Background
John Coney was born on January 05, 1655 in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. He was the first child of John Conney and Elizabeth Nash, the daughter of the butcher Robert Nash, who were married on June 20, 1654, in Boston.
John Coney was born on January 05, 1655 in Boston, Massachusetts, United States. He was the first child of John Conney and Elizabeth Nash, the daughter of the butcher Robert Nash, who were married on June 20, 1654, in Boston.
John Coney learned his trade from Jeremiah Dumber. His silver displayed fine workmanship and his house had a number of apprentices, among them Apollos Rivoire, lately arrived from France, David Jesse, and Thomas Millner. The remaining records of his life are few. He engraved the first plates for paper money issued by Massachusetts Colony. In 1677 he signed a petition with his fellow “Handycraftsmen, a very considerable part of the town of Boston, ” praying trade protection in their several callings “whose outward substance both depend on God’s blessings, and many of us not having estates any other way to advantage us. ”
In September 1689 he was one of the number of “Hogg-Reeves” of whom it was recorded in the proceedings of the Town Meeting: “Ordered, that ye Selectmen send for and quicken the Hogg-Reeves to the faithful discharge of their offices, which is of late much neglected. ” In 1666 he was one of twenty-six signers of a petition to the elected Government to “acknowledge the King’s authority. ” In 1693 he was one of the fourteen “Tythingmen” chosen to represent the fourteen militia companies.
Many examples of his work, including two sugar boxes and two chocolate pots, are in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Birmingham Museum of Art, and the Yale University Art Gallery.
Coney was a member of the Second Church of Boston.
Coney was married three times. His first wife, Sarah, died in 1694. Mary Atwater became his second wife. Later he married Charlotte M. Bayliss who died at the birth of their only child, Alice B. Congdon.