Mugs and jugs with “Another little drink won’t do us any harm”

Mugs in patterns 2982 (left) and 2986 (right)

An attempt has been made to classify the recorded examples of the “Another Little Drink” series of mugs and lemonade jugs, (shape 185). They are plain ivory glazed with tube-lined script and decoration in black slip. The jugs are quite rare, only 2 have been recorded. Mugs are more easily found with a 25 being noted but they are not deemed to be a common pattern. There are 8 design styles in the pattern book and although there are design variations in the observed sample of 27 items, it is not obvious if they should have different pattern numbers. None have been seen with pattern numbers on their bases.

Below is a table of the 8 patterns from the pattern book and their key design characteristics as gleaned from the sketches and any text descriptions. 

As an aside, “Another little drink wouldn’t do us any harm” and “Show me the way to go home” were both music hall songs and presumably would have been familiar to Charlotte Rhead.

To slim down the candidate list, firstly, no examples of a mug with “Show Me The Way To Go Home” have yet been seen. Secondly, all those recorded have been decorated with black slip and therefore patterns with brown slip are not relevant. And thirdly, no items have been found with a stitched edge rim. This effectively removes patterns 2979, 2980, 2981, 2983, 2984 and 2985 and just leaves 2982 and 2986 as contenders.

Since neither of the observed lemonade jugs match any of the 4 designs in the pattern book, but they do match pattern 2982, like the majority of mugs, it is proposed that this pattern number is the practical solution to recording the design for most mugs, (18) and jugs, (2). There are 3 mugs which have a very similar decoration but the tube-lined wavy line on the handle ends in a spiral at the top of the handle. This is deemed as a variation of pattern 2982. It is certain that more of this variation will turn up because a set of 5 were sold in a single lot and may have the same decoration but because they were not all suitably photographed only one of the 5 has been recorded.

 

The variation of 2982 with tube-lined spiral on the handle

Lemonade jug shape 185

 The remaining 4 of the 25 mugs have tube-lined stitches down both sides of the handle and the typical wavy line down the centre of the handle. The text is underlined by dots rather than the wavy line as found with pattern 2982. Although the decoration does not exactly match the drawing in the pattern book they are sufficiently similar to warrant this design with the different pattern number of 2986.

2982 on the left has underlining with a wavy line and wavy line on the handle. 2986 on the right has underlining with dots and the addition of "stitches" on the handle.

 The chart below shows the distribution of the various characteristics of the design together with production period based on backstamp style and the country where they were first seen for sale.

 The sample of 27 is quite small but the following observations could be valid: 

• Production probably began during mid-1933, (the design date) and may have lasted up until the end of the wartime restrictions in 1952. It is unlikely that production was continuous because, so few examples have been seen, but since the sample includes 4 backstamp styles known to have been use from 1933 until at least 1952, there are likely to have been at least 2, or probably 3 separate phases of production.
• The examples of pattern 2986 with the tube-lined stitches on the handle were all made in period 1, (1933-1934). 
• The mugs where the wavy line starts with a spiral at the top of the handle were all made during Period 4, (1942-1952) and sold originally in the USA or Canada so may have been made as a special batch for the export market.