A subject that is not widely known today is that there was regular red earthenware production in Portsmouth, New Hampshire in the eighteenth and nineteenth century, although the area was also a large port city, which saw a lot of pottery imported from both domestic and international manufacturers. Nonetheless, I just learned about this eighteenth or nineteenth century black glazed red earthenware jug that was recently recovered by mudlarker Austin Castrucci from the North Mill Pond in Portsmouth, which was a tidal inlet off the Piscataqua River reaching the Atlantic Ocean when the area's first settlers arrived in the 1600s.
Both the North and South Mill Ponds in Portsmouth retain long histories dating back to the seventeenth century with European settlers, whereas both of these locations have produced a wide variety of artifacts in recent years. Interestingly, the Library of Congress owns a drawing by Edwin Whitefield (1816-1892) from about 1830 of the North Mill Pond (see below) that could have been created during the same period that this jug was manufactured. This pond is located today near downtown Portsmouth and not far from Strawbery Banke Museum.
Furthermore, this is a shape of jug that was produced anywhere from Peabody (South Danvers), Massachusetts to Merrimacport (South Amesbury), Massachusetts, Exeter, New Hampshire and Portsmouth, as well as by the Clark family in New Hampshire, among likely other locations. Therefore, it is difficult to accurately identify where it was exactly made.
However, among the potter's businesses that operated in Portsmouth was a multi-generational company first owned by Joseph Dodge (1776-1849), who was related to other Dodge family businesses in Exeter and Portland, Maine. Dodge purchased the pottery business about 1796 from Winthrop Bennett, who had operated from circa 1789-1796. The business then continued through the Dodge family well into the 1800s, whereas both Joseph and his son Joseph Dodge Jr. (1798-1855) are listed potters in the 1821 Portsmouth City Directory. The Directory also notes that the family owned a wharf.
For more information about red earthenware production in Portsmouth - see a feature story I wrote for the February 2018 issue of Maine Antique Digest, titled, The Dodges and Their Potteries: http://www.earlyamericanceramics.com/2021/01/the-dodge-pottery-in-portsmouth-new.html.
Also see my seventh book, titled, From One Town Came Many: The Red Earthenware Industry of Ancient North Yarmouth, Maine: https://historicbeverly.net/product/94597/.
Note: It is also worth noting that red earthenware production in Portsmouth dates back to the 1720s with Samuel Marshall (d. 1749), who will be a subject of a chapter in my forthcoming New Hampshire book, titled, An Influential Family of Early Potters: The Clarks of New Hampshire and Related Businesses. Marshall was also a subject of a feature story I wrote for the April 2017 issue of the New England Antiques Journal, title, A Pioneering Potter: Samuel Marshall of Portsmouth, New Hampshire: https://www.scribd.com/document/344945085/Samuel-Marshall-Potter-New-England-Antiques-Journal-April-2017.
Red Earthenware Jug Recovered from North Mill Pond in Portsmouth, N.H.
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