Large Bead Plane
Dateca.1780-1800
Maker
Charles Dupee Jr.
b. 1759
MediumFruitwood, iron, and steel
DimensionsLength: 10 3/8"; width: 1 7/8"
Credit LineGift of Thomas Elliott
Object number2024-271
DescriptionLarge bead plane with a molded shoulder and shallow flat chamfers that terminate with a line and turn-out. Front of quirk replaced, held by two nails.Label TextAs a child, Charles Dupee (formerly Dupuis), Jr. moved with his family from Walpole to Wrentham, Massachusetts. Charles Sr. was a housewright and a tavern keeper, and likely a planemaker too, in a town that had been established as a center of that industry by Francis Nicholson, his son John, and his manumitted former slave, Cesar Chelor.Charles Jr. would follow his father into the woodworking field, but not before the call to help defend his country came. On December 8, 1776, as a seventeen year old Fifer in Capt. Lemuel Kollock's Company of Col. Wheelock's Regiment, he marched from Wrentham to Warwick, Rhode Island. Late the next year, as a Fifer in Col. Hawes' Regiment, Dupee took part in a covert expedition, lasting thirty five days, where he was sworn to secrecy in writing.
A spectacular jointer, made either by Charles or his father as a personal tool, is known. Incised into an inlaid in pewter plaque, it carries the inscription; LIBER. I AM A GOOD AND WELL MADE PLAIN • CHARLES DUPEE IS MY MASTERS NAM[E] • HE IS THE MAN THAT FORMED ME • HIS FAITHFUL SERVANT I WILL BE • Feb. 27, 1787.Mark(s)CHARLES•DUPEE in relief within rectangle, is struck into the toe (Elliott, GAWP 5th ed., p.113, imprint B).ProvenanceAugust 2000, purchased by Thomas Elliott (Westbrook, CT); 2024, given to The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (Williamsburg, VA)
