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The England Family William and Mary Joined Walnut Chest of DrawersWilliam Beakes III (1691-1761)Philadelphia, PennsylvaniaDated 171? Appears to retain its original surface and cast brass hardware. Inscribed in script chalk on interior proper left of paneled side William Beake 171?Height 36 3/4 in. by Width 40 1/4 in. by Depth 22 in.ProvenanceDescended in the England family of Chester County, Pennsylvania; Harry Roland England (1868-1937) m. Carrie C Nesbitt (1884-1911); Samuel John England Sr. (1899-1976) m. Pearl Lydia Williams (1899-1957), Oxford, Pennsylvania; Whiteside Auctions, Oxford, Pennsylvania, Public Auction, November 14, 1970; Philip Bradley, Downingtown, Pennsylvania; Joseph A. McFalls, Malvern, Pennsylvania.LiteratureWinterthur Museum, DAPC, file 1971.147;Cathryn J. McElroy, "Furniture in Philadelphia: The First Fifty Years," Winterthur Portfolio 13, American Furniture and Its Makers, ed. Ian M. G. Quimby, (Chicago, IL: The Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, 1979), p. 73, fig. 12;Elizabeth Bidwell Bates and Jonathan L. Fairbanks. American Furniture, 1620 to the Present, (New York: Richard Marek Publishers, 1981), p. 48;Benno M. Forman. “The Chest of Drawers in America, 1635-1730.” Winterthur Portfolio, Vol. 20, No. 1 (Spring 1985), fig. 26, p. 29;William C. Ketchum, Jr. American Cabinetmakers (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1995): p. 29-30. This chest is referenced but not illustrated;Wendell Garrett, American Colonial: Puritan Simplicity to Georgian Grace, (New York: The Monacelli Press, 1995), p .201;Jack L. Lindsey, Worldly Goods: The Arts of Early Pennsylvania, 1680-1758 (Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1999), pp. 97, 142, fig. 147, no. 26;Jacquelann Grace Killian, United by Water: Cabinetmaking Traditions in the Delaware River Valley, 1670-1740. Master of Arts thesis, University of Delaware, 2015, pp. 147-48, figs. 4.20-21;Robert Jay Stiefel, The Cabinetmaker's Account: John Head's Record of Craft & Commerce in Colonial Philadelphia, 1718-1753, (Philadelphia, PA: American Philosophical Society Press, 2019), p. 28, figs. 3.9 and 3.10;Christopher Storb, "William Beakes, Joyner," Antiques & Fine Art, 21st Anniversary/Spring 2021, discussed;Christopher Storb, "William Beakes, Joyner," In Proportion to the Trouble, March 23, 2021 [https://cstorb.com/];Christopher Storb, "William Beakes, Joyner, Part II," In Proportion to the Trouble, April 2, 2021 [https://cstorb.com/];Christopher Storb, "William Beakes, Drawer Making,” In Proportion to the Trouble (April 6, 2021) [https://cstorb.com/].ExhibitedPhiladelphia, Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Museum of Art, October 10, 1999-January 2, 2000, Worldly Goods: The Arts of Early Pennsylvania 1680-1758Catalogue noteSigned and dated by its maker, this chest of drawers is an extremely rare and important document of Philadelphia furniture that survives with its original surface and cast brass hardware. Inscribed in chalk on the inside panel of the case, “William / Beake 171?”, it was made by William Beakes III (1691-1761), one of the earliest joiners working in Philadelphia in the eighteenth century. The early history of the chest is unknown before it was owned by Harry Roland (1868-1937) and Carrie England (1884-1911) of Chester County, Pennsylvania in the late nineteenth century. It remained in the England family until 1970, when it was sold at Whiteside Auctions in Oxford, Pennsylvania. Born in Bucks County, Pennsylvania in 1691, William Beakes III was the son of William Beakes II (1663-1711) and his wife, Elizabeth Worrilow (1671-1705), who married at the Philadelphia Meeting of Friends in 1690. William Beakes I (d. 1687), his grandfather and namesake, purchased land from William Penn and emigrated from Blackwell, County Somerset in 1682 and founded with other Quakers the first meeting of the Society of Friends at Falls Township, Pennsylvania. In 1694, William Beakes II purchased land in Nottingham Township, Burlington County, New Jersey and moved his family