Sampler

Sampler

Honour Ann Pallett

1841

United Kingdom

Sampler made by Honour Ann Pallett in 1841.

Sampler completed by Honour Ann Pallett in October 1841, worked in silk threads on linen. The vast majority of the sampler is worked in cross stitches, with the exception of the sawtooth border above Honour Ann Pallett's name, which is worked in satin stitches. The sampler has a border of strawberries. At the top of the sampler is a verse which reads, 'Tell me ye knowing and discerning few/Where I may find a friend both firm and true/Who dare stand by me when in deep distress/And then his love and friendship most express'. This verse, a common one on samplers of this period, may first have been written by George Shelley and published in his book Sentences and Maxims Divine, Moral, and Historical, in Prose and Verse in 1712. Below the verse is a symmetrical arrangement of motifs, with crowns, flowers in and out of vases, diamonds, and hearts. At the centre of the sampler is a bird sat atop a flower that emerges from a decorative vase. At the bottom of the sampler is the maker's signature, which reads, 'Honour Ann Pallett October 1841'.

Honour Ann Pallett was born in 1830, making her 10 or 11 when she made her sampler. She was born in Hitchin, Hertfordshire to Mary Ann Pallett (nee Jordan) and George Pallett, a surveyor. By 1851, Honour was living with her eldest brother Edwin, a grocer, in Birmingham. In the 1861 census she is listed as a lady's maid in Hertfordshire, where she certainly used the needlework skills she learnt while making her sampler. In 1870 she married Robert House in Kensington. In the following year House is listed as a lodging house keeper in Cheltenham. Honour was buried in Cheltenham on 18 March 1896 and is listed as a boarding house proprietor.

width: 38cm
height: 40.5cm

linen
silk thread

Cross stitch 
Satin stitch 

Cross stitch 

crown
heart
bird
flower
basket of flowers
vase
strawberry

RSN.1467