A Set of Four George II Wine Coolers
Silver-gilt
London, 1769
Maker's mark of the Royal Goldsmith Thomas Heming
Height: 17cm, 6.6in
Weight: 5,860g, 187ozs

The arms are those Carroll or O'Carroll of Ireland, descended from Sir Maolroona O'Carroll, Chief of His Name, knighted in 1603. charles Carroll or Carrolton was a wealthy Maryland planter and last survivng signatory of the Declaration of Independance.
These elegant wine coolers are amongst the earliest of this new form of wine cooler introduced from France in the middle of the eighteenth century. sets of four ice pails from this period are exceedingly rare.
Artist Biography:
The son of a Midlands merchant, Thomas Heming was apprenticed to Edmund Bodington on March 7, 1738, and turned over on the same day to the Huguenot goldsmith Peter Archambo. He registered his first mark in June 1745; in 1760 he was appointed principal goldsmith to King George III, in which capacity he was responsible for supplying regalia and plate required for the coronation. Heming held this appointment until 1782m, when he was ousted after an investigation into his apparently excessive charges. Grimwade (1976, p. 543) comments that "some of his earlier surviving pieces in the Royal collection show a French delicacy of taste and refinement of execution which is unquestionably inherited from his master Archambo." Among Heming's outstanding works are a silver-gilt toilet service made for Queen Caroline of Denmark in 1766 (Dankse Kunstidustrimuseum, Copenhagen; Hernmarck 1977, pl. 727) and a wine cistern of 1770, made for Speaker Brownlow (Belton House, Lincolnshire; Grimwade 1974, pl. 12).