drawbored peg
A few years ago I was fortunate to acquire a seventeenth-century joined chest with drawer, made by William Savell, (1652-1699/1700) of Braintree, Massachusetts. It needed some restoration, but was well worth the trouble. One long rail had been removed from the bottom section of the chest and replaced by an incorrect restoration. The new rail was toenailed in, not tenoned into the stiles. When I removed it I found that the tenons for the original rail were still in place in the mortises. I had to remove these tenons to be able to insert my new replacement rail. Easier said than done. Each tenon was secured with one draw-bored peg; none came out easily, and only this one came out intact. The others I had to bore through them, and shred them to get them out. Each one took over 30 minutes to remove.
joined chest, incorrect restoration
This is the chest as it was when it came to my shop. Essentially the carcass is correct, but several other parts were wrong. There are 2 drawers where there should be one, the rail below these drawers is the replacement I had to remove. The lid is also incorrect. The floor and rear boards were also replaced. I’ve done all the woodwork for the restoration; all that remains is the coloring. Having the chest in the shop is a great way to really see how it is made. Here are the floor rails where they meet at the stiles. The groove for the floor is visible; and the floor rails are pentagonal, the thicker edge at the bottom is to strengthen the rail where the joiner cut the groove in it.
floor rails, pentagonal cross section
This is the new pine floor boards being installed. They are beveled to fit into the grooves, and sit on a lower rear rail. Tongue & grooved at their edges. The middle one is tapered in width to spread the floor right & left.
floor boards in chest
The chest as it stands now is pretty close to what it should be (other than those silly castors) I am going to bring it back to the shop at some point to color it, but in the meantime we have pressed it into duty here at home. To me it’s fitting that the only piece of antique furniture we have is one I have been studying for 20 years now. The article on these chests is online at chipstone’s website. Follow their pages to American Furniture, 1996 and it’s in that issue. www.chipstone.org
Braintree chest restored
February 12, 2009 at 11:29 pm
Nice to see some more pictures of this piece. I enjoyed looking it over when you brought it down to the Williamsburg conference a few years ago. Is that a till on the left of the chest and did you use a single pine panel for the back? Thanks Peter.
February 13, 2009 at 8:45 am
Peter,
Great job! Besides chipstone, I would think you have this or have read it Peter, but a good book showing a large selection of 1700 furniture is under google books for download: Colonial Furniture in America By Luke Vincent Lockwood 1913 and has some chest like this.
Don
February 13, 2009 at 9:08 pm
How did you determine it originally had one drawer?
February 13, 2009 at 9:50 pm
Three birds, one stone.
Yes, there is/was a till in this chest. I replaced it. Yes, it’s a single, pine panel placed horizontally for the back of the chest. that will have to be another entry to illustrate it. It’s in the Chipstone article.
Lockwood’s book is a classic. His figure 17 relates to this chest, if I remember correctly. If it’s the one I’m thinking of, Chipstone just bought it a couple of years ago.
This chest had one drawer because of the framing arrangement of the sides of the chest. Two vertical panels over one horizontal panel. Two-drawer versions have 2-over-2 vertical panels; chests with no drawer have only the 2 vertical panels, no horizontal one.
whew. thanks for the comments, I’m off to bed.
February 14, 2009 at 8:24 am
David
After I replied about the number of drawers, I realized you meant how did I know it had a single-width drawer versus two side-by-side drawers.
Simple. The Savell chests always had full-width drawers. But, had I not known the related objects, I would look for internal framing to support side-by-side drawers. There should be a central muntin framed into the rails above & below the drawer opening – on the chest I bought there was some framing, but it was clearly modern, toe-nailed in place, the material was flatsawn oak, and there was no evidence for there having been integral period framing.
There are about twenty or more joined chests from Plymouth Colony that had side-by-side drawers, and these have a muntin tenoned into the rails. Even when the chest has been cut down, you can still see evidence of the mortise for this muntin. See an article I did years ago – citation is:
Peter Follansbee, “Unpacking the Little Chest” in Old Time New England, vol 78, number 268 (Spring/Summer 2000): 5-23