Falls Art Tile Works, informs me that the remains of an old kiln fire-hole, saved from the ravages of time by being thoroughly vitrified, still exist a mile or two below South Amboy, N. J. This is a relic of the earlier pottery ware made on this continent, and was most probably established by the Dutch to make stew-pans and pots.
Dr. Daniel Coxe, of London, proprietor, and afterward governor, of West Jersey, was undoubtedly the first to make white ware on this side of the Atlantic. While he did not come to America himself, he caused a pottery to be erected at Burlington, N. J., previous to the year 1690, through his agent, John Tatham, who, with Daniel Coxe, his son, looked after his large interests here. It is recorded that in 1691 Dr. Coxe sold to the "West New Jersey Society" of London, consisting of forty-eight persons, his entire interests in the province, including a dwelling-house and "pottery-house" with all the tools, for the sum of £9,000 sterling. We are indebted to Mr John D. McCormick, of Trenton, N. J., for calling attention to the following reference to this pottery, supposed to have been written about 1688, in the Rawlinson manuscripts in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, England: "I have erected a pottery att Burlington for white and chiney ware, a greate quantity to ye value of £1200 have beene already made and vended in ye Country, neighbour Colonies and ye Islands of Barbadoes and Jamaica where they are in great request. I have two houses and kills with all necessary implements, diverse workemen, and other servants. Have expended thereon about £2000."[1] It is possible to gain some idea of the nature of this "white and chiney ware" by examining the statements of Dr. Plot, a contemporary, who published his Natural History of Staffordshire two years before, as quoted by the late Mr. Llewellynn Jewitt, in his Ceramic Art of Great Britain: "The greatest pottery they have in this country is carried on at Burslem, near Newcastle-under-Lyme, where for making their different sorts of pots they have as many different sorts of clay.… and are distinguish't by their colours and uses as followeth:—
"1. Bottle clay, of a bright whitish streaked yellow colour.
"2. Hard fire clay, of a duller whitish colour, and fully intersperst with a dark yellow, which they use for their black wares, being mixt with the
"3. Red Blending clay, which is of a dirty red colour,
"4. White clay, so called it seems, though of a blewish colour, and used for making yellow-colour'd ware, because yellow is the lightest colour they make any ware of."[2]
