Hall marks on gold & silver plate

ENGLISH GOLDSMITHS. 33
1636. John Pargiter was a goldsmith in Fleet but one to
Street, next door
Sergeants' Inn Gate. He filled many parish offices in
St, Dunstan's in 1636. In his "Diary" Pepys gives this estimate
"
I took up in the coach Mr. Pargiter, the goldsmith, who is
of him :
the man of the world I do most know and believe to be a cheating
rogue." His premises were destroyed in the Great Fire, and not
rebuilt until three years after. One of his sons opened a shop in
St. Clement's parish, where he was buried in 1688.
1637-56. John Perryn, goldsmith, who resided at East Acton,
founded almshouses at Acton by a bequest to the Goldsmiths' Company
dated 1656. He was also appointed one of the Jury of Goldsmiths
by the Commonwealth, in 1649, to superintend the making
of standard trial pieces for the coinage. In 1637 he was imprisoned
and fined with others, on the information of Thomas Violet,
for melting the heaviest coins into ingots and exporting the same
into foreign countries.
1640. George Snell, of the "
Fox," in Lombard Street, gold-
smith, lost ;^ 1 0,800 by the closing of the Exchequer in 1672. He
was chosen one of the jury to superintend the making
of the stan-
dard trial pieces for the Commonwealth in 1649. In 1677 he is
mentioned in the Little London Directory as a banker or keeper of
Snell were
running cashes at the same house. Four sons of George
at Merchant Taylors' School William in 1638 and George in 1643.
The latter died young, s.p., according to Burke ("Landed Gentry"),
and William died in 1705. Robert, third son, born at Allhallow's,
Lombard Street, in 1642, Merchant Taylors' School, 1650, died 1666.
John, fourth son, born 1651, Merchant Taylors' School, 1660, succeeded
his father in the business. (C. J. Robinson, o-p. cit.).
1640. Sir Thomas Viner, goldsmith. Sheriff in 1648, Lord
Mayor, 1653-4. He was chosen one of the jury to superintend the
making of gold and silver trial pieces for the Commonwealth in
1649. He was knighted by Cromwell during his mayoralty, and
created baronet by Charles II in 1660. Having been chosen Mayor
during the usurpation, he was, with other Aldermen, displaced at
the Restoration, and the former Aldermen were reappointed who
had been set aside. He married Honor, the daughter of George
Humble, Esq., ancestor of Lord Dudley and Ward (the present Earl
Dudley). He died May 11, 1665, ^^^^d was buried in St. Mary Wolnoth's,
opposite his shop in Lombard Street. He bequeathed ;"200
for the poor brethren of the Goldsmiths' Company. His son. Sir
Robert, erected a monument to his memory in 1672; also another
monument in the same church to his brother, Thomas Vyner, Esq.,
Clerk of the Patents, who died in 1667, thus recorded: "Thomas
Vyner, Esq., son of Sir Thomas Vyner by his second wife, Honour,
daughter of George Humble, Esq., of this parish." An ancestor.
Sir William Viner, grocer, was Mayor in 1389.
1640. Mr. Wakefield, goldsmith, is alluded to in the will of
Rowland Backhouse, formerly Sheriff, dated 1647, in which he leaves
his chain of office to his daughter, Doddinge, weighing about thirty
ounces, set with a diamond, bought of Mr Wakefield, the goldsmith.