A pair of 6 1/4 inch coin silver sugar tongs by James Gaskins, Portsmouth and Norfolk, Virginia. Gaskins is sometimes listed as a Norfolk silversmith, but he was known to have worked in that town for less than two years, returning to Portsmouth, where he had worked as a silversmith perhaps as early as 1800 and continued there for about two decades. These tongs are of early form and should date to the early years of his work. They have good, heavy weight, and are in pristine condition. The maker's mark is the same as the #5 mark illustrated in Cutten's "Silversmiths of Virginia", and I believe that this is the least seen of all of his known marks.

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