A fine silver covered sugar urn - Paul Revere, Jr., Boston, 1800

Of urn form, on pedestal foot with beaded border and bright-cut engraving, body bright-cut engraved with floral festoons, urns and oval cartouches on both sides enclosing monogram CC, the domed cover with bud finial, marked on body - 9¾ in. high; 14 oz. 10 dwt. Estimate: $40,000-60,000

Provenance: The sugar urn was made for a member of the Cooper family of Boston, and descended to the present owner through:

Capt. William P.S. Sanger (b. May 26, 1810), of Boston
Elizabeth Sanger, married John Seton Johns (b. December 22, 1835), of Washington, D.C.
William Sanger Johns (b. 25 December 1862), of Georgetown, D.C., thence by descent to the present owner

Capt. William P.S. Sanger was the U.S. Navy's first civil engineer and the father of the modern Civil Engineer Corps. A Bostonian by birth, he moved to Norfolk, Virginia, where at age 17 he became Resident Engineer at the Gosport Navy Yard in Portsmouth. He was responsible for the building of the Gosport stone dry dock, the Navy's first dry dock in the United States, completed in 1833. Sanger served as an engineer for the U.S. Navy for nearly 55 years, and was responsible for the founding of the Civil Engineer Corps through an Act of Congress in 1867.

Christie's. Important American Silver. 17 January 2008. 20 Rockefeller Plaza, New York