Thomas Till & Son/s

Thomas Till & Son/s Virtual Museum

We are delighted to have finally found an image of Thomas Till thanks to Cynthia Russell (the granddaughter of one of Thomas Till's half-sibling's (Ann, Dinah or Samuel - to be confirmed) and great granddaughter of Richard Till and his 2nd wife Martha) who has been so supportive and helpful in the building of this website. 

About this museum;

This site is a dedication to our favourite Staffordshire Earthenware Manufacturer, Thomas Till & Sons.  The content of this website is home produced and based upon our vast personal collection of Till & Son/s and Tillson pottery.

We are happy for anybody to use our site as a resource for finding information on Thomas Till & Son/s. We would ask that if anybody wishes to quote our research that we are given appropriate reference and acknowledgement. Equally, if anybody wishes to use or copy a section from this site of more than one sentence we would ask that permission be obtained first. We will not refuse a reasonable request as long as our own intellectual copyright is acknowledged and respected accordingly. The aim of this site is to promote the little public reference to the primary potter Till & Son/s. We would welcome any memories, historical facts or anything else that is known about Thomas Till. We will, of course, give acknowledgement to anybody who provides us with new or updated information.

 Handpainted dressing table set transferware pink roses with gold piping.

We hope you enjoy browsing our collection and hope that you return to see the frequent updates of both the history and pottery image examples.

To the best of our knowledge we have the largest collection of Till & Son/s  pottery worldwide and have identified at least eighty named patterns and numerous unnamed patterns. We have recently bought three pieces with new pattern names and a few kind individuals have written to us with details of their own Till items. Each pattern was produced in many forms. Many more forms and variations more than we could have anticipated when we first began our research. Our collection continues to grow and people often contact us and allow us to use photographs of their own items which we are very grateful for.

We are  fascinated by all the different  patterns and forms of Till pottery and feel that the company was strangely under-rated and under-reported in terms of accessing information about the company so we hope to address this.

Please leave your comments on this site - feedback, positive or negative, is really helpful to us in building this site to ensure that it becomes a useful and reliable source for Staffordshire collectors, antique dealers and social historians. However, although we want this to be an accurate and useful resource it remains a hobby to us and it is important that we are accessible to all and anybody can feel confident about approaching us with their enquiry, no matter how small.

'Windsor' teapot. (above)

Windsor dinner service FOR SALE  at Hospice Charity, Bude, Cornwall(see below for details)

Finally a big thank you to all the individuals who have contacted us with information about Thomas Till and his family during 2011.

A special thank you to Cynthia Russell who is a direct descendent of Richard Till and his second wife, Martha (Thomas Tills father and step-mother) and is  great- great- grandaughter to Thomas Till's half-brother. Cynthia has provided us with a great deal of information about the family and we are slowily piecing everything together before publishing. She also remembers visiting Rocklands, Thomas Till's final home, when she was younger. Sadly Rocklands no longer exists and has now been replaced by a retirement complex which is called 'Rocklands'. The address frequently quoted from the 1891 census is apparently inaccurate and we have used the correct address provided by Cynthia.

 She has been in contact with other family members in the hope that photographs of Thomas Till or extended family are available but unfortunately not been able to locate any to date. We are very grateful for the help she has provided us with so far.

We are working on a proper family tree so that it will be easier to see the relationship between the Till family dating back to Thomas Till's grandparents. In the meantime we are adding information as we confirm it. Apologies if it is a little difficult to make sense of just yet.

Thank you also to the many who have given us permission to use photographs of their Till items on this website. Contributions by others enriches our own experience of maintaining this website and we are always delighted to hear from people interested in our collection.  

Our Till & Son Shanghae loving cup (mug!) circa 1861 that we used during our wedding ceremony for a Craich ceremony. 

Well this one has us stumped and we are very excited to see this! We have seen handpainted tea and dinner services, dressing table sets, pairs of candle sticks and wash sets but we have never seen a Till & Son's handpainted ornament like this wonderful parrot owned by Mr Graham Matthews. He has kindly given us permission to add the photographs to our website.

Does anybody know what the four holes at the base of the parrots claws are for? We have some ideas but nothing we can confirm.
Apologies for the size of the parrot photos! We will have to resize them and add them again but we didn't want to wait to share this fantastic find!

There are many variations of Thomas Till backstamps and they are just as interesting to us as the actual items they are stamped on. We are planning on producing a page dedicated to all the backstamps we have including variations. A common question from individuals who contact us is about the wording across the middle of the globe. The word is usually, but not exclusively, the pattern name. However we have seen items which have lettering which is short for 'Earthenware Manufacturers' (such as EWARE) which is clearly not a pattern name.

 Please visit our Facebook page and 'like' it for more regular updates on our collection. Also if you have enjoyed visiting our non-profit website please consider donating a small amount on our 'Donations' page to help us keep the pages advert free and enable us to continue to with the reular upkeep of this invaluable resource. Thank you.

Please visit our friend, Jim, The Local Merchant,  in the US who has a wonderful and eclectic range of interesting items for sale.

Please visit our friend, Patrick, on the other side of the pond who also has a fascination with the past that existed, a past that existed in the romantic minds of the Victorians and a past that has yet to occur! His blog should give you something to think about or wish you had thought of it sooner...