History of Gray's Pottery Backstamps

Gray’s Pottery used many backstamps throughout the life of the company.
53 of them are included on this website but only 20 represent significantly different versions. However, of these, just six form major families of marks (Illustration 1), five of which are based on ship designs; the 1st and 2nd Galleons, the Liner, the Clipper and the Pharaoh’s Boat. The exception is the ‘Sunburst’ Gloria Lustre mark. Little documentation exists about precisely when particular stamps were in use but a letter written to AE Gray’s son Robin in 1977 from one of his relations, Major General GA (Jack) Bond, contains the following:

“As I remember it, I offered AEG the choice of two backstamps by means of black & white sketches (the other one recently turned up and is enclosed herein (Illustration 2) ), in 1932. I thought the mixture of steamships, sailing boats, sunbursts, and other things he was using were low grade and old fashioned. At the same time I sent another for use on silver lustre alone – the mediaeval ship something like this (sketch added). I don’t remember when the accepted stamps were taken into use, but it was at Hanley. Sorry not to be more certain, but cannot feel that the history of England is much to be affected by a slight uncertainty in this matter!”

From this we know that Jack Bond, an accomplished artist who had produced a number of designs for the pottery, created both the Clipper and the Pharaoh’s Boat backstamps, though his memory regarding the date of their introduction may have been slightly erroneous. His Clipper mark was highly successful and was in use, subtly modified as appropriate, from the early 1930s until the last of Gray’s Pottery products were made in 1961.

Dual Marks

Because Gray’s Pottery was a decorating business – buying undecorated ‘white ware’ from other pottery manufacturers – the pieces that the company bought usually already had a backstamp. Many Gray’s pieces therefore often have two backstamps (Illustration 3): the original maker’s mark and the Gray’s mark on top of it, usually large enough and bold enough to obscure the mark beneath. Mr Gray would not necessarily want the white ware producer to take any credit for the pottery, hence his use of bold backstamps.

A rare exception to the common sight of dual marks can be found in the use of one version of the Pharoah’s Boat backstamp (Illustration 4). Produced by some sort of rubber stamp, this mark was applied to ware exclusively made for Gray’s Pottery. Typically, it can be found on matt-glazed ware supplied by Kirklands of Etruria or Whieldon Ware from Winkle & Co/Ridgways of Shelton.

Dual marks are often an aid in dating items. The earthenware producer Johnson Brothers of Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, was a major supplier to Gray’s Pottery and its products often have distinct date-related marks such as ‘Pareek’ (registered in 1925), ‘Greydawn’ (introduced in 1928) or ‘Rosedawn’ (introduced in 1930) (Illustration 5). Lancaster & Sons, later Lancaster & Sandland, used distinctive marks such as ‘English Ware’ from 1944 or ‘Sandland Ware’ from 1949.

The presence of an impressed mark can also be useful. The most common is ‘JOHNSONS’, usually on cup bases, but early Gray’s ware often has impressed numbers. Examples are W931 (Illustration 6), indicating a piece by Wood & Sons of Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, and made in September 1931. Bishop & Stonier of Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, supplied Gray’s with white ware during the first 20 years of the company’s existence. The characteristic entwined snake mark from Bishop & Stonier is often accompanied by one number on top of another: 2/29 meaning February 1929 (Illustration 7).

Dating of Ware

The backstamps illustrated on this site have been taken from actual items of Gray’s Pottery and the dates shown have been deduced from a wide range of evidence. Note that the information is given in good faith, based on pieces of pottery, oral evidence from Gray’s Pottery employees and documentary material in contemporary sources. Very little original company material has survived, meaning that potentially useful primary source data no longer exist. Researchers and collectors must be aware that attributing dates is not an exact science and there are many exceptions to whatever rules exist!

Collectors must also be aware that Gray’s operated a ‘matchings’ service for a considerable time: customers could continue to purchase particular patterns long after they had been deleted from the current range. It is therefore possible to find, say, an example of a 1930s design with a 1950s backstamp because it was produced in later years as a ‘matching’. Popular patterns, kept in production for many years, will have a variety of marks: pattern 8312, named Harmony (Illustration 8), and probably designed by Susie Cooper in 1929, continued in production for almost 30 years and can be found with the 2nd Galleon, Liner, Clipper and Pharaoh’s Boat marks.

Hand-Painted

The absence of the words ‘HAND-PAINTED’ (eg compare backstamps N2 and N3, H1 and H2) may simply have been a practical consideration where there was little space to put the complete mark. However, the absence of these words on the ‘full’ mark N5 (ie mark N6) does seem to coincide with the trend for less or even no hand-painting on the pottery in the 1950s.

