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Josiah Spode (23 March 1733 – 18 August 1797) was an English pottery and the founder of the English Spode pottery works which became famous for the high quality of its wares. He is often credited with the establishment of blue underglaze transfer printing in Staffordshire in 1781–84, and with the definition and introduction in c. 1789–91 of the improved formula for bone china (a form of soft-paste porcelain) which thereafter remained the standard for all English wares of this kind.
As a family man Josiah Spode was an accomplished violinist, and he and his wife had further children Samuel (1757), Mary (1759), Ellen (1762) Sarah, William (1770), Ann (1772), and Elizabeth (1777). The suggestion that he took over the factory of Ralph Baddeley and Thomas Fletcher during the late 1750s and early 1760s is now discounted. R. Copeland, Spode (Shire Books), 2nd Edn (Osprey 1998), 4 After John Turner (1737–87) left Stoke for Lane End in 1759 or 1762, Spode may have carried on the factory of William Banks, Turner's partner and former master at Stoke. It is said that Spode took over the Stoke factory in about 1770, and recorded that he bought the rights under a Turner family patent in 1805. The production there was of creamware with blue painted decoration as well as white stoneware in the manner of John Turner: black ware was also made and a printing press for black transfer printing was maintained. Spode was powerfully influenced by Turner's work. He was engaged as master potter, but it is not known whether his work there was consecutive or sporadic,Hayden 1925, 9–10, 14. and there may be confusion between him and his son of the same name.
In 1775 Josiah's eldest son Josiah (II) married Elizabeth, the niece of John Barker, a manufacturing potter of Fenton, Staffordshire.It is stated in History of the Staffordshire Potteries by Simeon Shaw that his wife was John Barker's daughter, but he in fact married the daughter of Thomas Barker (brother of John) and Elizabeth Hammersley. This is confirmed in both of their wills. Josiah the elder took this opportunity to establish the regular London business. Between 1775 and 1782 Josiah II and Elizabeth moved between Longton, Staffordshire and Cripplegate, where he was doubtless manager of the Fore Street warehouse under the guidance of William Taylor Copeland, his father's friend and London partner.Simeon Shaw, History of the Staffordshire Potteries (1829), p. 216. During this time the young couple had sons William (1776) and Josiah (1777)Baptisms at Stoke on Trent. and daughters Eliza (1778), Sabia (1780) and Mary (1781).Baptisms at Cripplegate, London Elizabeth Spode died in London in 1782. Josiah the elder became a Freeman of the City of London in 1778 and was a Liveryman of the Spectacle Makers' Company.Hayden 1925, Plate facing p. 16, & p. 20.
Josiah Spode I is creditedHayden 1925, p. viii. with the introduction of underglaze blue transfer printing into the Staffordshire potteries in 1781–84.Hayden 1925, 46–53. More precisely he was the first to introduce a perfected method to Stoke, (with the help of engraver Thomas Lucas and printer James Richards, formerly of the Caughley Pottery Works, Shropshire), using improvements recently developed at nearby Shelton by or for Ralph Baddeley.Simeon Shaw, History of the Staffordshire Potteries (Simeon Shaw, Hanley 1829), pp. 214–216.
Spode the elder also, between 1788 and 1793, established and finalised the formula for English bone china, for whereas bone ash had previously been added in other factories to the fabric in proportions of roughly 40%, Spode simplified and greatly improved the recipe (see Spode).Hayden 1925, Chapter 5, pp 88–104.
Spode had various commercial premises in London, originally in Fore Street, Cripplegate. However, the warehouse was finally settled in the former Theatre Royal, no 5 Portugal Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, which his firm occupied from 1795 to 1848, when the building was razed. (This had been the venue of the first performance of the Beggar's Opera in 1727.Hayden 1925, 20–22.)
Josiah Spode the elder died in 1797 and his wife Ellen died in 1802, aged 76. They are buried in Stoke-on-Trent churchyard.
Samuel Spode (born 1757), Josiah I's second son, inherited the Foley factory which his father had built for him at Lane End,For the absorption of Lane End into the expanding settlement of Longton, see this account. See also 'Longton', A History of the County of Stafford (V.C.H.) 8 (1963), pp. 224–246. which produced salt-glazed wares up to the end of the eighteenth century. Josiah Spode (born 1790), the son of Samuel and his wife Sarah, emigrated to Tasmania where he held a position as Controller of Convicts.
After several generations under the guidance of the Copeland family, the Spode name is now owned by the Portmeirion pottery company, which now produces some of the former Spode patterns.
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