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Pierre Platel

Youngest son of Jean Batiste Bertrand Platel du Plateau of Lille, born c. 1664. The family are traced back at Lille to Jean Platel du Plateau whose son Luc was 'very old' in 1550. Jean Batiste fled as refugee to Flanders in 1685 and Pierre and his brother Claude arrived in England in 1688 in the train of William III (Domestic State Papers). Appears as Petro Platel in the Denization List, 8 May 1697, with his brother Claudius, and the names of Lewis Cuny and John Chartier adjacent. Free by redemption by order of the Court of Alderman 14 June 1699. Mark entered as largeworker, 28 June 1699. Address: Pall Mall. Heal records him as plateworker, 'over against the Duke of Schomberg's in Pall Mall', 1699-1707; and 'The Lower end of Pall Mall at the Iron Rails, 1716. That these are seperate addresses is confirmed by the St.James's rate books in which Platel appears from 1699 till 1704 in Pall Mall North (South in 1702, presumably in error), and from 1716 - 18 in Pall Mall South (the books are missing in the intervening years). Married Elizabeth Peterson, aged sixteen (?), 16 April 1700 at St. James' Piccadilly, he described as 'above 32 years', silversmith of St.James's. Their son Peter was born 6 and baptized 19 September 1701 at St. James', and daughter Martha was born 4 and baptized 8 February 1703 at the same. Livery, 26 October 1708. He died and was buried at St. James's, Piccadilly, 21 May 1719, leaving no will, but administration of his estate was entered in the Principal Probate Registry, 2 June 1719. His son Peter (Queen's College, Cambrudge, B.A., 1726 and M.A. 1730) became vicar of Yeldham Magna, Essex in 1832, curate Chipping Barnet 1745-7, vicar of ashburton, Devon, 1749, and of Newport, Essex 1769, where he died. He appears as himself in Hogarth's engraving of the Sheriff's Banquet(plate 8 of the Idle and Industrious Apprentice).His great-great-great-grandson Francis Vittery Platel was born 1908. It is significant that some of Platel's most important pieces including the rare and jewel-like gold ewer and dish of 1701 belong either to the Bentinck or Cavendish families, so closely associated with William III. The items at Wellbeck are the toilet service of 1701 ( some pieces later by Clausen and Pyne) and a set of casters of 1709. Those at Chatsworth are the gold ewer and dish and cup and cover of 1717. A chocolate pot of 1702 and cup and cover of 1705 are in the Farrer Collection, Ashmolean Museum.