MORTLAKE TAPESTRY WORKS
Mortlake’s most illustrious industry, the Tapestry Works, was established in 1619 under the patronage of James 1st. Henry IV of France had started a similar venture in Paris in 1607 and there can be little doubt that it’s success impressed the Stuart court. There were two factors that made Mortlake justifiable: it’s site by the river ensured a degree of humidity essential in weaving in order to relax the tension on the warp, whilst the river itself provided a satisfactory means of transporting the bulky products.
The site of the tapestry works, now a pleasant open space overlooking the river, is marked by an inscribed granite memorial which was unveiled in 1996. The true memorial to the weavers, however, are the Mortlake tapestries themselves which have survived to grace the walls of palaces, castles, stately homes, museums and private collections throughout the world.
In recent years, a local public house was re-branded as “The Tapestry”, a play perhaps on both local history and it’s Spanish themed (Tapas) menu.
SUGAR BOILING AND MALTING
Sugar refining on the Mortlake riverside was carried on in 1688 by William Mucklow, a Quaker at premises between the river and the High Street to the east of Bull’s Alley. By 1729 it was in the hands of John Bentley, the last known sugar refiner in Mortlake, but around thirteen years later the sugarhouse was no longer in use and the building became the first Mortlake Pottery. Malting was a thriving local industry from the seventeenth until well into the nineteenth century. Together with Nine Elms and Wandsworth, Mortlake was one of the main centres supplying vast quantities of malted grains to the many breweries situated in and around London. In 1811 there were five malt houses and Leigh’s Panorama of the Thames shows the Mortlake riverside fairly bristling with malt house cones in 1829. In Barnes a malt house fronted onto the Terrace with its rear on Back Lane, the surviving section of which was renamed Malthouse Passage in 1890.
THE SANDERS’ POTTERY
It is not known why John Sanders, a Lambeth potter, chose Mortlake to start a new manufactory c.1743, but perhaps he became aware of the suitability of the site of the disused sugar house: potteries needed substantial volumes of clay for the pots and coal for the kilns -both were heavy and unavailable locally, so that waterborne transport was a basic need. John Sanders remained active at Lambeth until his death in 1758 and it seems likely that his intention was to have his son William run the Mortlake venture; indeed this is what William did for the next 32 years, and after his death in 1784 the pottery was continued by his son John until 1794. Thereafter the pottery had various owners, but after April 1823 it is listed as empty.
Despite 78 years of production, Sanders did not mark his wares and anything that survives is, therefore, concealed within the large mass of similar London tin-glazes pottery sometimes, and misleadingly, called Delft ware.
KISHEREWARE
The second Mortlake Pottery was begun by Joseph Kishere, himself once a worker at the Sanders factory and son of Benjamin Kishere, who was overseer forSanders. Around 1800, Joseph married a Miss Griffin and, Tto quote a local historian, “had a little money by her” which together with a win on the state lottery enabled him to begin his own business.
Kishere pottery has been described as amoung the most decorative of the London stonewares. It is a tough, durable pottery with a high survival rate, and by good fortune a great deal of it is marked. Marking is often in the form ‘Kishere Pottery Moatlake Surrey’, the mis-spelling of Mortlake more common than not.
