Joseph Bonaparte's toiletry kit and leather case

Joseph Bonaparte's toiletry kit and leather case

Joseph Rodgers & Sons

Leather-covered toiletry case with silver plaque engraved "Legs du roi Joseph Napoleon a Adolph Mailliard." Hinged lid of case lined with red velvet contain 4 scissors (stamped Macdaniels, Oxford St.), nail file, 2 razors (stamped Joseph Rodgers & Sons, Liverpool), pocket knife, corkscrew, 2 button hooks (?); lower half of case lined with red leather and sub-divided to hold 6 glass jars with silver lids (engraved with crown and shield with eagle and several hallmarks), shaving brush; 2 ivory-handled toothbrushes, leather strop, and 2 indeterminate tools; hand mirror contained in removable velvet lined sleeve.

Leather case: 11.0" x 6.5" x 4.0"

Leather, metal, glass, fabric

Gift of the Anthropology Department, California Academy of Sciences, 2001. According to the California Academy of Sciences, “These items were donated to the Academy in 1961 by the descended family of Louis Mailliard, who according to family history, was Joseph Bonaparte’s son, born to one of Queen Julia’s ladies in waiting. Louis Mailliard later served as his father’s personal secretary and married Marguerite Redet, the daughter of one of Joseph Bonaparte’s equerries. Their only child, Adolph Mailliard, was born at ‘Point Breeze’ and later married Annie Ward of New York. The Bonaparte items passed through the Mailliard family were either given to Louis Mailliard by Joseph Bonaparte or were purchased by Adolph Mailliard at two estate sales following Joseph Bonaparte’s death.”

2001.M01.01

Early to mid-19th century