A George III silver basket, maker's mark IC, London, 1808

The arms are those of Lloyd of Leaton Knolls, Shropshire, quartering Graham, Ligonier and another, either for Francis Lloyd or his younger brother and successor, John Arthur Lloyd (2 February 1787 – 22 June 1864), neither of whom were married. They were the eldest children of Francis Lloyd (1747-1799) and his wife Elizabeth (1750-1844), daughter of Lieut. Col. Arthur Graham (1720-1807) of Hockley Lodge, co. Armagh, and co-heiress of her maternal grandfather, Field Marshal John Ligonier, 1st Earl Ligonier (1680-1770).

John Arthur Lloyd, who became a student at Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1805, succeeded to his family estates¹ upon the death of his elder brother, Francis, on 14 July 1814. Although he never served the office of High Sheriff, at one time he took a leading part in the management of the public affairs of Shropshire and for a short period held the position of deputy chairman of the Quarter Sessions.² In private life he was a collector of books and manuscripts and in 1822 he was elected one of the 40 members of the select Roxburghe Club of bibliophiles.³ The bibliographer Thomas Frognall Dibdin (1776-1847) described Lloyd as 'a gentleman in all respects qualified by his scholarship and attainments - and, above all, by his unwarped and unwarpable attachment to the Bibliomania.’⁴

A parcel-gilt dish engraved with the same coat-of-arms as on this present basket, William Pitts, London, 1815, has been recorded.⁵

Notes

1. The family papers of Lloyd of Leaton Knolls and elsewhere are held in the Shropshire Archives, Castle Gates, Shrewsbury, SY1 2AQ, England.

2. Obituary, Eddowes’s Shrewsbury Journal, Shrewsbury, Wednesday, 29 June 1864, p. 5b

3. https://www.roxburgheclub.org.uk

4. Reminiscences of a Literary Life, John Major, London, 1836, vol. I, p. 396

5. Matthew Barton Ltd., Olympia Auctions, 25 May 2010, lot 137.