Ceramics

In these pages it is my intent to convey some of the research I have done on the Ridgway group of partnerships illustrated by items I have purchased along the way. I hope my work will have shed some light on a sadly neglected group of wares. My interest was originally stimulated by the books written by Dr Geoffrey Godden to whom I, and all of us, owe a deep debt of gratitude.

I have split the research by factory, as follows, in order to simplify matters.

• Cauldon Place This factory was set up by Job Ridgway in 1802 and subsequently occupied by his two sons John and William until their partnership broke up in 1830. John Ridgway continued potting on the site, receiving the accolade of Potter to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, until his retirement in 1858. Brown-Westhead, Moore and Co. then continued until in 1905 the name was changed to Cauldon Ltd. The site is now a university campus.
• Bell Works The original Ridgway factory used by George and Job Ridgway until Job went off to create Cauldon Place. George continued until 1815 when Job's sons John and William took it over. William was sole owner from 1830 until his final bankruptcy in 1854. It is now the site of the Stoke-on-Trent Museum.
• Church Works William Ridgway's main factory from at least 1830, possibly before. Here he was in partnership with the modeller Leonard Stanley Abington and later his son, Edward John Ridgway. Edward ended in sole control and, in 1866, moved the concern to the new Bedford Works. The later products of that factory are beyond the scope of this review.
• Broad Street Works Hicks & Meigh bought the factory in 1807 and rebuilt it c.1815. They sold out to William Ridgway and his partners in 1835. It subsequently passed to his son-in-law, Francis Morley, who bought out the rights to the Masons name and designs. The factory then passed to the Ashworth brothers and became the Masons Ironstone factory, sadly now lost to us.

A dessert plate of pattern 6/5586 manufactured by John Ridgway at Cauldon Place, Shelton, Hanley c.1855.

This plate has been used for an illustration in a new Shire Book on the Potteries (David Sekers, The Potteries (Oxford, Shire, 2009), p.41).

Misleading pieces. Pieces that have been thought at times to be by one of the Ridgway partnerships but are, in fact, attributable to another factory are to be found here.