Pewter button backmark help.

[flyinryan2]

Going through my recent button finds and putting them in my Button Hill case I came across this pewter button with back markings. I've never had a pewter button with writing on the back so I am pretty stumped. I can't recognize any words that look familiar. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

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[RelicHunter97]

The only word I can make out (on the first and second pictures) is PATENT, then maybe some kind of name? S. ___L_

 

[Bramblefind]

It may be this--- neat find!

Patents from the USA

The earliest American patent backmark I am aware of - there may well be many more - is on pewter buttons
marked Grilley's patent the details of which I don't have. Rimmed Hard White Pewters are noted to have Patent
backmarks in JB May 1975 pp205. There is one Silas Grilley of Waterbury, who took out a patent for an
Improvement In The Furnace & Pots For Melting Metals,1838. Rootsweb.ancestry.com has a Silas Grilley in
Partnership with Samuel & Henry Grilley in Boston, Ma. c1790-1802, making Pewter buttons in a shop on Bunker
Hill & subsequently in partnership with Daniel Clark & Abel & Levi Porter, Waterbury, CT., as Abel Porter & Co.
1802-1811; I do recall reading, (source when I find it), that the Grilley brothers all joined with Clark & the Porter
brothers & that the company thus founded later became The Scovill Manufacturing Co. I remember finding many
contradictions in the online histories of and references to this company.

 

[flyinryan2]

I think it says "Patent S. Grilley" This maybe one of the first US made buttons by the later Scoville Co. A very unique find for sure!

 

[steelheadwill]

Nice find Ryan, just came across this while searching for pewter backmark info, Congrats!