The Mystical Rebus

Special Gloria Lustre patterns in the 4000, 5000, 6000 series and at the start of the 7000 series of patterns, often carry a strange hand-painted rebus (Illustration 9).
This may be three, four, five, six or seven-sided. Its significance is still not known. A list of patterns with recorded rebuses is given below.

A ‘star’ rebus has also been recorded on plates of lustre patterns 4124, 4133, 4149, 4153 and 4218. Website examples of pattern 4149 and 4218 show a ‘large’ version and for pattern 4133, a ‘small’ one.

Rebus list – a list of patterns with associated painters/paintresses and rebus shape

Estimated date	Pattern Number	Rebus Shape 3	Rebus Shape 4	Rebus Shape 5	Rebus Shape 6	Rebus Shape 7
1924	4141				RH
1924	4149		RH?
1924	4182	RH			RH
1924	4422		RH	RH
1924	4430			RH
1925	5018	SVC (3)
1925	5025		RH WS
1925	5037	SVC
1925	5058	SVC
1925	5101		AH
1925	5103		HL (5)	H
1925	5111	SVC
1925	5118		AH
1925	5119		RH	HH
1925	5122		Thj? HL RH
1925	5126		RH
1925	5138		SVC
1925	5145		HML HL	RH SVC
1925	5147		RH
1925	5152		SVC (2) RH AH	RH
1925	5153		RH NIL HML (2) AH SVC
1925	5155		HL (2) HML (5) RH (2)	RH (2)	RH?
1925	5156		HL HML (2) RH	AH
1925	5165			HML
1925	5173		HL (2) SVC
1925	5177		SVC
1925	5180		RH	blurred
1925	5181		HML
1925	5188		RH NIL
1925	5190			RH
1925	5200		SVC
1925	5208				HML
1925	5229		WS
1925	5231		WS
1925	5241		HL WS
1925	5253				H
1925	5269		WS (2)
1925	5294		HL
1925	5295				HL?
1925	5307		AH
1925	5329		HML
1925	5359			HH
1925	5360		HML	HH (2)
1925	5361		HML	HH (4)
1925	5364		AH	HML
1925	5365		AH	HML (2)
1925	5367			HH (3) HML
1925	5368		HH	HH (3) HML N
1925	5369			HML
1925	5371			HML (2)
1925	5373		HH	AH
1925	5374			HH
1925	5378				HH
1925	5435				SVC
1926	6001		HL
1926	6008	RH (2)	RH
1926	6014		NIL
1926	6015		HML
1926	6017		HL (2)
1926	7006		HL
1926	7017		HML (2) RH (2)	HML (2)
1926	7022		WS RH
1926	7023		RH (2)
1926	7025		HML (4) HL RH	HML
1926	7034		HL	HH
1926	7044		NIL
1926	7070				HH
1926	7072				HH
1927	7338				HH
1927	7339				HH
1927	7478					HH
1927	Unknown (but marked 1927)					SVC

Key to the initials
CAUTION! The hand-painted characters, as with pattern numbers, can be exceedingly difficult to interpret. The list below is the best guesstimate based on many years of recording pots. No written record of who used what remains. Some initials seem obvious, others less so, some entirely questionable and so all possible names are given.

Initials	Most likely name	Other possibilities
AH	Alice Hancock	Annie Hallam (m. Hill), Annie Hulse, Ada Eardley (m.Haynes)
H	?
HH	Hilda Holland	Hilda Harratt, Hilda Hughes
HL or HML	Hilda (May) Lockett
N	?
RH	Roland Heath
SVC	Susan Vera Cooper
Thj	?
WS (or SW)	?

Notes
– Not every pot recorded for a particular pattern has a rebus
– NIL means that there’s a rebus but no painter/paintress personal mark
– Figures in brackets show more than one pot recorded for that specific painter/paintress
– The names above were undoubtedly among the most highly-skilled decorators at Gray’s Pottery, the evidence
for which can be seen in the various pots, predominantly lustre, of the period.

The question – your help please
What do the rebus marks signify? As can be seen from the table above, the shape of the mark doesn’t relate to a year, to any painter/paintress, or to any particular pattern. So what do they mean – suggestions are most welcome!

This list compiled March 2024

Retailers

Gray’s Pottery supplied many top quality retailers almost from the start of the company’s existence. It is therefore possible to find pieces with such names as Harrods, Mappin & Webb and William Whiteley (London), Awmacks (Leeds), Grace Bros (Sydney), Mottahedeh (New York). Some of these names appear alongside the Gray’s backstamp, others replace it, such as with Heals of London, see the Retailers section.

Stoke-on-Trent

Because of the various town references included in many Gray’s backstamps, it is worth mentioning here that today’s conurbation of the City of Stoke-on-Trent was formed in 1910 following the federation of the six towns of Tunstall, Burslem, Hanley, Stoke-upon-Trent, Fenton and Longton.