Rare Collector’s Antique English Edwardian (Circa 1905) “The Blind Piper” 9”/23cm Ironstone Cabinet / Wall Plate By A E Jones & Co / Palissy Pottery.

Absolutely superb cabinet plate. Well over 100 years old and in superb condition without any chips or cracks with beautiful aged related crazing commensurate with age. Please browse all 12 sets of photographs attached for size, weight and condition as they are self explanatory.

Garret Barry (1847 - 6 April 1899) was a blind Irish uilleann piper from Inagh, County Clare, among the most famous players of the 19th century.

Barry was born in 1847, during the Great Famine, and disease caused him to lose his sight as a young child. A common form of charity for the disabled, Barry was taught the uilleann pipes, giving him a livelihood and a place within the community. As a bearer of the piping tradition Barry was a popular and respected musician travelling his region to play at house dances.

He inspired many later pipers such as Willie Clancy (whose father knew Barry). He is credited with many tunes that are still in the repertoire of players of Irish traditional music.

virtually all the information we have of the life of Garrett Barry comes through oral tradition. No official records of him exist other than certification of his death as a 52-year-old bachelor, on 6 April 1899. However, the impression he made on his community of west County Clare was great enough to have created abiding memories of his life as a mendicant musician. According to his relatives, he was raised on a farm in the townland of Kylea, Inagh parish, on the shores of Cloonmackan Lough, in an area known as Garraí na Saileog or the Garden of Willows. One tune, closely associated with Barry, carries this same name.

Barry lost his sight in infancy, contracting one of the diseases that were prevalent at that time, probably either chickenpox or smallpox. However, local wisdom claims that he developed exceptional hearing and was also possessed of a remarkable memory along with his other talents. A strong local culture had survived the Famine in the Inagh district, much still based on the Irish language. The region had largely retained its poetry, song, music and dance. Like most blind children at that time, Garrett Barry was obliged to learn poetic or musical skills in order to earn a living. His reputation as a singer and as a precocious performer on the Irish bagpipes soon began to grow.

In his early career as a travelling musician, despite his blindness and the lack of infrastructure, Barry seems to have exhibited a remarkable ability to avail himself to many hosting families over a large part of west Clare. The rise in popularity of house-dancing meant that someone with Barry’s talents was in great demand as a singer, storyteller and genealogist as well as a piper. His reputation was such that some families would compete for the privilege of hosting Barry for long periods and would arrange his transportation whenever he required to move on.

Barry was a heavy smoker and towards the end of 1896 he was diagnosed with a mouth cancer and died three years later at Ennistymon Infirmary. Gilbert Clancy, his friend, who had emigrated to America in 1890, returned just prior to Garrett Barry’s death and made his old friend a coffin and brought his body back to Inagh cemetery for burial, though the precise location of his grave was unidentified and is still locally disputed.

Sadly, Garrett Barry was never recorded though the earliest wax phonograph cylinders of piping in Ireland were made during the last two years of his life. The fact that memories of Garrett Barry had persisted with some natives of his home region implies that he had a profound effect on his local culture.

A.E. Jones Pottery and then A.E. Jones & Co Pottery (1905-1929) were earthenware manufacturers at the Palissy Works, Chancery Lane, Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, England. The firm previously traded as Grove & Co (1898-1904) and subsequently as Albert E. Jones (Longton) Ltd (1929-1946) and eventually became the world famous Palissy Pottery founded in 1946 in Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, UK.

Palissy was the trade name under which the English firm of A.E. Jones and Sons, of Stoke-on-Trent, marketed their china and pottery. The name was chosen as a tribute to Bernard Palissy, the famous French potter of the 16th century, creator of Palissy ware.

They were bought out in 1958 by the Royal Worcester group, and in turn the Carborundum company that already owned Spode china and took over Hammersley china in 1972, and then Royal Worcester in 1974. Spode and Royal Worcester merged to form a new company in July 1976 known as Royal Worcester Spode. Later pieces are marked Royal Worcester Spode Group, but production was undoubtedly still in Longton. From 1982, production of Palissy and Hammersley ranges was merged, until their final demise in 1988. Palissy was closed snd the pottery was sadly demolished in August of that year.

Aynsley China Ltd of Sutherland Road, Longton, Stoke-on-Trent, unconnected with Spode and Worcester, bought the trade name of Palissy in August 1989.

Spode has very little archive concerning Palissy which comprises only about half a dozen catalogues. One of their popular patterns “Woodland” is very similar to Palissy pattern “Game Birds”.

Bernard Palissy (c. 1510 – c. 1589) was a French Huguenot potter, hydraulics engineer and craftsman, famous for having struggled for sixteen years to imitate Chinese porcelain. He is best known for his so-called "rusticware", typically highly-decorated large oval platters featuring small animals in relief among vegetation, the animals apparently often being moulded from casts taken of dead specimens. It is often difficult to distinguish examples from Palissy's own workshop and those of a number of "followers" who rapidy adopted his style. Imitations and adaptations of his style continued to be made in France until roughly 1800, and then revived considerably in the 19th century.

In the 19th-century, Palissy's pottery became the inspiration for Mintons Ltd's Victorian majolica, which was exhibited at the London Great Exhibition of 1851 under the name "Palissy ware".

Palissy is known for his contributions to the natural sciences, and is famous for discovering principles of geology, hydrology and fossil formation. A Protestant, Palissy was imprisoned for his belief during the tumultuous French Wars of Religion and sentenced to death. He died of poor treatment in the Bastille in 1589.