An American Silver Creamer, Elias Boudinot, Philadelphia, Circa 1750-60

Elias Boudinot (1706-1770), of a Huguenot family from Marans, France, was apprenticed to Simeon Soumaine in New York between 1722 and 1729.  His older sister Susannah married the New York silversmith Peter Vergereau in 1737.  After a period in Antigua, Boudinot settled in Philadelphia in 1734, where he was a neighbor and close friend of Benjamin Franklin.

In the early 1750s Boudinot moved with his family to Princeton, New Jersey, where he was listed as a postmaster, merchant and tavern keeper.  His first wife Susannah Leroux, whom he had married in 1729, died in Antigua in 1733; his second wife Catherine Williams, whom he married in Antigua, died in 1765.