Instagram isn’t all Pimm’s-swigging influencers and creepy adverts for things you were conversing about in private the night before. Sometimes it’s genuinely insightful.
Case in point, one account – Best Cup Forward (here) – recently posted pictures of an intriguing set of glasses with a pattern known as the ‘Lady Hamilton’. While writing my Nelson biography, it has never ceased to amaze me how often I discover something completely new about his life. Lady Hamilton glass is the latest.
Information on it is scant, but it seems the set was created in the 1930s by the Czech company, Moser. Their official website says they ‘injected the memory’ of Lady Emma Hamilton into the design of each glass (a phrase so odd that I can’t begin to imagine what it means). The patterns were ‘conceived’, it continues, ‘as a tribute to the beautiful woman with a powerful fate’.
Here are some of the designs in the collection:
If you want a couple of these glasses for your picnic hamper, be prepared to stump up a few quid. Recent buyers include the Sultan of Morocco, an Iranian Shah, and the Maharaja of Travancore (none of whom are we likely to bump into in Lidl).
The Moser ‘Lady Hamilton’ design was a variation on an Edwardian glass style known as Pall Mall, which dates back to Edwardian times. The more popular pieces were sold in England by Woolworths until the 1960s. They were 10p a pop. I would love it if the Sultan of Morocco also had some of those in his collection.
Going down the rabbit hole of glass history websites, I saw one describe Emma as the ‘alleged courtesan of Admiral Horatio Nelson’. I think it’s safe to say that, considering Emma and Nelson had a child and bought a house together, we can get rid of the word ‘alleged’ now. Two centuries on, we probably don’t need to tip-toe around their affair.
Typically, while researching the glass, I discovered another completely unrelated bit of Nelson trivia: Alexandre Dumas – of Three Musketeers fame – wrote a novel about Lady Emma Hamilton in 1864. And now I really want to read it.
I told you, didn’t I? It never bloody ends.
Anyway. It’s fitting that one of history’s most liver-walloping drinkers should have had a set of drinking vessels made in her name. A powerful fate indeed,
Ryan
P.S. If you wish to read more about the Lady Hamilton design, Moser’s official website is worth a look. Click here.
Nelson The Sailor 