Tobacco pipe rim and bowl fragment with stamped "WM" with botanical inside half-circle.

This is a fragment of a white clay tobacco pipe, the bowl of which is stamped with the initials “WM” inside a cartouche. Smoking tobacco was an activity that permeated the lives of eighteenth century people. Individuals as diverse as planters and enslaved laborers, men and women, adults and children may all have used objects such as this pipe. Moreover, pipes would have been used while these individuals carried out a variety of activities, from relaxed socializing to laboring. Along with many of the other consumer goods of the eighteenth century American household, white clay pipes like this were primarily manufactured in Britain.

It is most likely the initials “WM” refer to the manufacturer of this pipe, given that the artifact was recovered from a deposit that dates to the third quarter of the eighteenth century. In that case, one possibility is that this pipe could be the product of a London area pipemaker named William Manby.

Pipes like these may have arrived at Mount Vernon through bulk purchases by George Washington, who placed at least two orders through his London merchant, Robert Cary, for pipes in 1762 and 1773. Noticeably, Cary acquired pipes to fill the 1762 order from an Edward Manby, of uncertain relationship to the previously pipemaker. Alternatively, such items were readily available for purchase from the local stores frequented by less affluent free, and some enslaved, individuals. Such pipes were fragile, but cheap in the eighteenth century. Their ubiquitous presence in everyday life, means that they are a common find on eighteenth century archaeological sites.