to America—a Synopsis,” in America’s China Trade in Historical Perspective: The Chinese and American Performance, ed. Ernest R. May and John K. Fairbank (Cambridge, MA and London: Harvard University Press, 1986), 14.
58. From Amelia Barry, ALS: American Philosophical Society, Tunis 3d. July 1777. In The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
59. Benjamin Franklin, to Lord Howe, Copy: Henry E. Huntington Library; other copies: British Museum; Library of Congress Philada. July 20, 1776. In The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
60. Benjamin Franklin, to David Hartley (unpublished) Passy, October 22, 1783. In The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
61. Susan Gray Detweiler, George Washington’s Chinaware (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1982), 8.
62. Ping Chia Kuo, “Canton and Salem: The Impact of Chinese Culture Upon New England Life During the Post-Revolutionary Era,” New England Quarterly III (1930): 429.
63. Esther Singleton, Furniture of Our Forefathers (New York: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1901), 2:548–53.
64. Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, Part Eight, in The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
65. Detweiler, George Washington’s Chinaware, 9.
66. The term was used in the eighteenth century to describe merchants who specialized in imported Chinese porcelain. There were over a hundred such Chinamen in London between 1711 and 1774. See Detweiler, George Washington’s Chinaware, 43.
67. Ibid.
68. Ibid., 37.
69. Kuo, “Canton and Salem,” 430.
70. Detweiler, George Washington’s Chinaware, 52.
71. Samuel Fraunces was a keeper of the Queen’s Head Tavern in New York. He used to serve as a steward to President Washington in New York and Philadelphia. See Detweiler, George Washington’s Chinaware, 77.
72. Ibid.
73. Ibid.
74. Ibid.
75. Ibid.
76. John C. Fitzpatrick, ed., The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources 1745–1799, volume 30, June 20, 1788–January 21, 1790 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1939), 223.
77. Lear to Biddle, 18, July 25 and August 1790, all in PHi: Washington-Biddle Correspondence; Biddle to Lear, 21, and July 29, 1790, and Biddle to George A. Washington, 8 August 1790, all in PHi: Clement Biddle Letter Book.
78. Detweiler, George Washington’s Chinaware, 145.
79. See Niemcewicz’s letter of thanks for his stay at Mount Vernon, in Eugene Kuisielewicz, “Niemcewicz in America,” Polish Review V (1960): 71–72. As for the cup, see Samuel W. Woddhouse Jr., “Martha Washington’s China and Mr. Van Braam,” Antiquaries XXVII (May 1935): 186; Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz, Vine and Fig Tree: Travels Through America 1797–1799, 1805 with some Further Account of Life in New Jersey, trans. and ed. with an introduction and notes by Metchie J. E. Budka (Elizabeth, NJ: Grassmann Publishing Company, Inc, 1965), 104.
80. Anne Petri, George Washington and Food, http://www.house.gov/petri/gw003.htm.
81. Ibid.
82. Susan R. Stein, The Worlds of Thomas Jefferson at Monticello (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1993), 23. (Jefferson’s Memorandum Books shows records of these purchases between August 21 and September 6, 1784.)
83. Thomas Jefferson to Rayneval, March 3, 1786, in Jefferson Papers (Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society, 2003), 9:312–13; Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson, 27.
84. Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson, 348.
85. George L. Miller, “A Revised Set of CC Index Value for Classification and Economic Scaling of English Ceramics from 1787 to 1880,” Historical Archaeology 25 (1991): 1; Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson, 346.
86. This china may be the double bordered Nanking pattern with an armorial shield with the initial “TJ” that was found in Boston in the late nineteenth century. It was acquired by Thomas Jefferson Coolidge Jr.
87. Martha Jefferson Randolph to Thomas Jefferson, January 16, 1791, Family Letters; see Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson, 68.
88. Martha Jefferson Randolph to Thomas Jefferson, June 23, 1808 (Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society); see Stein, Worlds of Thomas Jefferson, 86–87.
89. John Fanning Watson, ed., Annals of Philadelphia (Philadelphia and New York: E. L. Carey & A. Hart, 1830). See also Michael K. Brown, “Piecing Together the Past: Recent Research on the American China Manufactory, 1769–1772,” Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 133, no. 4 (1989): 555.
90. Benjamin Franklin to Deborah Franklin, January 28, 1772. In The Franklin Papers, http://www.franklinpapers.org/Franklin/framedVolumes.jsp.
91. Brown, “Piecing Together the Past,” 573.
92. Benjamin Rush to probably Jacob Rush, January 26, 1769, in L. H. Butterfield, ed., Letters of Benjamin Rush (Princeton: Princeton University Press), 1:74. Also in Pennsylvania Journal 1374 (April 6, 1769).
93. John Spargo, Early American Pottery and China (Rutland, VT: Charles E. Tuttle, 1974), 97–98.
94. Brown, “Piecing Together the Past,” 557.
95. Benjamin Rush to Thomas Bradford, April 15, 1768, in L. H. Butterfield, ed., Letters of Benjamin Rush (Princeton: Princeton University Press), 1:54.